Buchanan Rhetoric Should Terrify Us

When life got tough for 14-year-old Barry Loukaitis of Moses Lake, he reached for a rifle and started shooting.

There is an echo of Barry Loukaitis in the hot, resentful politics of Republican presidential candidate Pat Buchanan.

You poor, put-upon Americans, Buchanan tells his “troops.” International bullies - foreigners and heartless corporations - are stealing what rightfully is yours. Let me take the power of government and punish your tormentors with tariffs, end foreign aid, build big fences and guard towers to keep foreigners where they belong. And under Old Glory’s banner, let us march, Christian soldiers, into cultural war. Let us force our corrupt society onto paths of righteousness, for my name’s sake.

After the New Hampshire primary, Buchanan warned followers that he has powerful foes and shouted, jowls quivering, “Do not wait for orders from headquarters. Mount up! And ride to the sound of the guns!”

Consider his supporters: Gun-toting militias. Talk radio’s conspiracy theorists. Neo-Nazis. Aryans. And a well-meaning army of Christian conservatives, tempted by Buchanan to create righteousness with governmental force among those not converted by peaceful means.

With this as his audience, Buchanan’s throbbing rhetoric ought to make Americans’ blood run cold.

But let us give Buchanan credit. He has raised issues, real problems, which other candidates have neglected. American laborers and middle managers are indeed watching jobs disappear as the U.S. economy continues its difficult adjustments to global competition and computer automation.

Although Buchanan’s aim is accurate, his remedies, like the rage of Barry Loukaitis and his rifle, are as simplistic as they are mistaken.

The United States does not need to be pessimistic or afraid.

For many years, the best instincts of the Republican Party - and of our nation - have been optimism, inventiveness, competition.

Voters ought to look for candidates who eschew self-pity and favor constructive solutions. Sure, the welfare state’s a failure. What should take its place? How about equipping American workers and businesses to compete and innovate at home and in the global market, from which, in fact, there is no retreat? Stronger federal commitments to education, worker training, basic research, export enhancement, technological development - these are ingredients for a political platform worthy of our heritage and potential.

Fear, belligerence, revenge and repression are seductive. But Americans must look for leaders who know, as Ronald Reagan did, how to re-create confidence and hope.

, DataTimes The following fields overflowed: CREDIT = John Webster/For the editorial board