About the Election
Barkan, Joanne
Joanne Bark In was embarrassed at first to admit how good I felt about the Democratic party convention; then I realized that the four evenings I spent in front of the tv were a training...
...I liked Mike Dukakis's speech, and I liked the way he delivered it...
...I liked having the rare opportunity to witness the greater good triumph over ego as when Dukakis and Jackson compromised enough to unify the party for the campaign...
...Sure, the tv producers packaged what I saw, and they made a point of lingering on those nonwhite and female faces...
...I liked seeing all the women and minority delegates...
...Sure, the egos are still there, and the unity could fall apart at any moment...
...I liked Jesse Jackson's speech...
...and I liked a lot of the images on screen...
...then I realized that the four evenings I spent in front of the tv were a training period—like an athlete's spring training for a new season...
...I felt moved...
...And finally, I liked seeing signs that a majoritarian coalition might be rebuilt...
...But in this case, winter had lasted eight years...
...But warming up in front of the tv in mid-July, I began to remember what it was like long, long ago, during the Carter years, when only half of what I read in the newspaper each day infuriated me...
...I felt hopeful...
...And if he's as stubborn as everyone says, maybe he won't back down when he's pushed from the right...
...Sure, it was the rhetoric we've come to expect, but I liked the positions he laid out, and I liked thinking of millions of black kids watching at that moment...
...And yet Dukakis took stands on domestic policy, Central America, and South Africa that were just fine...
...Sure, the coalition includes some distasteful partners, but if it holds together, a Dukakis presidency may enable the progressive component of the coalition to grow...
...But it was a successful effort to rise above faction hostility...
...But 49 percent of the delegates were women, and the minority presence was high...
...By the time this appears in Dissent, we're likely to be raging against the Democratic candidates and the party that produced them...
...Sure, the media and his staff had pumped up expectations for a truly miserable performance, so by comparison, what he did seemed terrific...
...Watching the tv, I exercised parts of me that hadn't been budged since 1980: I listened to politicians speak words I wanted to hear...
Vol. 35 • September 1988 • No. 4
