August 20, 2004
In my last column, I introduced the topic of the role the presidential children are playing in their fathers’ campaigns. As this has relevance to the decisions that 18-30 year old voters will make this fall, it deserves to be fully explored.
To introduce the players: Jenna and Barbara Bush are both 22 years old. Jenna recently graduated from the University of Texas at Austin and Barbara from a little known New Haven school called Yale (safety school). On Team Kerry we have, Alexandra, 30, and Vanessa, 27. Vanessa is a third-year medical student at Harvard (go Harvard), and Alexandra just finished film school.
They have all recently put their careers on hold to stump for their old men. Alexandra and Vanessa Kerry were featured speakers on the last night of the DNC to introduce their father, and I listened closely to what they had to say.
During the DNC, I was frequently asked what role celebrities play in politics, and if their work is effective. My answer centered on the concept that when celebrities speak out for a specific party or candidate, it probably doesn’t, and shouldn’t, affect the voting behavior of the general public. Celebrities’ opinions are no more valid than anyone else’s.
Celebrities can use their platform, though, to push non-partisan ideas or concepts, if only to get people to think about them. Instead of using their popularity to get across their own opinion, they are using their platform to endorse a social good. From the Jerry Lewis telethon to Michael J. Fox’s work with Parkinson’s, it’s proven to be a successful strategy.
From that perspective, I believe the campaigns have rendered the candidates’ children ineffective in reaching their peers by choosing to have them be solely cheerleaders.
To side with one’s parents doesn’t tell us anything about the worthiness of the message. You don’t have to be a sociology major (like me) to realize that most people gravitate toward the same religions and political parties as their parents, because those world views are instilled in them at a young age.
Considering all the things the children could say, how legitimate is the message, “my dad is the best?” I guess if we see that a candidate’s children are well adjusted, then the candidate must be a good father; hence all the discussion from the Kerry girls in their DNC speeches about hamsters and science projects. Their participation in the campaign to date is a play to older voters, with strategists figuring the kids’ participation gives their candidate a softer, family values based image.
The Bush and Kerry daughters, to date, offer no new meaningful information to their peers. The Bush twins wrote in an online chat, “Like most kids, we do not agree with our parents on every single issue.” Great! What? “One opinion that we do share is that our father is the perfect person to be the President of the United States.” I don’t care!! What do you know?
The campaigns seem to be choosing to let a valuable opportunity pass. Hell, I’ll take it up a notch. By not allowing the Bush and Kerry kids to champion solutions to issues relevant to the rest of us 18 to 30-year-olds, the campaigns are letting a ground ball slide through their legs and risk losing the big one.
How great would it be if they allowed Jenna, Barbara, Alexandra and Vanessa to push solutions to the issues that are important for the rest of us, like better public education or access to health insurance? All the information is already there, provided by their fathers, in their responses to The 18-30 VIP. Let your best messengers deliver the message.
On Monday Night RAW, Chris “Harvard” Nowinski is the product of an elite, private education, completely out of touch with the needs of the common man.
He could never understand what it is like to be Malia Lazu. She told me during the DNC, “We have to talk about how you provide services without raising taxes. If you’re spending $30,000 a year on prisoners and $3,000 on students, then you can just sit by, decriminalize marijuana, have a lot less people in jail give money to needy kids. I was born in 1977. What really hurt me growing up? It wasn’t drugs. It was the horrible public education I got along the way. I could tell I was behind the kids who went to good schools by the time I got to college. I had never had a geography lesson.”
Three of the four campaigning kids are Ivy League grads. They all have dough. Do they know what it’s like to be forced to get on the trapeze without a net? Do they know what it’s like to pray you don’t get sick because it will bankrupt you? Do they know what it’s like to join the reserves to help pay for college and end up half way across the world fighting for your life? Maybe, not personally, but I wonder if they know people who face these challenges. If they do, what do they think about these situations or what can be done to make life better for their peers? Right now, I haven’t a clue. Let us know!
That’s what we worry about with the candidates – that they can’t see the world through our eyes. Partisan bickering makes us not want to vote. Political pandering makes us not want to vote. Certain messages and mediums make us not want to get in the political game.
Note to campaigns: Let Vanessa, Alexandra, Barbara and Jenna talk to the issues that their peers and I assume they care about. These are young, articulate, bright, successful women who know how to party (an important credibility builder).
Before we give up on them completely, I did read about one ray of hope. Apparently Vanessa Kerry went on the record recently as being in favor of gay marriage, a position that her father has not taken. Whether you agree with her or not, her voice just became more legitimate. Maybe there is hope after all.
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