{"id":115,"date":"2004-08-05T16:54:02","date_gmt":"2004-08-05T21:54:02","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/rezio.net\/woa\/?p=115"},"modified":"2004-08-05T16:54:02","modified_gmt":"2004-08-05T21:54:02","slug":"why-in-the-world-did-cheneys-speech-require-loyalty-oath","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/rezio.net\/woa\/?p=115","title":{"rendered":"Why in the world did Cheney’s speech require loyalty oath?"},"content":{"rendered":"

\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0P<\/strong>residential candidate John Kerry delivered a speech in Albuquerque in July. He was greeted by throngs of enthusiastic supporters and a number of detractors.
\n\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0 U<\/strong>nobserved at first, anti-Kerry members of the crowd began clacking their sandals together, over their heads. The sound of the flip-flops was emblematic of the protesters’ opinion that Kerry \u00e2\u20ac\u0153flip-flops” on issues, in particular first voting to send troops to Iraq, then opposing it. Facing crowd of detractors as well as supporters is the price public figures have to pay.<\/p>\n


\n\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0 R<\/strong>egrettable as it is, politicians can’t dictate the tenor of the moment; it’s lamentable that one can’t predict whether the gathering will be peaceful or disruptive.
\n\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0 E<\/strong>xperts agree that appearances in public by politicians need to be regarded with caution. Because of many unknown factors in what is shaping up to be an extremely volatile campaign, virtually every partisan speech is going to be attended by protesters as well as supporters.
\n\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0 P<\/strong>olitically speaking, nothing seemed out of the ordinary when Vice President Dick Cheney agreed to an engagement at Rio Rancho’s Mid-High School last Saturday to fire up his supporters. It’s standard practice to issue tickets to those wishing to attend the speech, due to limited seating. However, organizers of Cheney’s appearance added a new twist: In order to attend the speech, people who aren’t verified George W. Bush supporters needed to sign a kind of loyalty oath.
\n\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0 A<\/strong>rriving at the Bush-Cheney office to pick up their free tickets, members of the public learned of the catch: those who were not certifiably Bush-Cheney supporters needed to sign a form endorsing Bush for reelection. The bottom of the form contained a statement that signers consented to the use and release of their names as endorsers of Bush.
\n\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0 R<\/strong>ather than risk signing an endorsement, which they believed, was simply wrong, a number of people walked out without tickets.
\n\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0 A<\/strong>nyone can almost understand the reluctance of the organizers, the Albuquerque Bush-Cheney Victory Office, to allow non-Cheney supporters to crash the party. We say \u00e2\u20ac\u0153almost” because such logic is flawed:
\n\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0
\n\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0 N<\/strong>ot only is Cheney the Republican incumbent, he is the vice president for ALL the U.S., not simply members of his fan club and contributors;
\n\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0
\n\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0 O<\/strong>ther, non-Republican members of the public, can rightfully question the thinking behind the organizers of the speech. Since Cheney’s speech, delivered in a taxpayer-funded public school, was designed to bolster his and Bush’s chances for reelection, the rally, cleansed of any constituents save Bush-Cheney supporters, amounts to \u00e2\u20ac\u0153preaching to the choir.” GOP supporters already plan to cast their ballot for the incumbents; the \u00e2\u20ac\u0153pledge of allegiance” therefore makes the opportunity to convert others to his side appear unlikely;
\n\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0
\n\u00c2\u00a0I<\/strong>ntroducing the \u00e2\u20ac\u0153pledge” only after ticket-seekers have arrived at the office smacks of deceit and mistrust;
\n\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0
\n\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0 A<\/strong>nd quite venomous is the proviso that the names of the people who signed the pledge, for whatever reason, may be used against them. If, for example, someone who attended the speech later wrote a letter to the editor critical of Cheney, it would be a simple matter for Cheney apologists to write back, \u00e2\u20ac\u0153But that person who now criticizes the current administration even signed a pledge of allegiance for Bush. Oh my! See how he flip-flops!”
\n\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0
\n\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0 C<\/strong>utting off a large portion of the electorate in order to avoid the possibility of any disturbance, or the asking of tough Haliburton-related questions, is deceitful, self-serving and unfair.
\n\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0 H<\/strong>umorist Jay Leno recently quipped on The Tonight Show that Cheney had issued a statement to the effect that Kerry and running mate John Edwards \u00e2\u20ac\u0153are out of touch with main-stream Americans.” Added Leno, \u00e2\u20ac\u0153Cheney made the statement from a \u00e2\u20ac\u02dcsecure and undisclosed\u00e2\u20ac\u2122 location.”
\n\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0 E<\/strong>xclusive appearances of this type by the vice president, in a venue cleansed of all traces of dissent, speaks more volumes about the incumbent himself than of those with differing points of view who might or might not attempt to interrupt Cheney’s speech. Even swing voters may have been deterred.
\n\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0 N<\/strong>ear the end of his speech, delivered in a hot and stuffy gymnasium, amid chants of \u00e2\u20ac\u0153Four more years!” Cheney said, \u00e2\u20ac\u0153I really like this crowd.”
\n\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0 E<\/strong>ffectively orchestrating the speech-rally to include only a homogenized constituency may have done wonders to stroke the ego of a man in need of such a boost. But it’s a small wonder that he declared an affinity to his admirers–as they were virtually handpicked.
\n\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0 Y<\/strong>et, such a deliberate exclusion of citizens of different political and philosophical persuasions makes us wonder what could possibly have impelled Cheney to accept and even participate in such a choreographed event. What reason would he have? The answer may be more obvious than we realize.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0Presidential candidate John Kerry delivered a speech in Albuquerque in July. He was greeted by throngs of enthusiastic supporters and a number of detractors. \u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0 Unobserved at first, anti-Kerry members of the crowd began clacking their sandals together, over their heads. The sound of the flip-flops was emblematic of the protesters’ opinion that Kerry \u00e2\u20ac\u0153flip-flops” […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[2],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/rezio.net\/woa\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/115"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/rezio.net\/woa\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/rezio.net\/woa\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/rezio.net\/woa\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/rezio.net\/woa\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=115"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/rezio.net\/woa\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/115\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/rezio.net\/woa\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=115"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/rezio.net\/woa\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=115"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/rezio.net\/woa\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=115"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}