The Nation's Pulse/Semper Fidelis
McGurn, William
the Washington Post which declared Dole persona grata. In a front-page piece, columnist Haynes Johnson asked, "Who is this wave-maker, this instantly recognizable figure the fickle ptpulace of...
...To begin a fascinating odyssey into that wonderful world of words, send 50 ~ in stamps for brochure to LOGOPHILIA UNLIMITED, Box 11344-A, Palo Alto CA 94306...
...With passage of the big tax increase bill that bears his name, an act that goes against all the election-year instincts of the political animals of Washington and runs against the strongest ideological currents of his own party, Dole fully emerges as a major national leader, and one being praised for his moderation and fairness and bipartisan statesmanship," Johnson wrote...
...There will always be levelers in any democratic society, and such attacks prove little more than that "there is an ideal to tear down, whether it be of an elite university or of an elite fighting force...
...Send in $15 to stop it...
...It's for those who read and hke to understand what they read and for those who wish to add precision and eloquence to their speech and writings...
...Hawkins, the Carlson Raiders, etc.mbut it is through the memories and anecdotes of the common grunt that the Marine Corps soul is revealed...
...Get that?Dole, once an untrustworthy conservative hitman, is now talking "with candor...
...Mother surreptitiously THESAURUS AT PLAY r i l e LAST WORD IN WORD GAMES William McGurn, assistant managing "editor of The American Spectator, was born at Camp Pendleton but never served there...
...There are people wtto say that the Marine ideal, like our old crimson sweatshirts, has faded, that the Corps is an anachronism--an argument almost as old as the Marines -themselves_9 Much of this criticism reflects the larger post-Vietnam denigration of the military vocation, the ideal of the soldier class...
...Sometimes it is noted Ben J. Wattenberg is a senior fellow at the American Enterprise Institute...
...So much praise has come Dole's way not only for seeing the virtues of cutting back the horrendous federal budget deficit, but for'putting through some tax reforms that for years had been high on Democratic tax-reformers' lists, that he is just a bit embarrassed...
...But they knowwho they are: United States Marines...
...Why, and with exquisite irony, the lion of the moment is none other than yesterday's fall guy, Bob Dole of Kansas...
...As children of a former Marne officer, we had been raised in the lore of that fighting branch...
...perhaps that is why this century has had the two most inhumane wars ever known...
...Do you think that the folks who are against, abortion are assailing civil liberties and want to put Ronald Reagan in your bedroom...
...Now, direct mail is not popular these days...
...Perhaps too thisexplains the periodic at~tempts to banish the Corps, or to assimilate it into a purely ornamental and colorful anomaly of one of the other military branchesmonly let us keep the band...
...This article is adapted from Mr...
...But even~in this growing-andchanging-ands-feeling era, all is not lost...
...we played Marines...
...Do you think the nuclear-arms race is madness...
...Yet this elite force doubtless is among America's most egalitarian of institutions in terms of the people it accepts: Many Marine recruits do not it's sophisticated...
...According to Plato, this class was charged with carrying out the policies of the rulers, as well as defending the Republic from external attack...
...that direct mail is the vehicle by which something terrible called the "single issue" tactic is~allowed to undermine all t h a t is noble in America...
...We were thus under: standably ecstatic when one evening Dad brought home three bright crimson sweatshirts, each emblazoned with the Marine Corps globe, eagle, and fouled anchor over the chest...
...We progressives instinctively recoil at any aspect of war...
...Send $15...
...We choose not to admit that there is cruelty in the world...
...The Marines thus have a marked tendency to reflect Bedford StuyveTHE &MERICAN SPECTATOR NOVEMBER 1982 23 sant and the Chicago's South Side more than Scarsdale and Harvard Square...
...For $100,000 a year, a little organization with passionate beliefs can employ three or four young activists, provide them with logistical support, put out newsletters and public!ty releases, hold press conferences, and gain a toehold on the political map...
...He puffed up his chesL *narrowed his eyes, and pointed his spatula at me, all sternness...
...As Aristotle further noted, the ideal is just that: a balance seldom'struck in an imperfect world...
...The Marines' Hymn M any years ago, when little boys could still play soldier without arousing the suspicions of child psychologists, my two brothers and I would spend countless afternoons conducting mock wars in our backyard -battlefields...
...It is almost as though the country cannot countenance a group of men who know their job, do it welt, .and have no illusions about themselves...
...Maybe the Marines are anachronisms, holdovers from a more self-assured time...
...Glory, however, was shortlived...
...t hear you were a Marine," I said, in what I thought Was a complimentary tone of Voice...
...Two weeks l a t e r , Hobart Rowen, the Post's economics columnist, reported that Dole was a tad red-faced about all the praise...
...Of course, the "progressive" forces used direct mail to finance other" single issues"-to stop the war, to halt racism, to assail male chauvinist pigs, to promote consumerism, to enshrine Ralph Nader, 24 THE AMERICAN SPECTATOR NOVEMBER 1982...
...One summer evening, upon discovering that my college roommate's father was a Marine veteran of Korea, I went up to him as he whs grilling hamburgers, in'tent on some small talk...
...began its "Dirty Dozen" campaign...
...Even then, we knew...
...Now, all is forgiven...
...Nowhere is this self-knoWledge more apparent than in the shared conception of Marines and former Marines the world over...
...Lewis "Chesty" Puller,' for example, a genuine~ Old Corps leatherneck, was once asked during his long years as a bachelor why he had not married...
...Send in $15 to make it happen...
...Dole's chagrin may have been intensified by Rowen's valentine...
...Not so long ago, Dole wore the goat horns, historic in cast and heavy in weight...
...he snapped...
...JUNK MAIL DEMOCRACY by Ben J. Wattenberg I t has been noted by political analyst Richard Scammon that America has Contributed two valuable, and original, ideas to the practice of democracy: the primary election and the public-opinion poll...
...As the most visiblemand successful--incarnation ofthis ideal, the Marine Corps has borne more than its share of the criticism...
...Of coiarse, much of the money to defeat the Dirties was raised by direct mail prepared by computers...
...That negative campaign was targeted to defeat politicians whom the organization thought not properly proenvironmental...
...Whatever the past, the hardworking Dole does in fact evoke a new image," Rowen wrote...
...In a front-page piece, columnist Haynes Johnson asked, "Who is this wave-maker, this instantly recognizable figure the fickle ptpulace of Washington treats as the latest emerging political star...
...To reporters at breakfast, he talked with candor about the need for 'fairness and equity' in the tax system...
...For many of these recruits, the Marine Corps tradition is likely the only one to which they'll ever attach themselves...
...Whether the money is used as a campaign contribution to an on-the-fence politician or to hit-list an adversary or to lobby and publicize a particular set of views, a budget with a comparatively few dollars buys a lot of stroke...
...All the legends are there ~ Capt...
...Do you think it's madness to let the Soviets have more and better missiles than we have...
...It was his snarling, slashing, unfair, ideological gutfighter's campaign style as Gerald Ford's running mate in 1976 that caused the GOP to lose the White House...
...tossed the shirts into the wash while we were asleep, and the bright colors bled...
...Histories attempting to capture such a feeling almost always fall flat, for the Corps in its pure earthiness transcends the written word...
...Send $15 to halt it...
...No one who has been involved in national politics can fail to understand just how powerful a small amount o f money can be...
...The oldest fighting force in the country, indeed almost a year older than the United States itself, the Marine Corps has had a stormy history, with their fiercest adversaries often found, not on the fields of battle, but in the legislative chambers and committee rooms of government...
...Each virtue, as Aristotle noted, has its corresponding vices at two extremes, and the ,~varrior virtue of courage is a delicate balance between cowardice at one end and recklessness at the other...
...Not only were our prized sweatshirts reduced to pink caricatures of their former selves, but the.male members of the family were also saddled with pink underwear for the next six months...
...The other boys in the neighborhood, many of whose fathers had served in World War II or Korea, would come over to play with us...
...Courage, naturally, was the especial virtue of this class_9 In trying to develop and foster this manly virtue, the military establishment has been attacked for breeding unfeeling and inhuman warmongers...
...For a solid week we wore these sweatshirts as uniforms, proudly, defiantly, fearlessly, rolling down dirt mountains and storming monkeybar fortresses...
...I am a Marine...
...If the Marine Corps Wanted me to have a wife," he answered, " t h e y would have issued me one...
...Open the envelope'and inside--why, inside is a dream...
...They are selling us dreams...
...By then, some pundits may indeed have rendered a favorable verdict...
...Wattenberg~'s bi-monthly United Feature Syndicate column...
...Like a priest, a Marine is forever...
...He is, the pundits already are saying, a potential president_9 This appeared four days after the tax hike had been passed...
...For unlike our great modern Rationalists, these potential Marines implicitly accept the failure of reality to live up to the ideal--without becoming cynical about the ideal...
...Almost defiantly, Marine Corps recruiting stations report increases ~n volunteers each time John Wayne's The Sands o f lwo Jima is rerun on television...
...Do you think that abortion is murder and ought to be outlawed...
...But think for a moment..What are they actually doing, these purveyors of direct-mail single-issue computer-produced junk mail...
...by William McGurn even have a high-school diploma_9 A fair number are dead-end kids who, given the option of boot camp or prison, have chosen the former and found some pride and self-respect in the dress blues of the Corps...
...the Marines were not just another branch of the service, they were t h e b e s t , the essence of the soldierly ideal...
...What do you mean 'were a Marine...
...Waterloo may indeed have been won on the playing fields of Eton, but Belleau Wood and Guadalcanal are examples of lessons learned at Parris Island and Camp Lejeune, where the technical ability to fight has always been girded with an understanding of the Corps' role in history: SemperFidelis, always faithful...
...But" in SemperFi, Mac, an oral history of the Marines in World War H just released by Arbor House ($15.9S), author Henry Berry allows these vets their reminiscences...
...There was, though, a slight difference: They played soldiers...
...With this understanding, rooted in an indelible esprit de corps, comes a perfectly natural cocksuredness, an attitude that outsiders-find either charming or infuriating...
...Let me add a third: direct mail...
...Sometimes it is called "junk mail...
...Sometimes it is noted that nasty machines called computers actively produce the direct mail that allows single-issue groups to .erode all that is noble in America...
...He was tagged with being the architect of Republican defeat...
...Ironically enough, in recent times it was the environmentalists who most flashily introduced and refined the "singleissue hit l i s t . " Back in 1970, Environmental Action Inc...
...United States Marine Corps celebrates its 207th birthday, dating back to its founding by the Second Continental Congress in Philadelphia's Tun Tavern...
...The potency of small amounts of money has been apparent at just about every spot on the political spectrum...
...And the most important aspect of political direct mail is that the political dreams so often come true, for the dreams are about power...
...SEMPER FIDELIS _9 l f the Army and the Navy, Ever gaze on Heaven's scene, They will find the streets are guarded by The United States Marines...
...On November 10, the...
Vol. 15 • November 1982 • No. 11
