MISSOURI WATCH: IN DEFENSE OF RESPONSIBLE PASSION ABOUT POLITICS

A recent letter from a reader in outstate Missouri produced this sentence: "I love it when you get mad and blast those (blankety-blanks) in Jefferson City."

I appreciate the kind words, and I must confess that I enjoy a degree of anger myself now and then. It's like that good old southern custom of serving a little sorbet before the meal to cleanse the palate. Anger cleanses most political subjects these days, there being such a surplus of events to condemn in our modern world.

But lately I've been having second thoughts about all the political anger that's being retailed, often wholesaled, in today's marketplace. It's difficult to find a columnist who isn't steaming about something or someone, this being the popular journalistic mode today. Of course, anger isn't something new on the American political scene, and we can go back to the days of Washington and Jefferson to find it in abundance. Our third President was a favorite subject of angry journalists, a more vulnerable target because of certain personal habits that raised disturbing moral questions. Jefferson eventually came to hate the press, after earlier defending it, perhaps too grandly.

If you're looking for anger in the media, it isn't hard to find. It has become so pervasive that it's difficult to find a columnist, a television commentator or a talk show host who isn't raving about the alleged stupidity or moral turpitude of the "enemy." It has become so ubiquitous that most of these people are starting to resemble those pitifully comic professional wrestlers, who appear to be the forerunners of what often passes as political dialogue in today's times.

It's fun to rave, and I discovered quite by accident, that when I'm writing about something that is terribly disturbing, I can knock off a column in less than half the time needed for one that is more subdued---and more thoughtful. I even have the satisfaction of knowing that many of my readers will nod in angry agreement and perhaps show it to a friend.

The problem with many political disagreements is that more time and effort are spent in rebutting arguments than offering anything new on the subject. It is one thing to argue that Jefferson City should not be wasting money on frivolous projects but still another to suggest ways in which the state can meet its responsibilities and still maintain an acceptable tax base. Increasingly, political dialogue revolves not around issues and policies but around personalities, people who are high profiled by virtue of the jobs they hold or seek.

Several years ago, I attacked on several occasions the present speaker of the state House of Representatives, who quite naturally resented my attacks and began issuing press releases that were nearly as vitriolic as mine had become. In the middle of this process, Rep. Griffin began undertaking several projects that, I was forced to admit, were worthwhile and beneficial to the state as a whole. Over a period of time, I recognized that everything the Cameron Democrat did wasn't wrong and that in all fairness, he deserved the same kind of objectivity that at one time was a hallmark of political commentary. Subsequent columns about the Speaker required much more time and effort, but they were more accurate and less flavored with venom. Since then I have cautioned against finding him guilty of crimes until proved so, the same view I took during the trying days of former Attorney General Bill Webster. I've never had to eat my words about either of these men, and at least they have had, and deserved, all the objectivity I had.

The value of angry denunciations must be weighed against the damage they cause. Anger without policy resolution may entertain the reader but it doesn't serve the public. It only reaffirms the public paranoia about persons in power, whether their names are Clinton, Gingrich, Carnahan or Richardson.

It doesn't take a journalist to point out that abuses occurred when a group of state legislators attended a conference in California. Corrections are made when, after bills are mailed to offending lawmakers, procedural changes for junkets are suggested and demanded. The public is able to tell there have been violations; it needs to know what can be done to stop them.

Solving untold serious problems, both in our own state and the nation, requires not those who can shout the loudest but those willing to offer rational, reasonable and responsible answers. As Justice Holmes so cogently suggested, the freedom of speech does not extend to the person who yells "Fire!" in a theater. Irresponsible passion is simply irresponsible.

~Jack Stapleton of Kennett is the editor of the Missouri News and Editorial Service.