October 16, 2000
DOWN HOME:
Why didn't Lehrer make them take a time out?
___Parents everywhere know exactly how Jim Lehrer feels.
___Lehrer is the Public Broadcasting Service news anchor who has moderated the presidential debates between Texas Gov. George W. Bush and Vice President Al Gore.
___Any mom or dad who ever tried to "get to the bottom" of a dispute between siblings could sympathize with Lehrer as heattempted to referee the election-year brouhahas on national television.
MARV KNOX
Editor
___This especially was true in the first debate, which often seemed more like a scramble to incite invective on a sibling and solicit sympathy from mom and dad than it did a reasoned discussion between two men who want to be leaders of the Free World.
___Gore kept snickering and laughing while Bush tried to answer Lehrer's questions. And Bush kept responding to Gore's answers with the presidential-candidate equivalent of "liar, liar, pants on fire."
___Every mom and dad in America would've been tempted to vote for Lehrer for president if he had sentenced each candidate to a nose-in-the-corner "time out" while the other guy tried to answer his questions.
___We've been there, done that.
___Early in our parental experience, Joanna and I learned even physical evidence does not always lead to truth. Lindsay could point to teethmarks on her arm as evidence of Molly's guilt. But Molly, three years younger, could only hint at how her sister's sharp tongue left wounds invisible to the eye.
___Later, their vocabularies expanded and the volume of their disagreements escalated. "She said ...!" surely would be countered with, "Yeah, but only after she ...!"
___Back then, my all-time favorite line from TV was uttered by Bill Cosby as the wise but exasperated father Cliff Huxtable. In the midst of a familial fracas, he turned to his wife, Claire, and asked, "Do you think they'll leave the house before we die?"
___Life is quieter now. As teenagers, the girls have learned more about working out their differences. Or maybe they've just learned how to argue more quietly so Daddy won't get involved.
___It's a good thing they've improved, because I never had enough Agatha Christie in me to satisfactorily resolve their little disputes. If I had a dollar for every time I silently prayed, "Lord, help me know what to do here," I could pay their college tuition today.
___Well, that didn't happen. But I did gain a little patience, and I learned a whole lot about the reliability of God's grace to help Jo and me raise these children whose care God entrusted to us.
___And when I think of Jim Lehrer, I thank God I've raised daughters, not presidential candidates.
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