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Show ___Ali The Salt Lake Tribune OPINION Saturday, August3,1996 Liberals Subvert Religious Conservatives CAL THOMAS vocacy” for certain candidates and therefore should have been Jackson ran for president, he openly collected funds for his reported as “in kind” contribu- campaign in black Baptist and tions to those candidates oras in- Artistic Mexican Thinker Challenges U.S. Racism other churches in what appeared to be a flagrantviolation of IRS and FEC rules. No action was tak- ROBERTO RODRGUEZ PATRISIA GONZALES en against him.Liberal clergy and LOS ANGELES TIMES SYNDICATE help George Bush, Sen. Jesse Helms (Re N.C.) and Oliver North's failed Vir; ite race also amounted to illegal corporate contributions. The are by candidates on issues of impor- WASHINGTON — The surprise in the Federal Election Commission (FEC) lawsuit against the Christian Coalition for allegedlycrossing theline dividing voter education from political partisanshipis not thesuit itself — but thatit has taken so long. Since religious conservatives became active in politics in the late 1970s, manyliberal coalitions have been looking for ways to intimidate those conservatives and invalidate their full participation in the political process, which liberals apparently believe oughtto be reserved exclusively for them- selves. The FEC objects to the “score- ecards” the Christian coalition distributes, saying they “express ad- to the Christian Coalition. They include not only predictable ones, such as abortion and gay rights, but also economic ones, such as a balanced budget, welfare and national defense. Republicans and Democrats are questioned and their agmses ir non-responses) are duly printed. Noneof the scorecards I've seew endorses or opposes any candidate. te Christian Coalition spokesman MikeRussell called the lawsuit “a completely baseless and legally threadbare attempt by a reckless federal agency to silence people of faith and deny them their First AmendmentRights.” Notexactly. oesome people of faith. When the Rev. their churches and denominations have for years been involved in lobbying for and againstlegislation while enjoying special status underthe tax code. TheInterfaith Alliance, founded to combatthe so-called “Christian right,” is heavily subsidized by Democratic money. It’s holding a “prayer vigil” the day be- fore the Republican convention opens in San Diego. The ae is advertised as ‘“‘nonpartisai the samebilling used by the Christian Coalition. The Christian Coalition has invited Democrats, such as former Pennsylvania Gov. Bob Casey, to speak at its events. Some have accepted; most have declined. It cares about issues with which mainly Republicans identify. Is that the fault of the Christian Coalition? The lawsuit by the Federal Election Commission should be rejected on First Amendment grounds,or the FEC shouldbe re- Jesse Jackson quired to go after every liberal group that enjoys specialtax er ileges as an organi zation but dabbles in politics. Be. cause this is a thinly veiled attempt to undermine the organizational strength ofreligious conservatives in the political arena, don’t look for that to happen. And because so many liberals are in- volved in suchactivities, they had better hope this case is thrown out of courtor the next lawsuit might be directed against one of their own. Advanced Society Still Must Acknowledge Sure Death COKIE ROBERTS STEVEN ROBERTS into Centennial Park? Somebody must be to blame. And, of course, somebody is. These were not accidents. They were planned attacks perpetrated 1 " The fact that these were manmade casualties means they could have been avoided. But that’s becoming our national view of all death — thatit could be avoided if everyone behaves. UN ITEDFEATURES WASHINGTON — It seemslike the flags fly perpetually at half mast these days. The country, In the end,all of us will die, and for mostofus therewill be no one to blame. That obvious statement seems to come as a revelation these days. Our unwillingness to deal with whipsawed from one disaster to this most elementary of truths has another, hardly knows howto react to explosion after explosion: enormous impact on society. bia, then TWAflight 800, then the Olympics. After the shock comes the anger — someonehadtobe atfault. see their mission as healers. They are there to get you well. And even if there's no way on earth that you will ever be well again, they often will do everything pos- bigger perimeter around the sible to keep you alive a little first the U.S. base in Saudi Ara- Why didn’t the military build a base? Why wasn’t the security tighter at Kennedy airport? Why were revelers allowed unchecked First, it affects the medical community. Doctors, understandably, longer — sometimes in pain, often e fa cm, and usually at high Doctors will tell you that they're worried about malprac- tice suits, that someone in the family will hold them responsible — will blame them — if the loved one dies. So they do anything modern science can devise, knowing they can defendit to a jury. Critics of the medical profession cynically counter that these “he- roic measures”are an effort to drive up costs, make more money. Wethink it's something else. After talking to many doctors, and their teachers, and watching as we help care for those who are sick, we think that many doctors see death as failure, blame themselves if someonedies. These are men and womentrained to excel, to win, not to “lose”a patient, or to say those incredibly difficult words: “There is nothing more I can do.” As a consequence, somestudies show that we spend upto 75 percent of our national health care dollar on thelast year of patients’ lives. Of course it takes more to care for very sick people. And anyone with a chance of getting well should clearly receive treatment. In fact, anyone who wants treatment should receive it. But we should be granted the dignity of making informed decisions, which means doctors should come clean with us about our chances There's the probiem, of course. We know wewill die, but we can’t cope with it. So we keeptrying to blot out death, to pretend it won't happen, and to blame someone whenit does. That's why these horrible events that we've lived through the last few weeks both terrify and comfort us. Terrify becauseit could happen to us, comfort be- cause there actually are guilty parties. We will eventually have a place to put our anger. That's not true mostof the time, so we blamethe authorities, the doctors, and worstofall, the sick. In this time when the nation seems to be continually honoring the dead, we might think about payingsomerespect to the dying as well, “To have brown skin,” he says, “is a political act.” CHRONICLE FEATURES He has shocked and provoked audiences all over the world which has earned him a MacArthur Fellowship. His work on the SAN FRANCISCO — Imaginea North America of the “New spired Europeanartists who are World Border,” addressing issues of the merging where radio per- subject of Chicano identity has in- sonality “El Aztec High Tech” — in a mariachisuit and Aztec regalia — broadcasts on pirate radio. As the official spokesperson of the “Liberated Republic of Aztlan,” the recovered Chicano homeland of the Southwest, he Seige7 the future of the Ameri- borders, cultural mixture and the eth ‘this au. the new American without eortext and comprised of an a false sense ef understanding. hile, manypeople are talking over each other on hate radio. He portrays exaggerated stereo- entire border zone. The prophecy of “gringostroika” — the end of gringo dominanceof the Western hemisphere — has come true In this scenario, geopolitical borders have eroded; A “Free Raid Agreement” hasled to the union of Canada, the United States and Mexicoas a newfederation, controlled, in part, by a master chamber of commerce and a media junta According to the prophecy. monocultural territories of the disemboweled United States are so poor that the needy must leave in mass migrations. These Euro- Americans, who resisted racial mixture, are now known as waspbacks.” Their fate is a byproduct of the Spanglish Only Initiative, which banned English. Such is the “reverse social pyr- amid” invented by internationally-known performance artist Guillermo Gomez-Pena. The New World Border, Prophecies, Poems & Loqueras for the End of the Century, is a compilation of his works, performance texts from a “temple of intercultural confessions,” avant garde town meetings and interventions of program. ming on cable T.V. Gomez-Pena has said much of his work confronts “the fear of the other, the fear of losing con- trol, the fear of fusion and, most of all, the fear of dialogue.” He always “speaks from the border, whether amongnations or barri- os. rising xenophobia there. Gomez-Pena makes multicul- turalism complicated for a nation that has comfortable, simplistic notionsof race. He loathes the superficial treatment of race that supposedly enhances intercultur- al dialogue, but instead promotes types to provoke peopleto see the absurdity of their preconceived notions and ultimately, see a com- plex human being behind the Mexican curio. For instance, in protest of Cali- fornia’s Proposition 187, he and performance partner Roberto Sifuentes tied themselves to crosses near San Francisco's Goiden Gate Bridge. They asked spectators for a “political commitmentto liberate them” from becoming human sacrifices to polities. It took three hours for people to figure out they needed help to come down from the self-crucifixion. Gomez. Pena dislocated a shoulder, while Sifuentes passed out T am shocked by the willing ness of Americansto accept their racism,” says Gomez-Pena, and he is shocked that ‘to challenge rac ism is viewed as unamerican.” So he has taken his performances to places where confrontation is certain, places such as Fort Collins, Colo. 17 miles from the Soldiers of Fortune headquarters;" or in Christian Coalition strongholds in Indiana whereareatechnical staff had to get permission from the local churches to work on the production; or in towns where the crew couldn't go outat night because of “drive-by shouting.” In in Rhode Island College, he was given a police escort to protect him after being assaulted by skinheads. His art refiects what is not said tion,” the process of becoming a suspect in the U.S. He has been in polite and civil! speech across cultures. Gomez-Penais the most dangerous kind of Mexican. He makes people think — uncomfort- arrested seven times since 1979 ably so — and laugh. Gomez-Penasays heis a “Mexi- can in the process of Chicaniza- |
