POLITICIZING AMERICA: IT'S A STATE ISSUE AS WELL AS A NATIONAL ONE

One of the most disturbing aspects of life in America today is the growing tendency on the part of those involved in our established institutions -- governmental, economic, social to politicize issues that until recently were not considered a part of any partisan agenda. This trend resembles being unable to see the trees for the forest, rather than the other way around.

To the best of my knowledge the origin of this disturbance is unknown. One can only venture an opinion that it had its inception at a point when numerous members of one of our two political parties reacted to their growing lack of influence and power in resolving significant problems of the day, whatever those might be. When it began, an inquiry that will probably be explored by historians decades from now, is less important than why it has increasingly become a way of political life at the national as well as the state level.

Since it is undoubtedly easier to overlook the trees and see only the forest in Washington or New York or Los Angeles, my money is on the political party that at the moment was the weak minority in Congress and had no friends in the White House, a definition that could identify either the Democrats or Republicans over the past few decades.

As it was bound to do by now, politicization has landed squarely at the state level in numerous examples that can be easily identified in Jefferson City. Let's take the case of this year's earlier legislative session which faced the unpleasant task of seeking some kind of resolution to the 15-year road plan fiasco that started more than eight years ago. Not willing to swallow the whole problem, our legislators who gathered in Cole County in January decided to tackle only a small bite of it, adopting the term "jump start" as a politically correct explanation of how to prolong taxpayers' agony when it finally comes time to resolve the mess of pottage they were handed in 1992.

Emboldened by the political instinct there could be far worse dangers than having to pledge a couple of billion from the state's taxpayers in the future, our lawmakers decided this unpleasantness gave them the right to politicize a state activity that since the beginning of the last century has been politically out of bounds: the designation and approval of where and when highway construction projects would occur.

Believe me when I say there are few activities carried out by our state government that lend themselves any more to the partisan instincts of politicians than the power to locate new highways. Such projects can make or break whole towns and cities, can influence real estate prices or such a point that topography becomes virtually unimportant, and can reward or punish real estate and commercial enterprises to such a degree that millions and millions of dollars can be won or lost.

Indeed, the issue is so critical that until the General Assembly "rescued" the road plan this session, the decision rested solely with the bipartisan, six-member highway commission, appointed by the governor with the approval of the Senate. Historically, these men and women have named all of the members of the commission have been able to override independent, nonpartisan decisions by the commission.

Until now.

This session's "rescue plan" calls for the transportation department and its supervising commission to submit a list of projects to be completed by the bond issues, reserving the right to reject any that do not gain the approval of the legislature. We have now politicized one of the state's most important functions, and we could well wait another 50 years before this damage is repaired. In the meantime, this mischief is certain to become a nightmare.

Politicization, as might be expected, has become epidemic in our federal government. Congress finally got around to approving portions of the federal budget, but accompanying these totals our selected representatives began scratching around in areas that have historically been the responsibility of the executive department. Called riders, these mandates require changes, additions or deletions of rules and regulations on all manner of federal government programs, ranging from the environment to health services to national defense.

With these riders, Congress is essentially instructing the constitutionally independent executive branch how to run its day-to-day business, injecting all manner of cease and desist orders into the funding process that could jeopardize as many or even more than 40 current programs, projects and policies. In some quarters this would be called meddling. In others it would be called politicizing Uncle Sam's responsibility in protecting and caring for his nieces and nephews.

Politicization has become so pervasive in today's America that we have injected Democratic or Republican tenets in such fields as education, crime prevention, health and even national security. These are programs devised to meet citizens' needs and were, at the time of their inception, viewed as unrelated to political dogma. Virtually all of them were established not by men and women who only seek office every two or four years but by qualified experts in their fields and whose principal interest was not getting re-elected but meeting real, critical needs of men, women and children.

The gap between representative government and partisan warfare narrows each time the latter crowds out the former. As this distance grows less and less, America is in far grater danger than anyone can now recognize.

~Jack Stapleton of Kennett is the editor of Missouri News and Editorial Service.