DATE: Sunday, May 4, 1997                   TAG: 9705020187

SECTION: VIRGINIA BEACH BEACON   PAGE: 08   EDITION: FINAL 

COLUMN: ON THE STREET 

SOURCE: Bill Reed 

                                            LENGTH:   62 lines

POLITICS AND POLITICIANS EASY TARGET FOR CLICHES

Newspaper scribes often make a point by resorting to sports metaphors.

All right they're cliches, but what the heck, if they work, lather the text with 'em!

Boxing, baseball, football, even horse racing, provide ample material for the political analyst or commentary writer.

Sports analogies are especially useful in describing politicians and their insulated and self-absorbed worlds.

Without a few shopworn linguistic devices, how could we get the point across that local, state and national elected officials too often don't measure up to the most minimal ethical or public service standards?

We scribblers have to go to Palookaville, the baseball diamond or the gridiron to find the appropriate adjectives to describe their shortcomings.

How else would you describe Council member X, or School Board member Y, if you couldn't use the term ``lightweight,'' ``bush league'' or ``slap happy'' - especially at budget-making time?

Or that Senator A or Congressman B is ``all footwork, no punch'' or ``good glove, no bat,'' ``good hands, slow feet,'' ``all mouth, no action.''

How about ``no guts, no glory,'' ``no pain, no gain'' or ``You can run, but you can't hide?''

Somewhere in the text a resourceful commentator will slip in terms like ``can dish it out, but can't take it,'' ``sucker for a change-up'' or ``chokes under pressure.''

Maybe we could even bring in a horse racing reference here, such as ``great out of the gate, but fades in the stretch.''

Especially appropriate in times like these, when campaign financing is such a big issue on the local and national levels, are phrases like ``money talks, bull---- walks,'' or ``no pay, no play.''

In every sport your average, ill-tempered, demanding, overly critical, high tension coach has a few barely printable expressions that could be applied to the world of politics.

With whistles dangling from their necks and frowns plastered on their sloped foreheads these individuals can size up candidates quickly and accurately, barking terms like ``gold brick,'' ``hot dog,'' ``candy ---,'' ``(bleep) with two left feet,'' ``(bleep) with hands like bricks,'' ``glory hog,'' ``prima donna,'' ``(bleep) so slow he couldn't catch cold'' etc.

Anybody who has ever played a little high school ball can recall the approach of a cold-eyed coach with halitosis, who snarled sweet nothings in your ear like, ``What's the matter Mervis? Afraid to stick your nose in there? Afraid of a little pain, Mervis? Huh? You couldn't block your grandmother!''

Thusly chastened, you would double your efforts to perform up to the coach's lofty standards. Occasionally you would succeed and when you did and you got a flinty-eyed nod of approval, you knew you had accomplished something special.

Which brings up the subject of politicians again. Why can't coaches be in charge of politicians? They would be especially useful during deliberations on touchy issues such as tax increases, school prayer, campaign finance reforms, gun control laws or just plain doing the right thing when well-heeled special interest groups, right wing political ideologues or religious kooks ratchet up the pressure.

Wouldn't it be comforting to know that you, as a voter and a taxpayer, had a hard-nosed, jut-jawed, short-fused champion to see that your elected representatives ``walked the walk,'' not just ``talked the talk?''

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