Clowns to the Left of Me, Jokers to the Right

by Michael A Smerconish

Plus, you remember the photograph of Donna Rice sitting on Hart’s lap? Chances are you think the photo was the smoking gun that killed his political career. Actually, the picture didn’t come to light until nearly three weeks after he suspended his candidacy.

  Four years ago, I interviewed Hart about a book he was then releasing. I asked him where reporters and observers should draw the line today on covering politicians’ personal lives. He said:

  The standard that got changed I think 20 or 25 years ago was that a public person’s private life was of importance only if it affected their ability to do their job. I think that was a pretty good standard, and it permitted some people who are flawed human beings, as we all are, to continue to serve their country.

  Maybe he’s right. After all, as Hart noted, if today’s standard had been applied in decades past, the country would have been denied the service of Franklin Roosevelt, Dwight Eisenhower, and John Kennedy, among others. (Bill Clinton was missing from his list, but deserves mention, too.) Some might argue that by Hart’s own standard, he was rendered unqualified to serve, that a president carrying on an extramarital affair could be compromised by enemies foreign and domestic. But that’s only because we ostracize behavior, which is, arguably, none of our business.

  Tom Fiedler disagrees. Today, he is the dean of the College of Communication at Boston University. But 30 years ago, he was a political reporter for the Miami Herald whose phone rang with the tip that would eventually sink Hart. Recently on CNN, he told me that Hart’s challenge had been issued before Dionne wrote about it and that “Senator Hart himself raised that issue as really a measure of who he was, of his own authenticity.”

  I asked Fiedler about the propriety of three Herald reporters and a photographer literally cornering Hart in an alley adjacent to his home. He said they were there to confirm a tip that Hart was spending the weekend with Rice, adding, “You somehow make it sound like what we were doing was somehow out of the bounds of journalism. It was very much in bounds of what journalists do.”

  When I noted that the tip was about infidelity, he disagreed:

  The tip was about lying. He had lied to everyone, the public included, that he claimed he was not engaged in this kind of behavior. That was the tip—that he was, indeed, engaged in this behavior, and we checked out the tip. We felt that it’s important that voters be able to consider— when they’re looking at a person’s fitness for office—they should be able to take into account what his character included. And it included lying about, as it happened, infidelity.

  When I shared that recollection with Bai, he was quick to respond:

  When they were in that alley, on May 2, 1987, and four reporters and a photographer had the presumed Democratic nominee, the guy who was beating George H. W. Bush in the polls by double digits, and they have him backed up against a brick wall in a white hoodie, and they are peppering him with questions about the woman who they saw entering and leaving the home. The question was not, “You said you were not cheating on your wife, so how do you explain the lie?” What Tom Fiedler said to him is, “You held yourself out when you announced . . . as a politician who would hold himself to a high moral standard. Who is that woman in your house?”

  Bai sees significance in the fact that Hart’s announcement comments about the need for morality were in the context of addressing official misbehavior—Iran contra and a series of Reagan administration scandals. “He was not talking about his marital vows,” Bai told me, noting that the Herald reporters made no such distinction.

  Perhaps it was never for us to condemn Hart. That was a job for Lee, his wife. And how ironic that, after more than 50 years, they’re still together.

  AFTERWORD

  In December 2016, I was offered an interview with Donna Rice (Donna Rice Hughes since her marriage to Jack Hughes in 1994) for my SiriusXM POTUS program. She’s become a leading Internet safety proponent and is the president and CEO of Enough Is Enough, a nonprofit that lobbies for that cause. I was willing to afford her the opportunity to make her points about her cause but was eager to ask whether, these many years later, she thought Gary Hart had been treated unfairly by the outing of their relationship. She said:

  Here’s the thing. . . . [T]here had been an understanding, if you will, between people in politics, primarily men, and the media. And that changed in 1987. I think to some degree there was a perfect storm that was set up here. I don’t know if the media was necessarily out to get him, but there had been hints that people were trying to get to who he was because he was a bit aloof, from what I understand, with the media.

  I explained to her that what especially concerns me is that people avoid running for office because they know it will mean airing all their dirty laundry. And when I asked how small of a pool that really leaves, she replied, “We’re all human and we can understand that people are not perfect and they’re going to have things in their life that they’re not proud of.”

  I also asked whether she had ever spoken with Hart again. She said:

  He called me many years later during one of President Clinton’s many scandals. And he called and asked for my forgiveness. And I really appreciated that and told him that a long time ago I had forgiven him and anyone else that was involved with that.

  OVERREACTION IN C.B. WEST

  HAZING CASE

  Philadelphia Inquirer, Sunday, November 2, 2014

  HAD YOU GOOGLED Central Bucks West before the October 23 suspension of its football season, I suspect you’d have found links to such noted alumni as NFL referee Scott Green, who officiated three Super Bowls; Kevin Ward, who played for the San Diego Padres; and maybe the recording artist known as Pink, who attended but did not graduate.

  From its inception in 1952 until the construction of crosstown rival C.B. East in 1969, the school on West Court Street in Doylestown was known as Central Bucks High School. Graduates from that era include race-car driver Al Holbert, an inductee of International Motorsports Hall of Fame, and Fred Fielding, White House counsel to Presidents Ronald Reagan and George W. Bush.

  Ask the locals about C.B. West’s origins and they’ll likely direct you to the placard and stone facade that stand in honor of the old Doylestown High School, counting among its progeny author James Michener and anthropologist Margaret Mead.

  Of course, scholarship matters, but what has garnered the most attention for the school in the modern era is its extraordinary football program under the direction of coach Mike Pettine Sr., who amassed a record of 326–42–4 and four state titles while at the Bucks’ helm. Today, his son and namesake, a graduate of C.B. West and the University of Virginia, is head coach of the Cleveland Browns.

  It is sad that the school’s reputation, earned over generations, is now in jeopardy—both from the bad behavior of student athletes and the overzealous reaction of adults.

  In times like these, many of us have a tendency to reflect on the indiscretions of our own youth. But they can be compared only in context. The foolish things I did in my three years at C.B. West are evidenced only by the strength of memory. In the digital age, nothing is ever erased. Now, regardless of the outcome, the actions of the school board in an Internet age will always follow C.B. West.

  In his written notification to the community, Central Bucks School District Superintendent David P. Weitzel said:

  Our inquiry determined that students new to the team were expected to participate in several initiations that were both humiliating and inappropriate. The most personally invasive activity required a rookie to grab another player’s private parts while fully clothed. These initiations took place in front of most team members.

  The lack of specificity in the statement furthered the harm done to perpetrators and victims because it allowed minds to wander and rumors to spawn. Suddenly, C.B. West has been mentioned in the same breath as Sayreville High School in New Jersey, where sexual-assault charges have been filed against seven members of the football team. At C.B. West, no student has served a detention, much less been s
uspended, for the behavior alleged. A better course would have been a more complete disclosure of what was known—and if administrators believed there was not enough known to fully advise the community, then by definition no punishment was ripe to be administered.

  People close to the events have told me that on August 16, at the end of a week of two-a-day practices, the players had a scrimmage at home against Abington. The scrimmage ended about 11:15 A.M. and was followed by a football parents’ club picnic at noon. Last year, the picnic was held away from school, but this year, to save money, it was held on a playground adjacent to the campus. Most of the coaches—including head coach Brian Hensel—were not in attendance.

  During the picnic, the players left the adults and walked a short distance to the team locker room. There, the hijinks commenced. Veterans gave haircuts to rookies. Some initiates were “sugar cookied,” doused with talcum powder after walking through the shower. Worse, some mimicked the game “slap lick fondle” from the Comedy Central series Tosh.0. (Three individuals face one person, who has to choose one of those three options.) When the players returned to the picnic, there was no sign of distress. Many who’d had their hair cut took “selfies” with family and fellow players.

  Exactly two months later, an investigation commenced into allegations that a player was punched for refusing to have his hair cut, an allegation determined to be unfounded. Thus began an investigation that uncovered the other conduct described. Then, with two games to go in the season, and on the eve of the homecoming game against C.B. East, the district superintendent announced the suspension of the season.

  Justice Potter Stewart may also have been defining “hazing” when he said of pornography, “I know it when I see it.” For me, forced haircuts and “sugar cookies” don’t cross that line. But “slap lick fondle” clearly does. The perpetrators of that behavior should have been singled out and punished, and if their number was such that C.B. West could not field a team, then forfeiture was appropriate. Instead, the bad behavior in August has now been compounded by a school board, which, in its haste, issued what amounted to a capital sentence in an Internet world.

  AFTERWORD

  Brian Hensel was fired as head coach about two weeks after this column was published, but he still teaches science at C.B. West. The superintendent cited “lack of coach supervision” when terminating Hensel, who is now an assistant football coach at Hatboro-Horsham High School. C.B. West athletic director Sean Kelly ended up resigning in June 2015.

  CAT STEVENS’S POLITICS

  Philadelphia Inquirer, Sunday, December 14, 2014

  WHEN I BUMPED INTO DJ Pierre Robert at the Tower Theater, he had more on his mind than music. It’s something of a running joke—when I see him, he seeks to engage me in political discussion, while I try to steer conversation toward classic rock. On the night that Yusuf Islam, the artist formerly known as Cat Stevens, kicked off his first American tour in 38 years, those worlds collided. There were many of us at the show who were excited to hear the music, but wondering aloud about the performer’s politics.

  I’ve often said that if I screened my entertainment choices according to political bent, I’d be erasing my iTunes account and surrendering my cable subscriptions. (These days I’d have to add professional athletes.) So there I was, with my wife, circumnavigating the long lines outside in Upper Darby and working my way through metal detectors—something I’d never seen in three decades of attending Tower shows. (A Live Nation executive told me their presence was the mutual desire of both promoter and performer.) My trial-lawyer buddy, Paul Lauricella, offered the politically incorrect quip that it was the first time he experienced TSA-like screening to protect a Muslim from Americans.

  When I said hello to state senator Daylin Leach (D., Montgomery) just before the lights dimmed, he reminded me that Yusuf had played at Steven Colbert and Jon Stewart’s “Rally to Restore Sanity,” for which Stewart had been called out by Bill O’Reilly. Media and issues advocate Larry Ceisler, who was seated a row behind us with his wife, quickly weighed in, telling me that as a strong supporter of Israel, he was willing to overlook (for a night) any indiscretions toward the Jewish state in the name of music.

  Clearly, there were many of us thinking about more than just the set list.

  “The Wind.” “Where Do the Children Play?” “Oh Very Young.” “Moonshadow.” “Wild World.” “Another Saturday Night.” “Morning Has Broken.” “Peace Train.” “Father and Son.” “Sad Lisa.” “Miles from Nowhere.” The repertoire was rich, and the recent Rock and Roll Hall of Fame inductee exhibited a rare voice.

  But the next day, not only were the songs ringing in my ears, but so, too, the questions raised by friends about Yusuf’s worldview. My cursory Internet search revealed that before Philadelphia, Yusuf played in Toronto, an event he marked with a contribution to the Toronto Star where he says:

  At one time I wrote, “I’m being followed by a moonshadow—moonshadow—moonshadow.” Today I would amend that to, “I’m being followed by a trail of misconceptions—misconceptions—misconceptions.”

  He referenced “dragon-sized myths,” and directed fans to the lyrics of new songs, including “Editing Floor Blues”:

  One day the papers rang us up,

  T’check if I said this?

  I said, “Oh boy!

  I’d never say that!”

  Then we got down to the truth of it

  But they never printed that!

  On his website, yusufislam.com, he has a section titled “Chinese Whiskers,” “dedicated to dispelling myths and rumors created around my bruising skirmishes with the media.” Perusing the site, it became obvious that these days, Yusuf is catching it from all sides. One of the frequently asked questions is why he has stopped wearing Muslim robes.

  In further addressing his faith, Yusuf comments that he feels “very fortunate that I got to know Islam before it became a major headline.” And he offers an opinion as to why he was stopped from entry to the United States post 9/11:

  No reason was ever given, but being asked to repeat the spelling of my name again and again, made me think it was a fairly simple mistake of identity. Rumors which circulated after made me imagine otherwise. I’m now free to travel to the U.S., so whatever it was has been resolved.

  But it was whether he’d once supported a fatwa against author Salman Rushdie that I’d heard most raised the night before, and I was pleased to see Yusuf offer context.

  Because of imaginary scenarios set by courthouse TV interviewers, in 1989 I was drawn into making stupid and offensive jokes about Rushdie on a program called Hypotheticals; however, they were meant to lighten the moment and raise a smile—as good ol’ British sense of humor occasionally is known to do—unfortunately for me . . . it didn’t.

  In 1989, during the heat and height of the Satanic Verses controversy, I was silly enough to accept appearing on . . . Hypotheticals, which posed imaginary scenarios by a well-versed (what if . . . ?) barrister, Geoffrey Robertson. . . . I foolishly made light of certain provocative questions. When asked what I’d do if Salman Rushdie entered a restaurant in which I was eating, I said, “I would probably call up Ayatollah Khomeini”; and, rather than go to a demonstration to burn an effigy of the author, I jokingly said I would have preferred that it’d be the “real thing.”

  Criticize me for my bad taste, in hindsight, I agree. But these comments were part of a well-known British national trait; a touch of dry humor on my part.

  Yusuf claims to never have “knowingly” supported Hamas, and most important to me, he denounced terrorism.

  (Like all right-minded people, I absolutely condemn all acts of terrorism, including the attacks of 9/11 and 7/7 [the July 7, 2005, bombings in London that killed nearly 60 people]. The actions of the terrorists were completely un-Islamic and against the teachings and example of the Prophet. It’s everybody’s responsibility to make this world a safer, more peaceful place.)

  It was all the information I wish I’d have k
nown the night before so that I would have celebrated the man as much as the music.

  AFTERWORD

  Another mea culpa coming.

  First, something not in the column: For this concert, I paid more money for a pair of Cat Stevens/Yusuf Islam tickets than for any other concert I’ve attended in my four decades of seeing shows. Even more than I spent for the front row of Roger Waters at Madison Square Garden. And more than I paid to see the Grateful Dead’s second-to-last show, billed Fare Thee Well, at Soldier Field. That will also be sad news for the artist who went to great lengths to try to mitigate ticket scalping of his shows. In fact, this show that I saw at the Tower Theater was supposed to occur at New York City’s Beacon Theatre, but Yusuf relocated it out of concern over inflated prices due to scalping in Manhattan. For me, this was bucket-list stuff. Forever, I’d hoped he would reemerge after 40 years of not touring, and there was no way I intended to miss it. My wife was with me, and we were in about the fifth row, dead center. Perfect. Coincidentally, our friends Larry and Lina were in the row behind us, two seats over. (Knowing Larry, he got the seats free. No way he paid what I paid.) Directly behind us sat a young couple, the female half of which did not stop screaming and singing loudly for the entire first half of the show. Not intermittently—constantly. I did my best to stay under control but I was doing a slow burn, and by the intermission, I was ready to blow. “I paid to hear him sing, not you,” I finally said. Lina interceded and used her psychological training to befriend and ultimately quiet the woman and the second half of the show proceeded. Larry later told me they were a Hollywood couple that had flown in just to see the show. I truly do get flying across country to see Cat Stevens. But I don’t get making the trip so you can shout over him and ruin the experience for everybody else.

  The column makes reference to Cat/Yusuf’s having been stopped while seeking entry to the United States after 9/11. Left unsaid is that I defended that decision at the time. When I wrote this column, I didn’t recall having written about Cat Stevens a decade earlier, in a September 2004 column with the headline “The Cat May Be outta the Bag,” or I would have said so. That column is about the diversion of a flight carrying Cat Stevens/Yusuf Islam, and in it I say: