People have long relied on signs. In my small hometown in Kentucky, we depended on the faded, bent sign at the city limits proclaiming the population: 3,200. It seemed to be stuck perpetually on this number, season after season, census after census, generation after generation.
Though some optimists among us blamed this on an official sign-neglect policy, most of us figured out the sign warned of a stagnant local job market and advised us to go elsewhere to make a living. And so we did, contributing to the accuracy of the sign.
Signs, as a rule, pack deeper meanings. For example, the baseball manager worries his pitcher is tiring when the opposing team gets two hits in a row. The passionate financial investor pores over the stock and bond tables for clues to corporate failure, trouble or success.
And then there is Washington, D.C., the city of a million signs, where politicians, consultants and journalists spend most of their time drinking strong coffee and reading weak tea leaves. Their business is booming today because of a brand-new sign: Clarence Thomas` nomination to succeed Thurgood Marshall on the Supreme Court.
The storm over this nomination is at gale-force velocity, and rising. To opponents, the sign is clear. It poses a clear and present danger to the Roe v. Wade abortion-rights ruling and to liberal civil-rights interpretation and the law.
But there is a deeper meaning too. In choosing a black conservative with off-the-reservation views on many legal questions, Bush has indicated he no longer feels constrained by the boundaries of the coalition government over which he has presided for 2 1/2 years.
Bush`s brassy selection of another conservative hard-liner, who through most of his life had little to conserve and experienced the evils that liberals say conservatives can`t address, shows his growing confidence in breaking away from the pragmatic tone that has dominated his presidency to date.
The Thomas nomination appears to be more than the usual tidbit designed to make conservatives happy. After all, they have nowhere to go in the next election except to vote for Bush. With this move, Bush has taken off the gray suit of moderation in favor of the more ostentatious black-and-white duds of his right wing.
This explains the extra intensity of the uproar accompanying Thomas`
selection. It signals a challenge to the comfortable nature of the coalition and its tepid, middle-of-the road legislative record. It also signals a more combative White House willing to lay out a clearer vision for American society.
It signals more vetoes, more stalemates and an economic policy that assumes an attitude of benign neglect over a widening gap between rich and poor that arose in the 1980s. It says that the road to economic prosperity is through providing opportunity for entrepreneurs and favoring economic efficiency, and not through tax or spending programs that attempt to redistribute income from rich to poor.
The deeper meaning of the nomination is that Bush apparently believes the country is much more conservative, economically and politically, than it was when Ronald Reagan took office in 1981. Although Democrats control Congress, the White House believes the power of incumbency has more to do with this than genuine affection for the party`s message.
Thomas may be a political oddity in Washington, it is reasoned, but he is closer to the mainstream of prevailing American political sentiment.
It must be terribly frustrating for a president to be in charge of a divided government, especially one constantly accused of having no ”vision.” This explains his desire to give a clearer definition to his administration as it enters a new election cycle.
But, if my sign-reading is accurate, then a sharp move to the right is a threat to his administration. Conservatives are misreading the severity of economic pain that occurred during this so-called ”shallow” recession. Perhaps more than any downturn since the 1930s, it drove home the sense that the nation`s economy is in deep, long-term trouble.
Unlike in recessions of the past, unemployment cut more deeply into the ranks of the white-collar middle class, even that rock-ribbed Republican world known as middle management. Millions of young high school graduates from good, hard-working families are finding a harsh, low-income economy confronting them.
The level of economic discontent is high. Even with a recovery this discontent won`t fade, because the economy is undergoing many troubling transformations that will continue to keep workers on edge. Large, old-line firms are downsizing and cutting back benefits for workers they keep on the payroll. The banking industry is in deep trouble, a disconcerting threat to stability.
Many Americans blame the federal deficit, deregulation and the debt-ridden `80s for the problems of today. Before Bush takes his administration too far down a more conservative road, he should read these signs very carefully for their deeper meaning. If he does, he might turn around.
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