WE JOURNALISTS LIKE TO THINK we have all the answers. But when it comes to actually putting our money where our mouths are and running for political office, we tend to stay on the sidelines.
The on-again, off-again, who-knows-now candidacy of TV commentator Chris Matthews for the U.S. Senate in Pennsylvania brings up the issue of whether journalists can run for office and whether they even should. While some journalists are bold enough to put their names on ballots, the exceptions far outweigh the rule.
In Hawaii in 2002, more than a half-dozen TV and print journalists tried for office in the same year, including one print-TV journalist who ran for lieutenant governor. And occasionally, you'll see a local TV commentator or the publisher of a local weekly newspaper jump into the fray.
But most journalists — perhaps seeing the kind of grief elected officials have to put up with, often from journalists themselves — prefer to perform their public service by writing about it rather than actually doing it.
That wasn't the case in England, where a wild-haired, free-speaking political commentator with a questionable personal background named Boris Johnson decided to go for it. Johnson, well known as kind of a character, ran an unlikely campaign for mayor of London earlier this year — and won.
His election was as much a referendum on the incumbent political party than it was a desire to have this particular 43-year-old political neophyte running the city. But maybe voters just admired the guy's nerve.
An article in the International Herald Tribune described Johnson's colorful life before politics this way: “He has survived public airing of an extramarital affair whose existence he originally denied as an 'inverted pyramid of piffle'; has apologized to whole cities, like Liverpool, that he offended in one way or another; and has been prone to saying things like: 'Voting Tory will cause your wife to have bigger breasts and increase your chances of owning a BMW M3.' “
He did make one concession to the voters during the campaign by vowing to go on the wagon. Of course, his personal prohibition ended once he had the job.
“Tomorrow we'll work like crazy,” he said, “but tonight we'll have a drink.”
OK, so at least there's one perk that journalists can relate to. *