Concession and Statesmanship

          Election lawyer Romulo Macalintal claims to have shed tears when he watched John McCain's concession speech when Barack Obama's victory became definite.  He said, "It's not because I pity him, but because I pity our country, asking myself when we could have men like McCain who could accept the will of the people and put the nation's interest paramount to their own political interest."  This is a sentiment shared by most of those who watched the progress of the US elections (but perhaps in less-emotional terms).

          It maybe because of our collective experience in having atrocious elections in this country that we are easily awed and touched by displays of grace in the face of defeat, which are common in any country that has reached a high degree of political maturity.  Somebody loses an election in a manner that does not leave any room to doubt, subsequently concedes to his opponent as he is supposed to do, and we think it is a display of virtue which is nothing short of exceptional.

          Think about it, Obama not only breached but demolished the 270-vote mark en route to a victory.  (For those of us who were tracking the progress of the elections, this happened literally within a matter of seconds as poll projections from a number of states began to pour in.)  What else was McCain going to do?  Conceding the elections was the only option, and delaying such a concession would have only worked against him.

          If we are looking for a much better model for statesmanship, then we should be looking at Al Gore.  This man should have been President instead of the unlamented George W. Bush, but was cheated of victory due to machinations of the latter's political strategists.  But rather than expose his country to a divisive electoral protest, he chose to finally concede even though he was actually leading his opponent in the popular vote.  To add insult to injury, he presided over the official tallying of his "defeat", and repeatedly rejected protests against his opponent's "victory".

          If we follow the McCain model of statesmanship, then unscrupulous politicians can always justify that only landslide losses are worthy of concession.  On the other hand, close contests are fair game for protests and allegations of cheating.  In short, the Philippine status quo.  In even shorter terms, "nothing changes".

          Now, I'm not going to fully advocate the Gore model either, for the simple reason that I still think the person who gets more votes, no matter how small the lead, should win an election.  But our politicians can probably emulate Gore on the manner by which he put the well-being of the country above his own political ambitions despite being so near to his goal.

          Many politicians in this country believe that "almost there" entitles them to be "there".  Hence, the tendency to make full use their resources to undertake legal, extralegal, and sometimes illegal means to  prevent a winner from being proclaimed once they lose an election.   This is done partly in frustration, and partly due to a malicious intent to subvert the electoral system in order to perpetuate themselves in power (in the case of reelectionists) or to take power from those who are lawfully entitled to it.

          We are hoping, therefore. that Al Gore's statesmanship is emulated by those politicians who are in an "almost there" situation (which accounts for a large number of losing candidates in this country) but whose factual bases for claiming victory are tenuous.

photo credit:

Al Gore: http://blackliberal.files.wordpress.com/2008/06/al-gore.jpg
John McCain: http://thepoliticaltipster.files.wordpress.com/2007/08/040416_mccain_vmed_1p_widec.jpg