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Vol. XX No. 2 October 2004 |
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 Making Sense of the Presidential CampaignWith just a few weeks to go before Election Day, The Juilliard Journal asked several Juilliard students to share their thoughts about the upcoming presidential election. Here are a few responses to various questions that were posed to them: Do you think that this is the most important election our country has faced in a generation?Every election is the most important election. Only now does the general aggregate seem to realize this. In a sense, the last election (in 2000) was more important than this one. Because not enough people paid attention then, we are stuck in our current situation. Now we're seeing a lot of retroactive involvement to make up for the benign ignorance that characterized the great majority of people's political involvement in the late '90s. The last four years should have taught us that democracy is something that needs to be maintained every day, because people will take it away if we're not looking. Hopefully, we'll be referring to the 2008 election as the "most important" election as well.—Tommy Smith, playwright fellow Are there important things that you feel people are forgetting as we face this election?Real differences divide the candidates on certain domestic issues, but focusing on taxes or health care shows a willful, shameful ignorance of the issue which will determine the course of 21st-century history: the relationship between Islam and the West. The American president must commit to creating a climate in which the stark differences between American and Arab cultures can coexist peacefully. If there was a lesson to be learned from 9/11, it was that the conditions that inspired such anger to fester throughout the Arab world can no longer be allowed. We must have a president committed to dialogue, to an unbiased approach to the entire situation in the Middle East, to the withdrawal of every last American troop from that area.—William Harvey, master's candidate, violin Why do you think this upcoming election has polarized so many people in their discussions?Twenty years ago, Americans picked sides on critical issues because they firmly believed that if their preferred policies were implemented, the country would truly be a better place. When someone voiced support for supply-side economics, it wasn't simply to protect their own finances; some people genuinely hoped that "a rising tide would lift all boats," and that the dwindling tax receipts as a result of tax cuts to the wealthy would be made up for by the buoyed economy. But the opinions people form today are entirely the result of the politics of self-interest. If you are a white male, you are typically expected to eschew affirmative action, since such policies would make it more difficult for those of your race and gender to gain entrance into universities or find employment. If you've voted against restrictions on abortions in the past, perhaps it's because you're a young woman, and thus have a chance of accidentally becoming pregnant in the future. When Americans stopped making decisions based on the good of their country, and started simply doing what was best for them, the inevitable consequence was the breakdown of rational dialogue and communication between the members of differing political parties.—Joel Ayau, master's candidate, collaborative piano Do you think campaign coverage helps or hinders people in deciding about the candidates?If Americans choose to watch general election coverage on a cable news network, I hope that they will turn the television off when pundits start delivering spins. We are more than intelligent enough to make up our own minds about whose ideology we stand behind without being swayed by things as trivial as image. Which political platform best represents what you believe in? Which candidate has lived up to his promises in the past and is most likely to do so in the future? These questions are immeasurably more important than who seems more friendly on TV.—Evan Kuhlmann, bachelor's candidate, bassoon
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