John Whitehead's Commentary
It's Time to Look at the Real Issues in the Campaign
Now that George W. Bush has picked his running mate, an announcement from Al Gore cannot be far behind. With both sides acting as if the election has already been won, it only seems natural to wonder what the candidates will talk about until the November election.
If revised agendas for the Republican and Democratic Conventions don't soon surface, I have a few suggestions. For starters, there's the death penalty.
Looking back at the execution of Karla Faye Tucker, the Texas death row inmate killed by lethal injection on February 3, 1998, I wonder what happened to the national dialogue that accompanied her death.
We seem to have forgotten that one in seven people who are sent to death row in our nation are later proved innocent. With some 3,000 people currently on death row, this means that approximately 430 people are facing executions for crimes they probably did not commit.
In addition, racial and geographic bias in the death penalty remains a stark and compelling reason to reconsider this entire process. President Clinton, for example, recently postponed the first federal execution in 40 years until the government can get a handle on the problem.
In Philadelphia, the city hosting the Republican Convention, black activist and author Mumia Abu-Jamal sits on death row after being convicted of killing a Philadelphia police officer in 1981, almost twenty years ago. Abu-Jamal has, in essence, come to represent all that's racially wrong with death penalty laws.
Then there's the problem of police brutality, an issue that is one of the most racially divisive in our nation today. Credible evidence suggests that most of the victims of police abuse are racial minorities, especially African Americans and those of Latin American or Asian descent.
Although the ubiquitous video camera continues to make it harder to sweep police atrocities under the national rug, it doesn't seem that enough real progress is being made in ending or punishing the mistreatment of suspects, deaths in custody and unjustified shootings. Real corrective leadership on this issue would undoubtedly do a lot to move our country toward racial harmony.
On the health care front, women (especially older women), minorities, poor people and immigrants still don't have access to the kind of health care available to others. Serious improvements are required in the areas of preventive health care and medicine, in addition to critical care.
With infectious and communicable diseases relatively under control, these groups are increasingly left behind in the treatment of maladies such as heart disease, cancer and cerebrovascular problems. Overall, medical care has failed to keep pace with the changing cultural and language needs of our increasingly diverse society.
Moreover, it would be helpful if there could be a discussion on health care that avoided being compromised by underlying economic philosophies, a discussion that included ideas of justice, compassion and love. If we could figure out what's "right," we could surely figure out how to pay for it.
Ending the violence in our public schools must not become a forgotten priority. Our school children should be as safe and secure as we are where we work and play. Pouring more federal money into our schools is obviously not the answer. Neither is improved security, profiling or enforcement of oppressive zero tolerance policies. Maybe it has more to do with community support for working parents, quality childcare and better attention to the health of our families in general.
I remember the nightmarish scenes on the streets outside the Democratic Convention in 1968. Many of our nation's most idealistic young people were beaten senseless and arrested for protesting the Vietnam War. Or perhaps they were really beaten because they protested the refusal of the Convention's power brokers to listen to--and really hear--their grievances.
Now that we--the young people of 1968--are inside, I hope that we do not repeat the mistakes. More important things are going on in the streets than inside the convention buildings. And it's time to listen and act.
If revised agendas for the Republican and Democratic Conventions don't soon surface, I have a few suggestions. For starters, there's the death penalty.
Looking back at the execution of Karla Faye Tucker, the Texas death row inmate killed by lethal injection on February 3, 1998, I wonder what happened to the national dialogue that accompanied her death.
We seem to have forgotten that one in seven people who are sent to death row in our nation are later proved innocent. With some 3,000 people currently on death row, this means that approximately 430 people are facing executions for crimes they probably did not commit.
In addition, racial and geographic bias in the death penalty remains a stark and compelling reason to reconsider this entire process. President Clinton, for example, recently postponed the first federal execution in 40 years until the government can get a handle on the problem.
In Philadelphia, the city hosting the Republican Convention, black activist and author Mumia Abu-Jamal sits on death row after being convicted of killing a Philadelphia police officer in 1981, almost twenty years ago. Abu-Jamal has, in essence, come to represent all that's racially wrong with death penalty laws.
Then there's the problem of police brutality, an issue that is one of the most racially divisive in our nation today. Credible evidence suggests that most of the victims of police abuse are racial minorities, especially African Americans and those of Latin American or Asian descent.
Although the ubiquitous video camera continues to make it harder to sweep police atrocities under the national rug, it doesn't seem that enough real progress is being made in ending or punishing the mistreatment of suspects, deaths in custody and unjustified shootings. Real corrective leadership on this issue would undoubtedly do a lot to move our country toward racial harmony.
On the health care front, women (especially older women), minorities, poor people and immigrants still don't have access to the kind of health care available to others. Serious improvements are required in the areas of preventive health care and medicine, in addition to critical care.
With infectious and communicable diseases relatively under control, these groups are increasingly left behind in the treatment of maladies such as heart disease, cancer and cerebrovascular problems. Overall, medical care has failed to keep pace with the changing cultural and language needs of our increasingly diverse society.
Moreover, it would be helpful if there could be a discussion on health care that avoided being compromised by underlying economic philosophies, a discussion that included ideas of justice, compassion and love. If we could figure out what's "right," we could surely figure out how to pay for it.
Ending the violence in our public schools must not become a forgotten priority. Our school children should be as safe and secure as we are where we work and play. Pouring more federal money into our schools is obviously not the answer. Neither is improved security, profiling or enforcement of oppressive zero tolerance policies. Maybe it has more to do with community support for working parents, quality childcare and better attention to the health of our families in general.
I remember the nightmarish scenes on the streets outside the Democratic Convention in 1968. Many of our nation's most idealistic young people were beaten senseless and arrested for protesting the Vietnam War. Or perhaps they were really beaten because they protested the refusal of the Convention's power brokers to listen to--and really hear--their grievances.
Now that we--the young people of 1968--are inside, I hope that we do not repeat the mistakes. More important things are going on in the streets than inside the convention buildings. And it's time to listen and act.
ABOUT JOHN W. WHITEHEAD
Constitutional attorney and author John W. Whitehead is founder and president of The Rutherford Institute. His most recent books are the best-selling Battlefield America: The War on the American People, the award-winning A Government of Wolves: The Emerging American Police State, and a debut dystopian fiction novel, The Erik Blair Diaries. Whitehead can be contacted at staff@rutherford.org. Nisha Whitehead is the Executive Director of The Rutherford Institute. Information about The Rutherford Institute is available at www.rutherford.org.
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