Apr. 15, 1998
I do not want this citizen in a position of power. Suppose the House drafts a bill our new President doesn't like: "That's crazy!" he thunders. "You're all insane! Brain surgery for the lot of you!" Although brain surgery has its benefits (for example, Stone Phillips could have one installed), one of the rights not assigned to the goverment (and thus reverting to the people) is the right to decline invasive medical procedures. Isn't it?
Here's another guy that shouldn't run for office. Joe Rock Station DJ, casting around for callers, asked "What would you do if you were president?" Guy-who-should-not-run's platform: a) make Pamela Anderson submit to a full body-cavity search; b) make Chevy truck owners report to the local police.
This dude shouldn't even be voting. The Pammy issue is minor: you could probably give him an inflatable doll with no one the wiser. Bad taste is really no big deal. But what's up with this Chevy vs. Ford thing? Truck owners are watching too many of those "buy this and be a man" TV commercials: trucks ramble up and down piles of cinder blocks, splash through foot-deep streams, and tilt against each other like sumo wrestlers. Owning a Detroit truck is not an honor. If you announce to the world that you're a proud Ford owner, you're making a fool of yourself. All these trucks do is clutter the road, and 95% of the time, these big adventurers are commuting to their dead-end jobs, and their 8-foot beds are hauling a cubic yard or so of air.
Back to insanity claims. This is a popular ad hominem tactic: labeling your opponent racist, uninformed, mean-spirited, or insane, when you're losing the debate on the merit of your position. Other labels tossed about are "close-minded" (a neologism popular at Penn State circa 1986), "insensitive," "homophobic" and so on. You begin to recognize when further discussion seems less and less fruitful. Interstate 394 in Minnesota has a "Sane Lane" for buses and carpools, separate from the insane general-purpose lanes, where drivers are talking to the Earth Mother and impaling their children on garden implements. In Rhode Island, residents were blocking the widening of US 44 with little campaign posters on lawns: "Two Lanes / Safe and Sane." Doubtless the traffic engineers now gibber madly at each other, stare moodily out safety-glass windows into the institution courtyard, and draw Jackson Pollockian pictures with black and red crayons.
