DISPATCHES by Hank Kalet: Democrat or Republican? History shows that the label does not always match the actions.
By: Hank Kalet
I’ve been accused lately of being biased.
My column, I’ve been told, is biased against Republicans and that I am a liberal, a Democrat, a left-winger, a socialist and so on. I should criticize Democrats more, I’m told, and I should support the president more, drink milk and keep my mouth shut.
OK. I have a confession to make: I am biased. I have a political point of view that stems from some basic beliefs. These are:
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I oppose the death penalty and believe that military force should be used only when all else fails and then only in a limited and targeted manner.
I believe no one has the right to tell me what I can read or watch, that the government should not involve itself in private matters like what temple I attend (or whether I choose to attend at all) or who my neighbor might choose as a partner. I believe in the right to protest and to speak my mind and that the rights of the accused in criminal trials must be protected.
While I am suspicious of big government, I am more suspicious of the growing power of corporations and believe that government, which represents the interests of the people, is our only effective counterweight to that power. I believe we have a responsibility to make the lives of our neighbors better, that we have a responsibility to protect our world and ensure it survives for future generations and that all students have a right to good schools and safe streets.
Everything I write is informed by these basic beliefs.
Does this make me a liberal or a Democrat or anti-Republican? I voted for Ralph Nader in 1996 and 2000. Does that make me a Green?
Our society is too willing to apply labels. Everything must fit neatly into its particular category, as if everything we do, everything we believe is subjected to marketing plan. It’s a limiting and maddening. Suffice it to say that I hate labels and categories whether we are talking about politics or clothing or music. Music stores are a case in point with their need to break all of music into the smallest possible categories rock and pop, hip hop and R&B, country, folk, jazz, blues, soundtracks, world, new age and so on.
And sometimes, these categories are broken down into even smaller subcategories Amazon.com, for instance, breaks rock and pop into alternative, hard rock and metal, classic rock, indie music and the like. But many if not most musicians do not fit neatly into their little musical ghettos. Where should Steve Earle or Lucinda Williams be placed? Country or rock? How about Chuck Berry or B.B. King? Blues or rock? And the Beastie Boys? Hip hop or alternative?
In politics, labels are just as limiting, but far more dangerous. Labels are used as political weapons to pigeonhole and bully and dismiss.
Don’t believe me? How would you characterize a politician who expanded the federal death penalty, bombed Iraq, dismantled the federal welfare system, balanced the budget, opened federal lands to miners and allowed roads to be cut through federal forests?
I’d say he was a fairly conservative fellow. But most people don’t seem to view President Bill Clinton as a conservative. Why? He has that big ugly D next to his name, which explains more succinctly the vitriol and overt hatred directed against him by much of the self-described Conservative movement and their water-carriers in the Republican Party (the guys with the big ugly R’s next to their names).
How about a president who increased benefits under the Social Security Act, continued to subsidize housing for low- and middle-income families and increased federal funding for education? Seems kind of liberal, right? Not how most people think of Richard Nixon. That is not to say that President Nixon was a liberal he was a foreign policy hawk who viewed the world through the specter of the Cold War, used the racial prejudices of many Southern whites to his electoral advantage, spied on his enemies and encouraged law enforcement to crack down on dissent. But he is not the arch conservative that some remember.
So, let’s drop the labels, move past the easy categorizations and judge our politicians on what they say and do and not on what initial they wear on their shirts.
But for readers who need an easy shorthand label so they can either better understand me or more easily dismiss me, here it is:
I am a left-wing radical, anarchist rock-and-roller, libertarian liberal, small-d-democrat, Mets-loving progressive populist, pinko pacifist, hippy freak, basketball-watching beachcomber poet, punker, peanut-butter-eating, Jewish Zen dove Knicks fan.
I hope that answers any questions.
Hank Kalet is managing editor of the South Brunswick Post and the
Cranbury Press. He can be reached via e-mail at
href="mailto:[email protected]">[email protected].

