Chickens in the Henhouse by MARK WATKINS Wednesday, November 22, 2000 Most of us will not recognize the 2000 presidential election as it will appear later in the history books. Living through history is different from reading about it. History made while one is alive arrives first as news. News becomes history later, after historians have pondered and researched it and editors have framed it. Consider how your elders described life in the U.S. during The Great Depression, World War II or the 60's. Their descriptions most likely were not what we learned in school. Editors, you see, are powerful folk. In the first week after the November election I would bet that most of us felt a bit like I imagine one does after spontaneously getting a tattoo -- in pain and surprised at our own stupidity. Later, of course, comes embarrassment and woe. We were seriously hung over without having drunk a drop. This "historic" election will be studied at length for the lessons it offers. One lesson I hope the editors leave in should be painfully obvious even now.

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The people of Florida -- including the aged, the immigrant and the poor who were so thoroughly maligned by the pundits -- are no more stupid than those of Iowa or Connecticut or Texas. The problem lies not in Palm Beach County or Miami or Tallahassee. "The fault, dear Brutus, is in ourselves." Most Americans have just become too busy with other things. November 7th was exactly like July 12th. And February 23rd. It was just another day: the brakes need fixing, Justin is flunking History, Megan's band practice runs late, the shipping department screws things up, Firestone is one the ropes, Calista looks too thin and Tom Brokaw sounds drunk (and what's up with that?) On November 7th we were just plain disinterested. The media had struggled to keep the campaign exciting (and their ratings up) but neither presidential candidate was special and "the issues" were lame or manufactured. Worse, the rhetoric was uninspiring. And -- oh, yeah -- people are satisfied with their lives, the networks told us, because the economy is good. But it goes deeper than that. The painfully obvious lesson from 2000 is that the decades-long dumbing down of America is coming home to roost and the chickens are now crapping on our nice carpet. Maybe the voting machines failed Floridians and maybe not. Maybe there have been previously scrambled elections. But a certainty is that for decades we have been slipping and it's beginning to catch up with us. We let this slide; we let that slide. "Tolerance" -- a fine concept originally -- has come to mean acquiescence to mediocrity and sloth. We're being tolerant if we avert our obligation to reward excellence and demand accountability of ourselves and the next generation. "Diversity" similarly has been used to seduce and intoxicate while eviscerating us. How else to explain Jenny Jones, Maury Povich or Sex in the City? If Floridians are not to blame for the election mess then who is? Ah, yes: those chickens coming home to roost. This is how a colorless president moves in at 1600 and how -- most assuredly -- a once great nation is lost.

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