
          Building On Fire
          By Derian, PatriciaPatricia Derian
          Vol. 5, No. 3, 1983, p. 3
          
          All the groaning that the presidential campaign has begun too early
is surprising. It seems to me that it isn't coming a minute too
soon. The questions to be decided in 1984 go to the heart of what kind
of nation we want to be.
          It is no news that the initiatives of the Reagan administration
have raised questions, quite deliberately, about the intent of the
national will. Every administration does this to some extent in the
manner of refurbishing a room or two.
          This time, however, the chief executive is pacing through the halls
putting the torch to one room after another.
          By election day we will have seen so much: the Fourth Amendment
assaulted; bad appointments weakening civil_rights and affirmative
action; worker safety and environmental protection flying out the
door; aid to the poor, the handicapped, aged and the sick given
grudgingly; jobs disappearing; incomprehensible economic and foreign
policies; class differences and conflicts rising with the smoke.
          On November 6, 1984, we'll have another chance to say what we do
expect. And because the damage is so extensive we need to be equipped
to say what we want and know what we are getting. That's why we should
welcome the early advent of the presidential campaign. It is the right
forum for the national debate on how we will live in this country and
it needs the extra time.
          Why? Because 1984 belongs to the professionals. In that year all
efforts will be directed toward delegate gathering until the national
conventions choose the party nominees. Delegate gathering is flat-out
voter courtship and bending over backwards is the preferred
method. Little is seen of the real men, their ideas or vision. Those
who win the parties' nominations levitate to the thin air inhabited by
The Candidates, becoming public men programmed to win first and think
later. They react to the polls (a modified position is taken), to the
publicity firm (a blue suit is chosen), to the campaign managers
(Nevada drops off the schedule), to fatigue (a dirty word is spoken in
anger). All of that may be somehow instructive, but it is not what
we're after.
          This year is ours. Here is Askew or Cranston or Glenn or Hart or
Mondale in our kitchen, board room, union hall, school, or here he
would be if we asked. This is not a paid commercial rehearsed
twenty-seven times, this is the living person. While he can be
expected to try to tell us what someone in the campaign office has
told him we want to hear, this is our chance to demand more.
          Has he noticed the condition of the burning house?
          What is gone that he thinks we can do without? What must be
replaced? How do we replace it? We're going to have to go room by room
with each man to determine what he'd do if he were president. And
we're going to have to know why he's making the choices he offers,
what the principles are which underlie them. The time and place for us
to find out are in the long campaign.
          
            Patricia Derian is a past president of the Southern
Regional Council.
          
        
