Wedge issues may play big role

It seems that the Democrats now have a nominee apparent. There’s already a “short-list” of possible running-mates. Former Florida Governor and Senator Bob Grahm is someone who could bring vindication for the 2000 election if he can deliver his home state.

Missouri Congressman Richard Gephart would appeal to old-style blue-collar Democrats.

I think that retired General Wesley Clark could bring broad appeal to moderate and socially conservative swing votes since he opposes gay marriage and abortion. He’d also supply extra oomf to the Kerry challenge to President Bush’s Defense policies.

There is even buzz that Kerry might consider New York Senator Hillary Clinton. Many people think she’d rather run for President on her own sometime in the next couple of decades.

The most likely choice, of course is North Carolina Senator John Edwards.

I think that a more exciting question is, what will the issues be in the fall? Well, it would be nice if they’d be things like civil rights, defense, environment and energy, health care, homeland security, foreign policy, education, deficits and balanced budgets. Fat chance.

Expect President Bush to bring out two big wedges and a red herring. Tax reform is a perennial Republican attention diverter (red herring), sure we need it, but to Bush it means more supply-side tax cuts for corporations and the top 2% of super wealthy Americans.

Then there are the “wedge” issues. Abortion and gay-marriage. They’re called wedges because they divide us. In stead of agreeing to disagree and live together or agreeing to hash it out until we come to a consensus or till one side compromises, wedge issues inflame passions and get people so worked up that they can’t think about anything else. Divide and conquer, just as good a political strategy as it is a military strategy.

Personally, I think that they’re both way to messy and way to personal for the Federal Government to mess with. You’d think that a true conservative who professes to less intrusive big-government would agree with me, but not Bush and the Religious Right. That’s ironic since these are both issues to truly be decided in the Bible, the Church and the heart, not with secular legislation.

You could call me socially conservative in so far as oppose both abortion and gay marriage, but the problem is, that much like the reconstruction of Iraq, I believe that the real battle is in people’s heart’s and minds.

I admit it, it pains and embarrasses me that Democrats keep a pro-choice plank in their party platform. The problem, as a matter of fact, is with Roe v. Wade. I think that the Supreme Court was really stretching to interpret the Constitution to include a right to abortion. Even is you squeeze the 4th, 9th, and 14th Amendments enough to say that the Constitution protects a “right to privacy,” what does that have to do with a human being, the baby? My point is, this is an issue for the Sates or Congress to hash out, not for the Court to have decided.

If only it was as simple as it should be. There are complications like rape, incest, and mortality of the mother. There are theological, ethical, and biological disagreements about the definition of a human life and when exactly it begins. Unfortunately, these are issues that there may never be concessions on. Congress and the FCC can’t even settle on a clear definition for decency and indecency on TV and radio, how can we hope that we’ll all agree on abortion as a nation?

It may be about to get worse. The newest issue- that could well become a wedge issue is human cloning. Last week South Korean scientists announced that they had successfully cloned a human being. They say that it is for harvesting stem cells for research and tissue production-not for reproduction.

There’s the wedge. Devout Mormon, Republican Senator Orin Hatch of Utah is a staunch opponent of abortion, but he is an adamant proponent of stem-cell research. Stem cells, taken from human embryos (babies) are thought to hold the keys to treating or curing such debilitating diseases as Parkinson’s and Alzheimer’s.

Some people believe that cloning for the sake of producing stem cells should be permitted for the sake of genetic therapy, organ replacement, and research. Of course the embryos created are terminated so that they don’t go on to develop into full grown adults. So the question is, is that a form of abortion? Are clones human? Are they human lives? Do they have souls? Do they have rights?

I may not think that Abortion is a privacy issue, but don’t think that privacy won’t also be an issue between cell phones, e-mail, surveillance cameras, and National security. Big brother is here and we may need a Constitutional amendment providing the right to privacy before amendments on abortion or gay marriage get fought about.

Is gay marriage wrong? I for one can’t get passed that the Bible calls homosexuality a sin, but so is drunkenness and gluttony. Jesus said that if you so much as look at a woman lustfully, you’ve committed adultery. In His time that meant you were sentenced to being stoned to death. He said that if you hate someone it’s the same as committing murder. So being gay is wrong, but so is hating gays.

We’re stuck aren’t we? That’s why wedge issues are so effective in forcing would be moderates and progressives over the fence to the radically conservative side. It’s more comfortable.

The 14th Amendment does promise “equal protection under the law.” Does that mean that a monogamous gay partner should be allowed to visit their partner in the hospital or be covered by their partner’s insurance? I don’t know for sure, but it does make us straights look stupid for trying so hard to protect the sanctity of marriage when heterosexual celeb-bratt-ties have their Vegas marriages annulled after 24 hour because they were drunk.

One thing for sure, this doesn’t seem to be an issue that’s going to fade away.

Then, there’s still war. Americans die every day in Iraq. Iraq had nothing to do with Al Queda and there’s no proof of any weapons of mass destruction. Former Bush administration officials say that he talked about invading Iraq as soon as he got into office and began implementing plans to do so within a week of September 11.

Then there is the mother-of-all-wedge-issues rearing its ugly head again. In 1971 a Viet Nam veteran, with Silver and Bronze Stars and three Purple Hearts sat before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee to oppose the Vietnam War and asked the Senators something very controversial.

Commander John Kerry asked them, “How do you ask a man to be the last man to die for a mistake?”

No military man or woman’s service to their country should ever be devalued, their lives and sacrifice is truly honorable and sacred- and I don’t think that Commander Kerry meant to say they died in vain. I believe that he questioned the policies and decisions of Presidents Johnson (a Democrat) and Nixon (a Republican) just as people today question Bush’s policy of “preemptive unilateralist.”

Carter served in the cold war on the first nuclear submarine. Ronald Reagan played a soldier frequently in Hollywood Movies. Bush Sr. served in WWII. Clinton got a deferment for college because he was accepted to be a Rhodes Scholar at Oxford University in England (like West Point grad Wes Clark), of course he took a lot of heat from Republicans because he participated in protests against Vietnam.

Bush Jr. is thought to have joined the Air National Guard to avoid being drafted and sent to Vietnam, where men like Bob Kerry, John McCain, and John Kerry suffered and sacrificed.

I have two uncles who are great friends, but Vietnam is something they both choose not to talk about. One was a medic, another fled to Canada. Almost forty years later, it’s a wedge issue that still divides families, and divides America.

What we must learn to do is to agree to disagree. Wedge issues will always divide us, but they need not destroy us. Like it or not, compromise is an integral part of our democracy. As foul as they often are to endure unresolved or un-vanquished, these differences should be the price we pay for our unity and freedom, not the levers we use to wrest power from our political opponents.