From: "Linda Muller"
Date sent: Mon, 15 May 2000
Subject: [BRIGADE] The Night Pat Buchanan Came to Dinner
Dear Brigade,
Read this excellent Field Report from Izzy Lyman!
GO PAT GO!!!
Linda
--------------
From: ILyman7449@aol.com
Date sent: Fri, 12 May 2000 17:03:27 EDT
Subject: RE: Field report from Izzy Lyman
To: linda@buchanan.org
The Night Pat Buchanan Came to Dinner
by Isabel Lyman
Remember Guess Who's Coming to Dinner? The 1960s comedy featured
a freespirited young woman who shocked her white, liberal parents by
returning home with a fiancee - a black doctor.
At the new millennium, the way to scandalize family and friends is not to
announce plans for an interracial marriage or even a gay civil union.
Try this: A freedom-loving, Ph.D.-toting, Hispanic woman, with a die-hard
Kennedy-worshipping, Democrat father and country-club Republican
neighbors, brings home a third-party presidential candidate who brags: "I
have never been afraid to speak my mind."
Hard to fathom? Well, that's what transpired when my husband and I
welcomed Reform Party presidential hopeful Patrick J. Buchanan and his
wife, Shelley, into our casa during his recent campaign swing through
central Oklahoma.
On the same Wednesday that Texas governor George W. Bush was
speaking to the party faithful in Washington, D.C. (schmoozing at a ritzy
gala that featured laser lights and a disco band), Pat was eating a plate
of grilled chicken on my scuffed kitchen table and chatting with my next-
door neighbor Kathy Costello, a homeschooling mother of five.
While Dubya was greeting guests clothed in black-tie and sequins, Pat
was shaking hands with ol' Charlie Meadows, an overall-wearing window
washer from Guthrie.
While Dubya was taking center stage promising to "restore civility and
respect" to national politics, Buchanan held court in my living room and
condemned Attorney General Janet Reno for "that raid in little Havana"
that he likened to the actions of communist tyrants.
While Dubya was cracking corny "no new tuxes" jokes, Pat sarcastically
noted that if Ohio's motto had been "If God is dead, all things are
permissible" (Friedrich Nietzsche) instead of "With God All Things Are
Possible," a Federal appellate court would not have declared it
unconstitutional.
While the Republicans raised over $21 million at the shindig in the
nation's capital, my forty guests and I collected, oh, about twelve
hundred bucks to donate to Pat's coffers.
In addition to the limitations of stumping for votes among the grass roots
in middle-America, Candidate Buchanan also has to face friendly cross
fire. Even fans are sometimes perplexed by the road less traveled he is
taking to the White House.
At my home in Edmond, he was asked the following: What's a patriot
like you doing with a Marxist like Lenora Fulani? Is it true that you said
you would appoint Teamster President James Hoffa to your cabinet?
And, just what would be your first act upon arriving at the Oval Office?
Pitchfork Pat's answers never disappoint. For it's his punchy, fun
speaking style that makes him not the dinner guest from hell, but the life
of the party. Buchanan isn't going to bore any audience with wonkish
discussions about health care reform, like Vice-president Al Gore does.
Nor will he pander to the soccer mom vote by promising that he will
"rescue children from failure," like Governor Bush does.
Instead, he patiently explained that Dr. Fulani, a leader in the Reform
Party, endorsed him. That, no, he never said he'd appoint Jimmy Hoffa to
the Cabinet, but that Hoffa sure would be a better fella to have
negotiating trade agreements with the Red Chinese than Charlene
Barshefsky, the current U.S. trade representative. And his first action
upon taking office? Tell Bill Clinton that he has the right to remain silent.
Loud applause followed each answer. The Buchanan Brigades are
reassured that the "old troll under the bridge" - as Pat calls himself - is
still a conservative of the heart, after all.
Indeed, Pat Buchanan has that Winston Churchill never-never-never-never-
give-in thing going for him. It's a quality that causes ivory tower elites to
verbally pummel him, yet ignites the grass roots support he needs.
As long as he continues to broadcast his America First message - and
hopefully the Commission on Presidential Debates will allow him to
participate in the debates this fall - he will reinvigorate his old base and
win new converts in the process. No doubt a scary scenario for those
who want him to remain as relevant as a silent film star.
Go, Pat, Go!
Isabel ("Izzy") Lyman, a free-lance journalist who writes about politics,
popular culture, and family life, lives in Edmond, Oklahoma.
Copyright 2000 Isabel Lyman
http://www.myrightstart
