Voters want to send Frank Capra’s Mr. Smith to Washington to wade into the muck of politics and rescue us from … government? Liberals? Whatever the foe, the voters don’t care. Only a political neophyte can save us.
So many voters are embracing the candidate who boasts “I’m not a politician. I’ve never held office.” Only in Hollywood, though, have Mr. Smiths wrought wonders. In government, the politicians – those who made deals, brokered compromises, fine-tuned proposals, all while listening to constituents – are the agents of change.
Lyndon Johnson was the dealmaker’s dealmaker. Historians describe his powerful rule over the Senate as he bartered favors. We credit him with pushing through civil rights legislation. On the health front, he pushed through Medicare. John F. Kennedy proposed national health insurance for the elderly and the disabled; LBJ navigated it through Congress.
Say “Richard Nixon,” and the Rorschach elicits a slew of yucks. The illegal craftiness of Watergate’s dirty tricks brought him down. But this politician pushed for food stamps, a program that ended the atrocious malnutrition that had plagued swathes of the population for decades. Originally Richard Nixon envisioned a national welfare program, run by the federal government, administered by the states. That did not pass, and today welfare remains a state program. But food stamps became a model of help, thanks to a crafty pol.
As any first-timer will admit, it is easy to campaign against a veteran politician. The politician has a flawed track record: anybody who makes decisions will make some boners. But the politician is adept at negotiating and crafting compromises that get things done, the things that often make the difference in our lives. •
Joan Retsinas is the managing editor of Medicine & Health/Rhode Island, a monthly journal of the Rhode Island Medical Society.
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