AN UNFORTUNATE HYPOCRISY

We Allow Our Intellectuals A Flexibility That We Deny Our Politicians.

A MAJORITY OF AMERICANS want George W. Bush and Al Gore to come clean about
their past drug use. An even larger majority think that such information is
not pertinent to the candidates' suitability for the presidency and should
not disqualify them. As both Bush and Gore continue to withhold information
regarding this particular recreational activity, the issue is finally waning
as a topic of conversation among pundits and voters.

The vagueness of their answers aside, both men have exercised sensible,
mature judgment by disregarding the issue in an attempt to downplay its
importance. In the wake of a Clinton presidency tarnished by allegations of
one personal scandal after another, the American people, the campaigns, and
the true professionals in the press want to focus this presidential race on
issues rather than the candidates' personal lives. That's why most agree
that we should cast this question into the sea of irrelevant issues, where
wardrobe deconstruction and college grades already float around. Hopefully,
we are now ready for more substantive discussions. Health care proposals,
education initiatives, and plans for the budget surplus might not be as
exciting, but these debates are the ones that affect people's lives and make
politics meaningful.

However, before we close the book on the drug question, in the spirit of
mind-expanding exercises, let's take a completely new look at what else this
is about. Aside from whether or not we should be delving into candidates'
personal lives, there is an entirely different conversation that needs to be
held. The way we view our politicians' past drug use points to a fascinating
but troublesome commentary. Drug use exemplifies how we perceive our
intellectuals differently from how we perceive our politicians, supposedly a
subset of the intelligentsia.

Some of the most brilliant, creative, talented, and influential thinkers,
artists, and inventors that ever lived experimented with drugs. Most truly
bright people are by nature introspective, experimental, and philosophical.
Great thinkers and pioneers challenge conventional beliefs and ways of
thinking by discovering the capabilities and limits of the mind. Such people
often flirt with drug use at some point in their lives, and some even
embrace it. In academia, drug use is not stigmatized like it is in politics.
Rather, it is generally accepted. Among artists of all sorts, drug use is
often viewed as a facilitator of creative expression. A few intellectual and
creative heavyweights who used drugs in recent history: Sigmund Freud, Carl
Sagan, Steve Jobs, John Coltrane, Allen Ginsberg, the Beatles, Jean Paul
Sartre, Samuel Taylor Coleridge, Jack Kerouac, Richard Branson. The list
goes on and on.

This phenomenon by no means justifies drug use and does not speak to the
morality of using illegal drugs. Nor is the relationship causal: not all
intellectuals use drugs, and certainly not all people who use drugs are
brilliant. That said, we grant a significant amount of flexibility to most
of our intellectuals when it comes to drugs, but we treat our politicians
quite differently. It's fine if your favorite philosopher, jazz musician, or
author has a history of drug use. But your presidential candidate? That
doesn't fly? Politicians are public figures who create and debate laws and
are held to a higher personal standard. Parents understandably want their
children to be able to look up to our leaders as role models. Perhaps,
though, the more important lesson for our young people is that they can
respect and appreciate someone's achievements and contributions to society
without necessarily endorsing or adopting that person's particular lifestyle
or habits.

Maybe we really don't want any innovative, radical thinkers in politics and
we're content with the stagnant system we have today in which the two major
parties have practically converged. However, if we want to attract society's
most imaginative people to the political scene, we must first reconsider how
open-minded we are willing to be about drug use. Many gifted, off-beat
thinkers steer clear of politics not because of the personal scrutiny but
because the uninteresting, shallow manner in which the game is played. But,
unless we cultivate a less intrusive, more tolerant atmosphere when it comes
to our politicians' private lives, our smartest folk will opt to pursue
careers in fields where they can truly be themselves and not have to march
to anyone's drummer but their own. It seems that we are moving in the right
direction, but we have a long way to go.

Index for the Harvard Political Review's series:

"Smoke and Mirrors - America's Drug War"

The Thirty Years' War - (Part 1 of a 10 part series)
http://www.mapinc.org/drugnews/v00/n1084/a03.html

Editorial: From The Editor - (Part 2 of a 10 part series)
http://www.mapinc.org/drugnews/v00/n1084/a02.html

The Experts Speak Out - (Part 3 of a 10 part series)
http://www.mapinc.org/drugnews/v00/n1084/a05.html

Keep It Real - (Part 4 of a 10 part series)
http://www.mapinc.org/drugnews/v00/n1084/a04.html

The Colombian Conundrum - (Part 5 of a 10 part series)
http://www.mapinc.org/drugnews/v00/n1084/a06.html

Demystifying the Dutch - (Part 6 of a 10 part series)
http://www.mapinc.org/drugnews/v00/n1085/a03.html

Paralyzed by Politics - (Part 7 of a 10 part series)
http://www.mapinc.org/drugnews/v00/n1085/a01.html

An Unfortunate Hypocrisy - (Part 8 of a 10 part series)
http://www.mapinc.org/drugnews/v00/n1085/a02.html

Throwing Away the Key - (Part 9 of a 10 part series)
http://www.mapinc.org/drugnews/v00/n1085/a04.html

Beyond Good and Evil - (Part 10 of a 10 part series)
http://www.mapinc.org/drugnews/v00/n1085/a05.html