Word: mcgoverns
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...DIFFICULT to see why so many students support Senator McGovern. Clearly his ideological stances oscillate about a point somewhere to the left of President Nixon. But the difference may be exaggerated, and outright Marxists are generally lukewarm about McGovern for just this reason. It is rather students at the leftward border of the establishment who wear McGovern buttons and, echoing the artful words of their champion, indignantly charge that the present administration is "the most immoral and corrupt" in our history. Still, vague general sentiments aside, one wonders which of his specific positions are so attractive...
...McGovern has called for various domestic reforms: he would change laws on taxes, estates, corporations, amnesty, abortion, and marijuana. But properly to call a proposal for change a reform presumes several conditions. There must be a deficiency in the present situation requiring a change. The proposed change must eliminate or Finally, the change must accomplish its purpose without introducing new harms. If, for instance, someone proposed to alter the U.S. government by installing a dictator, few would agree to call this change a reform. McGovern's so-called reform proposals must be carefully examined...
Unfortunately, McGovern's suggestions are so indefinite and fickle that this project is impracticable. Aside from his plan to reduce defence expenditures, not one of his important proposals has survived popular criticism. His ideas on amenity, abortion, and marijuams have been hushed up. The dramatic increased in the inheritance tax, first to 100 per cent and then to 77 per cent, have been abandoned. Even his infamous welfare scheme is a casualty of the campaign trail. McGovern's waffting showed itself most clearly in the Eagleton affair, leading to quips about his 1000 per cent support of the U.S. Constitution...
...Recently McGovern has talked about his own proposals less and Nixon's supposed corruption more, a prudent change in light of the polls. But the Watergate incident, the ITT case, and the grain deal (even presuming, as is commonplace nowadays, that these are as sinister as the Democrats charge) are not the stuff of a winning campaign. Nor are McGovern's charges that Nixon is our trickiest President particularly damning...
Every administration has had scandals--the recent cases of Bobby Baker, Walter Jenkins, and Billy Sol Estes come to mind. It is safe to predict that a McGovern Administration would have a few embarrassments in its wake as well. Not that scandals are morally defendable, but experience suggests that they are politically inevitable. Old-fashioned graft at least distributes its burdens more equitably and less destructively than certain majoritarian programs which are quite legal and above-board...