[CrackMonkey] Politics

[Nick Moffitt]

For most of us, politics is an impossible toy that bears neither logic
nor reason.  I always felt that one of the virtues of democracy is
that the fools and charlatans will be elected to public office--and,
because they can be bought or sold like fish, will leave the rest of
us alone.  the only times our country is in danger--true danger--is
when some idealist finds himself in a position of power.  Because they
nurse beautiful ideals to their ambitious breasts--they will sacrifice
you and me to those ideals without a qualm.  More wars sprouted in
this country during times of saints than fools--Lincoln, Wilson,
Roosevelt (the younger), and Kennedy managed to spill more blood,
between them, than any Eisenhower of Harding or Tyler.

I mean the virtue of American democracy is that it fosters healthy
mediocrity--and when a saint comes along to upset the balance, then we
are in trouble.  Since Grant got in power by fudging, indecision, and
thievery--then his administration was marked by those
characteristics--and we weren't called to unite under some foolish
banner (marked "Excelsior") and fight for his ideals.  Who could go to
war for a thief, anyway.

My only chance to experiment with people's democracy came during the
summer of 1968.  My boarding house--the Jean-Paul Sartre Memorial No
Exit Rooming House--was losing a bucket of money.  I figured it was
the manager's fault.  He figured it was my fault.  I figured that the
best way out was to get him a job somewhere else--a job in which he
wouldn't have t work, would draw a comfortable salary, and we could
get together once a year and tell old drinking-stories about his
ruinous regime as head of the rooming house.

We signed him up to run in the primary for Washington State Land
Commissioner.  The Apocrypha (probably made up by me) was that when we
were driving down to Olympia during sign-up week, I asked Richard what
he wanted to run for, he said "State Coroner."  I pointed out that
there was no State Coroner--so we settled on Land Commissioner.

That was it.  Richard A.C. Greene appeared on the ballot on the 11th
of September and--against a field of four other hapless candidates,
and with no campaigning at all--won by 15,000 votes.  I figured it had
something to do with his name.  He figured that the word of his
gracious personality had gotten around through some mystical
underground.  Neither of us knew what to do next.  He was in Hawaii at
the time (he had got an appointment in Classics at the University of
Hawaii on the 1st of September).  What does a Land Commissioner do,
anyway?

I called Richard to tell him that he had won the Republican
nomination.  There was a long pause.  He said that he was flattered,
but in order to avoid injective "personalities" into the campaign, he
would stay in Hawaii.  I agreed to form a campaign committee to do the
dirty work for him.  I thought of the best talent to utilize for a man
who--after all--is to take care of the dirt problem in the state, and
called on Jon Gallant, a geneticist at the University of Washington,
Gene Johnston, and old newspaper writer and commentator on KRAB, and
herb Hannum, the only mystical architect I've ever met or heard of.
Between the four of us, we fabricated a campaign.

We had seven weeks in which to get our candidate's name in front of
the public.  Since we weren't about to spend the $100,000 necessary to
win public office, we decided on press releases--some whiff of
freshness, as compared to all the gunk sent out by other uh . . . REAL
candidates.

Our first press release went as follows: 

	Richard A.C. Greene, Republican candidate for Land
	Commissioner, fired his opening salvo in what promises to be a
	ferocious campaign, demanding that the state of Idaho annex a
	large part of Eastern Washington, especially Spokane.

	"The so-called Inland Empire is a trackless waste contributing
	nothing to the Evergreen State but rattlesnakes and nitwits,"
	Greene thundered from his headquarters in Honolulu. "I'd offer
	that sandpile to Idaho and if they didn't accept it, I'd
	invade.  It's high time Washington had a foreign policy
	anyway."

	Greene, who knocked off four opponents in the G.O.P. primary
	with the ingenious strategy of leaving the country, levels no
	criticism at Democrat incumbent Bert Cole, who has no
	noticeable foreign policy.  "Cole is simply too good a man for
	this job," opined Greene. "I'd like to see him move on to
	something more challenging."

I took this release to a print shop, had two hundred copies made up,
and sent them to every major radio station, television station,
newspaper, and press service in the state--with a couple of extras to
some national magazines.  Not only was it printed entire in most
newspapers, but the AP picked it up, and I had the funny experience of
trailing across the radio band at noontime hearing almost every radio
station intoning the exact words of the release.

One of the things we figured out at this time was that the
media--rather, the reporters and writers who work in what we call the
media--are so bored by the usual election trash that litters their
desks that they are willing to open, read, and write about any
campaign that shows some life.  For that reason, we figured that we
could--in each of the six weeks remaining in the campaign--issue one
release, or create some diversion--which should get Greene's name
around the state, and perhaps around the country.

Our next challenge was the voters' pamphlet.  Like most states in the
West, Washington issues a booklet which lists the platforms of every
candidate for every office--at minimal cost to the candidate.  The
circulation of this booklet is 1,200,000.  I think it cost us $200 to
put the platform into the pamphlet.  this is what we used (Jon
Gallant's handiwork):

		PLATFORM
	
	LAND USE: Land should be used gently but firmly.
	WHIDBEY ISLAND: Whidbey island must be replaced.
	PUGET SOUND BRIDGE: If it becomes necessary to build a bridge
		across Puget Sound, it should be a covered bridge
		because of the rain.
	STATE PARKS: There should be an expanded system to place park
		lands within easy reach of every citizen.  For the
		citizens of King County, I envision a wilderness area
		on the site of The Boeing Company.
	QUILCENE OYSTERS: Baked at high heat with a little chive,
		parsley, garlic, and wine.
	LITTERING: A litterbag at Bert Cole's private hunting lodge.
	EMPLOYMENT PRACTICES: Elimination of all catchpolls and
		tipstaffs.
	INDIAN FISHING RIGHTS: Individual catches will be limited to 
		four Indians.  All those under five feet two inches
		must be thrown back.
	GEODUCKS: A Republican Land Commissioner to back up Governor
		Evans.
	IF ELECTED: I shall be the sort of Land Commissioner who will
		go out fearlessly and commission the land.

We tried to get the Voters' Pamphlet people to let us use a picture of
Francis X. Bushman, posing as Richard Coeur de Lion, but the stodgy
committee assured us that a picture taken within the last two years
was necessary.  This also eliminated our other idea of using a baby
picture: Greene from twenty-five years ago, stretched out barebottom
on a bear rug, or something like that.

No campaign is complete without a press conference and a rally.  We
determined to hold our press conference--not at the Olympic Hotel or
at some fancy restaurant--but rather at the Blue Moon Tavern--which
has been the hang-out for all the University of Washington radicals
and dissidents for the last forty years.  Gallant, Johnston, Hannum
and I appeared promptly at two o'clock and found three television
stations, four or five newspapers, and a national press service in
attendance, plus about thirty bleary-eyed regulars.

Johnston answered the first question about Greene's political roots by
pointing out that his Republican leanings "go back to Millard Fillmore
by way of Rutherford B. Hayes."  Gallant said that Greene was with us
in spirit if not in body, and indeed, insisted on being Captain of the
team.  "In fact," he said, "he insists on being addressed as Captain
Greene at all times.  He's his own man," he concluded, " unless anyone
else will have him."

Johnston said that Greene was challenging incumbent Bert Cole to a
wrestling match over Eastern Washington--and went on to state that
Greene would welcome Cole in television debate--in Hawaii.  Hannum
gave an extemporaneous speech on "Can the grass roots be greener, can
the forests ever be truly virgin?"  He contended that there was no end
of misunderstanding about Greene's form of Republicanism--which was
NOT "temperate Republicanism" and most especially not "tempered
Republicanism"--but rather "temporary Republicanism."

How would the candidate win, asked one reporter.  On his record, said
Gallant.  What's that, asked another reporter.  Two arrests, no
convictions, said Johnston.

Between this monumental press conference, and the giant rally--Greene
extruded himself into the campaign.  Spiro Agnew, then running for
Vice President, appeared in Hawaii for a brief round, and somehow,
Greene wrangled a picture-taking session with him.  What we got in the
mail was an extremely fuzzy picture of Greene in his mustache shaking
hands with what looked to be Spiro.  The only clear image in the
photograph was a smiling oriental-looking gentleman in the background.

I called Richard and asked him why the hell he sent us such a lousy
picture.  He explained that the photographer was an amateur from the
University who was nervous enough anyway, but was rendered damn near
paroxysmic by the secret service.  Seems the SS didn't trust amateur
photographers to be merely that--and while the camera was trained on
Agnew, one of them held a pistol (cocked, loaded) at the poor
photographer's head.

In any event, we had a picture--and Gene wrote up the following
caption to go with it:

			NICE TO MEET YOU, MR. UH
	One of these jolly men is Washington's Republican candidate for
	Land Commissioner, Richard A. C. Greene.  The other is Spiro
	Agnew, GOP Vice-Presidential hopeful.  Greene is probably the
	one behind the moustache, though Agnew--fresh from his 'fat
	Jap' mot--may have borrowed it for the nonce. The setting is
	Honolulu, Greene's fall campaign headquarters.  The others in
	the picture are not identified--although the gentleman smiling
	in the rear may or may not be a secret serviceman from Tokyo.


	*	*	*	*

The Woodland Park Zoo in Seattle was given, sometime in the 1920's,
and bandstand.  Forty-five years later, it looks garish and bleak.
This was the setting for our grand rally.  Johnston, when he began his
speech, said "Welcome to the Warren G. Harding Memorial Bandstand and
storage area," for indeed, in the base of it, chairs tables, and
presumably old animals are kept out of the way.

Apparently Harding, when he was still in form, made an appearance in
Seattle sometime in 1925.  Boy Scouts all over the country contributed
pennies for this structure, so besides steps, platform, and plaques of
Harding, there are two shiny statues of Boy Scouts, dressed in the
1925 Boy Scout style.

Once again the press was in full attendance.  As well, there was the
Great Excelsior Jazz Band (Dixieland) which played songs made up for
the occasion including "What Does a Land Commissioner Do?" and "When
Richard Greene Walks Down The Street (You know there's a man, can't be
beat.)"

Each of us gave a speech, of sorts.  Gary Maragason gave a speech on
Greene's character.  Byron Coney gave one on Richard Greene's mother
("she made all this possible").  Johnston explicated at length on
comparisons between Harding, the Harding cabinet of thieves, Greene,
and the rest of us.  I think he billed me as Andrew Mellon.  I gave
one on the boys downstate who were fighting against Greene's own
personal initiative ("You'll have to write it in on the ballot: it
calls for the amalgamation of Forks, Wa., and Pysht, Wa., into the
single great city of Pysht-Forks").

Jon gallant gave a long speech on Richard Greene's genes--concluding
that they were superior to the incumbent's.  And Herb Hannum gave an
indescribable speech which rendered him hoarse for a week.  I'm going
to put out a record of the whole affair, so you can hear it for
yourself.

The nicest thing about the Greene rally was that it was the final
sequence in a truly silly campaign.  I think they call it "peaking"
among the professionals.  It gave us a chance to watch the media--to
see ourselves on television, watch the distortion process of news.
Time magazine came and did an article on the campaign which reassured
me, once again, that they can get the facts wrong and--with little
effort--kill the humor in any humorous enterprise.  One of the local
newspapers came out editorially against the candidate, suggesting that
the joke was going too far.  On the plus side, the Wall Street Journal
did a front page article written by one of their reporters, Thomas B.
Carter.  It was a superb reporting job: as funny as the campaign
itself: intelligent, witty, and (as with all the Wall Street Journal
articles) extraordinarily well researched.  Look it up.

A lot of other things happened, but I can't remember them all now.  I
wish I could.  Jon and I both tried to write up a story for a national
magazine shortly after it was over--but, as he said, "It's like trying
to eat a good meal twice."  It simply wouldn't come.  I kept all the
clippings--but like all clippings, they begin to yellow and moulder,
and soon enough the whole thing will be so distorted in our minds that
we'll be arguing over the flimsy details of who said what, wrote what,
and did what.

There are a couple of things I shan't forget, though--that's why I'm
writing them down now.  One is election night.  We took a room in the
Olympic Hotel just down the hall from the suite of Governor Dan Evans.
When one of his aides confidentially told us that the Governor had
given his vote to Greene we thought for one terrible minute that our
man might win.  God, we thought: what will we do then?

But even the joke, the laugh, was a little weak when Greene lost by
800,000 votes.  We had thought--maybe, hadn't we?--that the voters
would be as amused as we were.  That's what we thought.  Wrong: they
take their votes seriously.  Sometimes, I guess, too seriously.

And most of all, I remember one other speech.  A local
clean-government group had called me up a week before election day,
and had asked me (cum Greene) to write up a talk for them.

I had some inklings of the defeat that was coming up.  After all, the
campaign (on which we spent about $5,000) was more of a victory over
the media than anything else.  We had gotten the reporters, the press
people--both nationally and locally--to take the joke, and carry it as
far as they could.  They did: they enjoyed it as much as we did; saw
it as a mockery of the usual bullshit that comes out of political
campaigns, and--for that reason--maybe a healthy thing.

But in the speech I wrote for CHECC, I was able to go somewhere that I
couldn't during the whole campaign: that is, to say something serious
about something that had been so silly for so long.  perhaps that is
why it remains as my favorite memento mori of this whole mess.

	DEAR FRIENDS AT CHECC:  Richard A. C. Greene here -- speaking
	to you from fall campaign headquarters in Honolulu.  On the
	eve of my success at the polls, I salute you.  Though I may be
	sunburned and windswept, though the constant sunshine of my
	days may tend to distract me from the hard work of running for
	public office--still, I often think of you there in Seattle:
	clouds gathered overhead, skins pasty and mole-like, the grey
	winds of the north leaning down to chill the bone and darken
	the soul.  I think that: and my soft political heart goes out
	to you.

	Three days from now, the voters of Washington State will go
	into the sanctified hole we call the voting booth to decide on
	the many grave candidates and issues.  There's not only Nixon
	and Muskie and O'Connell and Pelly and Greene.  As well, there
	are all those intellectual decisions: the voters will be asked
	to be international economists on Initiative 32; they will be
	asked to be credit experts on Initiative 245; they will be
	asked to be scientific toxologists on Initiative 242.

	In Washington State--unlike many states on the east coast--we
	show profound belief in the judgement of the voter: a belief
	which I am delighted to confirm.  After all, they chose me
	from among four candidates--sensing, somehow, my ability and
	intelligence even though I waged what might be called a
	Sitz-Kampaign.  As I stated after the primary election: "My
	faith in the integrity and wisdom of Mr. and Mrs. Average
	Washington Voter has been confirmed forever."  And I thought
	to myself--as Pyrrhus did in 280 B.C.: "Another victory like
	this, and we are done for."

	You at CHECC have your own crises, your own Czech crises--and
	it has nothing to do with the Russians.  It has to do with
	that sometimes sad, sometimes laughable, sometimes whimsical
	phenomena we call the American Voter.  I claim the problem
	with the American Voter today is that he feels that he is
	being turned into a whore.  He knows that he is bought and
	sold in huge blocks on television.  he knows that candidates
	for public office get enormous quantities of money from some
	mysterious money-bag to but--not radio time or television
	time--but PEOPLE: he knows that he, the voter, is being traded
	in what (I think) they call it cost-per-thousand.  He has been
	bought like a prostitute: and, worst of all, doesn't even know
	who's buying him.

	I once propounded the notion that not only is it dangerous to
	buy and sell voters--but it is even more dangerous to spend
	our time trying to get them into the voting booth.  You know
	what I'm talking about: this: "Vote as you please, but please
	vote."  Somehow we have the misguided idea that quantity is
	important to democracy.

	I disagree--I have always preferred quality.  And I think the
	voters who have to be dragged from the offices, pulled from
	their beds, yanked from their TV sets to get them to vote:
	those are the wrong ones to be in the booth.  If their
	motivation is so lousy, their knowledge of the candidates and
	issues must be equally lousy: I'd just as soon see them stay
	in bed on election day.

	Sometimes I think about that 15,000 vote plurality I received
	in the primary campaign for state land commissioner.  This
	plurality--mind you--came not from King Country, where I was
	living, where I lost; no, this surge of voter interest came
	from every county EXCEPT King County.  Since my primary
	campaigning consisted of me sitting in the Jean-Paul Sartre
	Memorial No Exit Rooming House, or teaching classes at the
	University of Washington--we can hardly say that the voters
	outside King County had some special insight into my wit and
	ability.

	See what I tell you: Richard A. C. Greene became Republican
	nominee for the office of Washington State Land Commissioner
	not because of his pretty smile, or because of his knowledge
	of Greek and Latin--but because all these people thought it
	their DUTY to vote.  They didn't give a damn, really: I know,
	because that's why they got in the booth and fumbled around
	with all those unfamiliar names and finally said: "Land
	Commissioner.  Hm.  Greene.  That sounds nice."  They had been
	brainwashed by the thought of green lands, rolling on forever.
	Tricky business--these campaigns.

	Well: I'm too far away for that now.  Let's leave all these
	sophist questions about The Issues and The Voters to some
	boorish graduate student at the University.  that's what they
	are paid for--isn't it: those meaningless, tedious
	examinations for Truth.

	For me, Truth lies on warm beaches.  Like the good
	Existentialist candidate that I am, I shall repair to the
	waters of the Pacific on my new air-mattress which is a
	friendly companion indeed.  Filled with a lot of hot air,
	perhaps, but the kind of hot air I value and enjoy.

	As for you, there at CHECC: I send you my love.  From Hawaii I
	greet you.  Long may we wave.
						November, 1968




				Excerpted from Lorenzo Milam's book
				"The Merkin Papers", used without
				permission, etc.  Most of the typos
				are probably his and not mine.



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