ROANOKE TIMES
Copyright (c) 1996, Roanoke Times
DATE: Sunday, October 27, 1996 TAG: 9610290038
SECTION: EDITORIAL PAGE: 3 EDITION: METRO
COLUMN: ALAN SORENSEN
SOURCE: Alan Sorensen Editorial Page Editor
THE SUSPENSE is over. After months of intense research, interviews and deliberations, we have emerged from our book-lined boardroom. We have issued our pronouncements.
You can go back now to whatever you were doing before you dropped everything to wait, in breathless anticipation, for the Roanoke Times editorial staff to announce its selections for high office.
You can start up conversations again with your friends or at the office, confident in the knowledge that you have learned from the experts whom to favor for Congress and the presidency.
The electorate, I imagine, is quickly falling into line as voters prepare to march, heads nodding in agreement, newspapers in hand, to the polls Nov. 5 to follow our reasoned advice.
Goode, Boucher, Goodlatte, John Warner. We have bestowed on each, in the past week, the much-coveted mantle of our editorial endorsement. Today, Bill Clinton joins the ranks of the anointed.
Like the others, he probably becomes a shoe-in - never mind what the polls say - as readers, who once may have regarded him as a lying, draft-dodging, philandering, sleazy liberal, are persuaded by our editorial to yearn for his re-election.
Did I mention you're under no obligation to vote for the candidates we recommend?
Seriously folks, we understand endorsements may seem a bit high-handed and presumptuous. But we're not dictating to anyone how to cast his or her ballot. We're merely stating an opinion - one humble view, among a wide range published in these pages, meant as much to provoke as to persuade.
We like to hear your opinions, too. They just might be better than ours.
Other points about endorsements:
Rest assured, they don't reflect the views of everyone here at the newspaper. They only express the consensus of the editorial board, a pretentious name for five people headed by the publisher and identified daily under the editorials.
Our deliberations have nothing to do with the process of news coverage.
Endorsement editorials don't "endorse" anyone, in the sense of conferring some sort of stamp of approval. They merely express a preference for one candidate, given the alternative.
If the alternative approximates a walking cadaver, so much the easier for someone to win not just editorial favor but votes. And if a winner who got our endorsement proves a turkey in high office - sorry, not our fault. We give no guarantees. He's your man as much as ours.
Did you notice we endorsed three Democrats and two Republicans this year? See, party headquarters doesn't fax our opinions to us. We think them up on nonpartisan grounds. (Who knows, next year we might endorse even more Democrats.)
When you come down to it, endorsements are just like all the other editorials we do year-round. Why opine about everything else and leave the most important decisions alone?
We all do, after all, have to vote for someone. Or we should, anyway. It's a duty as well as a privilege of citizenship. We say so every Election Day.
Did you think these editorials are easy? Your fall - the taste of cider, the smell of smoke, the crisp, cool evenings, the football games, the brilliant spectacle of leaves on the mountains, whatever - may only occasionally be interrupted by political ads depicting one candidate's devotion to his family and another's determination to kick the canes from old people's trembling, arthritic hands. When you hear talking-head commentators come on TV to explain why the latest event or strategy represents Bob Dole's very, very last chance to catch up with President Clinton, you can go make a sandwich.
Not us. We on the editorial staff have had to immerse ourselves for months in the political muck, struggling with candidacies and issues, with all the platitudes and evasions and charges and counter-charges.
Actually, we like it. It's a great job. One benefit: We get to meet with state and local candidates, most of whom are interesting people. Especially the libertarians.
Oh well, election season is almost over. But don't take my word for it. Go look at a calendar. Do something for yourselves for a change. We've given our opinions. Take them or leave them as you like.
I wonder if my wife will be persuaded by any of them.
LENGTH: Medium: 82 lines KEYWORDS: POLITICS ENDORSEMENTby CNB