Herschel Walker Loses in Georgia

I would not have thought that Herschel Walker could lose an election in Georgia, but he did. A friend points out that he might have simply waited too long to run: the median age in Georgia is 38, meaning that most voters weren't even born when he was leading the Bulldogs on the gridiron to their national championship. They wouldn't have been old enough to know who he was until he was long gone from Georgia. 

It is also true that he is not well-spoken.  His English is poor at times, and his ability to express his thoughts is limited. He can come across as unintelligent.  On Saturday Night Live, Dave Chappelle -- whose comedy is praiseworthy for its courage and truthspeaking, generally -- called him stupid. He made that remark in a performance that otherwise attempted to save the career of Kanye West for remarks that were surely as stupid as anything Walker ever said.

Chappelle also used to give a performance designed to show O.J. Simpson in his best light. While acknowledging that Simpson surely killed his wife, Chappelle could praise him for his remarkable football career and manners. No similar accord is granted Walker, who was accused of far less serious things than murder. The media has done much to find women who would often simply say that he wasn't nice to them. "One, who was involved with him in 2006, said: 'Having Herschel Walker lose this very important Senate race tonight not only vindicates that democracy has won but the women that he betrayed, have won.'" I suppose he was a philanderer, like Bill Clinton; or perhaps like Ted Kennedy, who like the Juice actually also killed a woman. It is no matter, though, because they were favored by our cultural institutions. 

His opponent, meanwhile, could go on television and literally claim that Jesus favors abortion and only receive laudatory remarks for it. Indeed he ran on it and was portrayed as saintly for his views.

Ultimately I am saddened to see that a boyhood hero has not proven to be as good a man as my boyish self might have hoped him to be; and deeply dismayed to see that support for abortion -- not merely as an occasionally-necessary but tragic medical procedure but as if it were somehow a good and desirable thing -- has taken root in the state of my birth. It is a sad day to see self-described men of God claiming it in the name of God, and being rewarded with praise and power. I left Georgia quite a few years ago now, and will never be back except perhaps to visit; but it is sad to see the moral state into which it is falling.