ROANOKE TIMES
Copyright (c) 1996, Roanoke Times
DATE: Monday, May 20, 1996 TAG: 9605210041
SECTION: EXTRA PAGE: 1 EDITION: METRO
COLUMN: BEN BEAGLE
SOURCE: BEN BEAGLE
Those scientist people have been at it again, and now they say politicians have these brain chemicals that make them act that way.
They've found that this stuff starts secreting when big-deal monkeys listen to other monkeys cheering them and, I guess, shouting the monkey equivalent of "Tippecanoe and Tyler too!"
There almost certainly are other monkeys who think the big-deal monkeys are a tiresome bunch.
These are the kinds of monkeys who never get mentioned in research papers, and they don't vote and their names are purged off the registered voters' list.
The scientists say chemicals make the big-deal monkeys happy and confident; they suspect the same thing happens to politicians who go before cheering crowds.
In my sometimes unfortunate time on this planet I've covered enough politicians to say that I knew something like that was going on long before those guys in the white coats came along.
I just didn't have any monkeys to experiment with.
I know there are other chemicals, too.
At one time, a brain secretion made a Virginia politician who had lived 20 years in New England and graduated from Harvard say "mah opponent" every time he got around a crowd of people. This same substance made him say things like: "Mah frans, an' yew ah mah frans."
Mercifully, this chemical seems to have lost its potency and is no longer a factor in a politician's behavior.
Others are still active, however, including the one that causes a politician to give long answers that don't answer the questions.
If his children ask if they can go to Hardee's, he says: "I'm glad you asked me that. I would say at this juncture in the affairs of the family, we should eat at home; yes, eat of the hearty, earthy, plain American food your mother has prepared. But, as Henry Clay once said, 'I know no North - no South - no East - no West.'''
(Special note: I'm not using female politicians as examples here because I don't know anything about their brain chemistry.)
We could go on and on, but I think I've made my point.
I don't mean to be critical of these scientists. I know they stay in their labs watching monkeys all the time and don't get into the field to see how politicians act.
Which seems to me to be a pretty good deal, given the fact that monkeys don't make speeches.
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