THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Thursday, September 14, 1995 TAG: 9509140006
SECTION: FRONT PAGE: A12 EDITION: FINAL
TYPE: Editorial
LENGTH: Medium: 52 lines
Some may have wondered how the more than 4,000 delegates attending the Christian Coalition's Road to Victory conference in Washington found the stamina to endure four White House-minded Republican politicians in one day, especially after having earlier endured both Phil Gramm and Bob Dole.
But these are folks as dedicated to their conservative political agenda as to their religious faith. That day's final speaker being Pat Buchanan, most coalition members may have felt founder Pat Robertson and executive director Ralph Reed had saved the best for last.
Which invites a look at what may be the biggest obstacle facing the 6-year-old coalition if it seriously expects to help right what is wrong about America.
Granted, Buchanan can stir conservative emotions to feverish levels. But he also is a mean-spirited ideologue who practices the politics of exclusion and division.
What America needs today is a retreat from right and left alike, a dual redirection toward the center. And agreement that the U.S. Constitution, not the Bible, is the foundation upon which this democratic republic exists.
Finally, Americans must seek common ground instead of pursuing name-calling binges that cheer the converted but alienate everyone else. For too long we have made politics the art of the acrimonious.
Perhaps the most centrist of the GOP speakers - and just possibly the one best equipped overall to occupy the Oval Office - was Sen. Richard G. Lugar of Indiana. News reports indicated that his reception, while polite, was unenthusiastic.
Yet we need candidates who will frame questions like these: How can we reduce the deficit without declaring economic war on the poor? Enact a health-care system that serves all but doesn't drain the public treasury or break private budgets? Improve race relations, not inflame them? Broaden the fight against crime beyond building prisons and making more crimes subject to the death penalty? Provide training, jobs and wages that can help narrow today's skyrocketing gap between the rich and the rest? Work together on programs that can lessen the need for abortion? The list could go on.
And the list is not merely long. Its items are complex, controversial - and vital. Only through pragmatic discussion and willingness to hear and weigh competing arguments can the United States find workable solutions..
In this defense of our liberty, extremism indeed can be a vice, moderation a virtue. by CNB