European Stars and Stripes (Newspaper) - November 8, 1992, Darmstadt, Hesse                                Sidelights after the Campaign lets Start again by cutting its length Andy Rooney it is As i write monday before election Day. I am writing this without knowing what a going to happen tomorrow. No matter what happens in a not going to be surprised. I can Tell you this the Republic will survive no matter who has won. Its one of the Good things about our country. It survives whether we have a Good bad or mediocre president. What everyone should be talking about with the voting Over is How to improve this crazy election process we have. By the time the candidates have finished with each other its difficult for a voter to like any one of them. They ruin not Only each others reputations but also their own. The candidates done to Ever seem to understand that when one of them says scurrilous things about his or her opponents it does the candidate who said them the most harm. In new York sen. Al do Amato had a terrible reputation deserved or not. Do Amato spent $10 million on his re election Campaign More than any other senatorial candidate in the country and he used most of it to say scurrilous things about his opponent Robert Abrams. Abrams had been the new York state attorney general with a Good reputation. By the time Abrams mounted a vicious democratic primary Campaign to beat out former vice presidential candidate Geraldine Ferraro and took on Damato in hand to hand combat on a lot of television talk shows Abrams had lowered his reputation to the level of do amatos. George Bush started his Campaign for re election about 10 minutes after he was sworn in four years ago. Gov. Bill Clinton of Arkansas announced his intention to run for the presidency on oct. 3,1991. Imagine spending a year and a month of your life running for office such an incredible waste of a capable Many a time. With the election Over id like to see a few More polls before the polling organizations fold up and fade away. One question could be do you think election campaigns Are too Long too Short or just right would a poll like that show less than 98 percent thinking campaigns were too Long How Many americans think campaigns should be longer Well then lets find a Way to shorten them a by Law. Bill and Hillary Clinton on election eve. On one of the talk shows i heard Clinton say he liked George Bush. It was the most likable thing i heard Clinton say. He said he thought or. Bush was a different person not really himself when he was campaigning. Why done to candidates say More Nice sensible things like that about each other so we could get to love them Tribuno Modia services Andy Rooney is a former stars and stripes  and Lee would make a material couple Clarence Page leading my list of potential fun couples for 1992 is Madonna and Spike Lee. Talk about matches made in hell. Imagine a Blind Date Between Madonna a Singer dancer movie producer on again off again blonde self proclaimed a boy toys and Power flailing Boss or perhaps More appropriately miss Bossie a and Spike Lee the Bright Young Black filmmaker and clothing entrepreneur who never seems to get his women characters quite right and says he  go out with a White woman if you paid him Ross Perot a billions. Are these two made for each other or what strip away their race their gender and the technical differences in their a part Quot As they Call it and you have two contemporary masters of hype whose most lucrative product is their own Little o p selves. I checked out Madonna a new $50 Book scat no sacrifice is too great to make in Pursuit of truth for my readers and afterwards Felt like the new York film critic who saw last tango in Paris and concluded a the Only thing about it that was obscene was the  Madonna warned us dutifully to hold on to our socks because this magnum opus was going to Shock the living daylights out of us. Actually in be seen More shocking material on Sale for much less behind the counter at the local 7-eleven. Sorry but its going to take More than this to Shock an America that has seen for example the curator of a prominent Cincinnati Art gallery risk going to jail just to show the Honio erotica of the late Robert Mapplethorpe. Next to that Madonna a Quot statement As an a artist a As she likes to flatter herself comes off As stupefying by Safe and disappointingly faked. The biggest Shock in Madonna a carefully staged and self consciously posed photos with a variety of men women and what have you is their remarkable Lack of passion. Perhaps by making sex look like work instead of fun Madonna is making some sort of statement for the age of aids. Clothes conveniently appear when and where they Are needed to As they say in Hollywood save the a a re rating. Safe porn for the Era of Safe sex. Perhaps social critic Camille Paglia was right when she said Madonna tries too hard to squeeze a socially redeeming Sermon out of projects that should be Able to speak for themselves. Paglia recalls Madonna sitting on Abc nightlife in her tailored business suit conspicuously holding a pen visible confirmation of her literacy and arguing that mtg was just too too prudish for Banning her justify my love video As unsuitable for children. Actually Paglia Points out Madonna should have thanked mtg for Banning her justify my love video As unsuitable for children. It confirms the videos significance As cutting Edge Shock Art. Instead Madonna tried a persuasively to pose the project As a benign educational tool. What one wonders Are children supposed to learn from say the scene with the topless woman wearing the nazi Cap the word is a pornography Quot Madonna. Look into it. Then there a Spike Lee who has called on african american students and workers to play Hooky to see his new movie on the life of Malcolm x when it opens nov. 18. What it Hasni to opened yet Haven to we been wearing his a  Caps for about a Century now Black conservatives dutifully called press conferences to denounce Leeds suggestion which of course Only helps hype the movie More. Lee responded that his movie is no worse than gone with the wind which his teachers forced him to see. How about that for moral equivalency and Why not help Spike get a Little Richer at the same time its called profiteering Spike. Check it out. Hollywood where entertainers constantly strive to prove they Are something More significant to society is a great place to take a blast at racism and make a Buck off it too. Sometimes you can even commit a Community service while doing it. For example after having been burned in his View by naive White reporters Spike Lee says he would prefer to be interviewed Only by african americans from now on. The statement sent Shock Waves through the Media even though it was Only a request not a demand. Lee has not refused any interviewers based on race. Besides its no More shocking than his longstanding policy of calling for Black craftsmen to be hired in his film productions in behind the scenes Union jobs previously reserved for Whites. Spike docs have a conscience. And it is not As if show business stars have not had a say in naming their own interviewers for years in some of the major show business magazines if not in the More ethically sensitive mainstream newspapers like this one. Eleanor Roosevelt gave interviews Only to women reporters in the 1930s, forcing depression strapped editors to keep at least one woman in their Washington bureaus. And refusal by Black militants in the �?T60s to be interviewed by White journalists combined with riots that spurred editors to hire journalists who could be sent to the ghetto without looking too conspicuous resulted in the hiring of numerous african americans like me after years of Whites Only policies. So far Leeds request appears to have resulted in decisions by several magazines to assign Spike Lee stories to Blacks. One of them premiere also decided to hire two new Black editors according to editor Susan Lyne. Thus we see Spike Leeds Genius. At once he performs social Good encourages favourable press coverage and through it All clings unflinchingly to his pose As a poor powerless and put upon but still proud Black Man bravely fighting the hopelessly racist establishment even As he becomes one of its most influential figures. But that soc spikes right. He a not doing anything new. The world of show business is built on hype and Spike knows hype like Michael Todd Cecil b. De Mille and the rest of the Best. More Power to you Spike. Hype hype Hooray. The Chicago int Curie november 8, 1992 sunday a Page 9