Some pick at Vice President Al Gore’s choice of Sen.

Monday, August 14, 2000

Some pick at Vice President Al Gore’s choice of Sen. Joseph Lieberman, but I have seen nothing substantive raised by anyone. It is, indeed, an excellent choice and he deserves credit. Yet, one aspect troubles. Al Gore’s selection of Joseph Lieberman as a running mate may or may not indicate Gore’s move to high moral ground, but it does almost nothing to relieve him of guilt for moral irresponsibility as vice president under an immoral president.

Joseph Lieberman is, as politicians delight in saying, a good and decent man. Sometimes that is silently qualified with "despite all the bad and indecent things he has done." Not so Lieberman, who is consistently so. Not despite but very much because of his strong, orthodox Jewish faith he is to be respected and admired. Al Gore knows all this, and it is undeniably a large part of the reason for his selection.

Unlike the line Democrats are putting out and much of the news media is carelessly passing on to the public, the Connecticut senator was not a strong and uncompromising critic of President Clinton’s immorality involving Monica Lewinsky. Yes, he stood up on the Senate floor and delivered a moralizing speech more eloquent than his usual droll style. What captured attention, however, was not the scope of his critique but that it was a Democrat senator speaking out against a Democrat president. As strong as his condemnation and as sincere as he certainly was, Lieberman confined his criticism to personal behavior. He never then, nor has he since, related Clinton’s personal immorality to suitability for a president.

Lieberman’s position was tantamount to saying: Clinton behaved terribly in private but we must indulge him in office; we don’t like what he did, but there is nothing we can do actually do about it. In point of fact, Lieberman voted against Clinton’s impeachment.

None of these facts is to suggest that the senator, who will become his party’s nominee for vice president, does not have high moral standards or that he will not practice his standards if he should become vice president. They do, however, say something about his willingness to tolerate personal immorality for political expediency. And this brings us to the crucial point in Al Gore’s selection.

I believe that Al Gore was as shocked and appalled by Bill Clinton’s behavior with Monica Lewinsky as was Lieberman. At least relative to personal sexual morality, I believe that Gore also is a good and decent man and would never behave in the manner of his boss. Lieberman, however, at least spoke up. Gore said not a word. All indications are that the vice president never as much as mentioned it to Clinton even privately.

Does a vice president tell the president he has sinned? Apparently none ever has. Certainly Lyndon Johnson never confronted John F. Kennedy about his transgressions. He should have. Despite some people’s cynical suspicions, his title does not mean he presides over vice, but he is constitutionally charged to assist the president in his duties. When the president’s personal immorality besmirches his office and throws the government into disarray, to confront the president with the facts would be an appropriate act of loyalty. Vice President Al Gore should have called President Bill Clinton to task. He did not.

In fact, Gore participated in the Democrat campaign to minimize the scandal and to prevent Mr. Clinton from suffering the natural and appropriate consequences of his sin. Although his failure to act and efforts to excuse are not directly covered by a legal requirement, he is guilty of a level of malfeasance in office.

If Al Gore failed the nation as vice president in a matter as significant as this, what can be expected of him as president? True, he is currently distancing himself from Clinton as a fatal political liability. But it is too late to believe it is much other than smart politics.

Al Gore’s selection of Joseph Lieberman as a running mate does, in fact, bring high moral standards to the ticket. However, it neither undoes Gore’s irresponsibility relative to Clinton nor does it promise that Gore would perform as president with more moral courage than he did as vice president.

Wallace Alcorn’s column appears Mondays