Dialogue: Foot-in-mouth Dubyya is no laughing matter

By GORDON McLAUCHLAN

Nothing galls me like the sneering superiority of liberal commentators at the grammatical solecisms of George W. Bush.

First of all, it smacks of the worst sort of intellectual snobbery.

Secondly, I've laboured in the freezing works and on the wharf and sat in the sun at the beach with many a person whose syntax may occasionally be mangled but who is wise in the ways of the world and has solid common sense.

Thirdly, I read and hear plenty of cliche-ridden drivel from educated people whose knowledge of the grammatical structure of the language may be impeccable.

And remember, it wasn't the ill-educated who invented the weasel-words of politics.

Fourthly, and most important of all, while liberal intellectuals snigger at Dubyya - as American media commentators often now call him - an ultra-conservative agenda may be slipped into place whose main purpose seems to be to withdraw government from public responsibility for social matters, except police and the military, by using private agencies for the delivery of welfare, health services, education and superannuation.

Taxation may be cut to a base so low that it would be a major political hurdle for any future administration to restore public services.

And while this is going on, huge increases are being promised in welfare benefits to industry - in the form of billions and billions of dollars more in defence spending. The world's largest armaments exporter is about to boost development and production.

If a case can be made for this sea change in public policy, let it be argued for what it is and not be allowed to come into existence by some political legerdemain as the media focuses on Bush's language and the last of the Clinton sleaze.

And, by the way, those who argue that less government is an administrative virtue should remember that in a truly free democracy only political power stands between ordinary people and economic power.

I travelled on the train from Mascot to Central last Sunday morning, and among the other two or three people in the carriage was an Asian woman who disembarked at the same time as I did, and was having trouble managing her big floppy luggage. I asked her if I could help and she smiled, handed me the strap on one side and off we went down the platform with the very heavy bag between us.

After an attempt at conversation I realised that English was her second language, and a very distant second at that. Suddenly, she stopped, thrust out her hand and said, "Oony," or possibly "Yoony".

I grasped her hand and said, "Gordon."

This attractive Chinese lady fluttered her eyes, put her left hand on my arm and nearly swooned with pleasure.

Now I have three grandsons and it has been tacitly agreed among their parents that Gordon is not flash anymore (to flick a pun), so the name has disappeared from view in the next McLauchlan generation - except that my son-in-law after the recent birth of his son asked how I would feel about Gordon as the baby's middle name.

I said that would be fine, that maybe it should be stuck there in the hinterland of nomenclature because it was not likely to make a comeback against Jason and Simon in the foreseeable future.

But here was this woman seeming to get the vapours at the mention of it. I flicked through my memory to recall any previous time when my name had received such a response and nothing came up from the card file of my mind.

As we got to the concourse, I turned to my admiring friend, determined to help her as much as possible, and asked her where she was going. "Where next?" I asked. She looked at first perplexed and then out of sorts with me.

To make a long story short, I gradually discovered that what had enraptured her was not my robust masculine charm but that she was actually headed for Gordon station, on the Northern Line, and had thought I was some sort of guardian angel sent to take her there.

Coincidence like this is a device often used by novelists to pull together the strands of a story and most people distrust it when overused. But life is studded with coincidence of one sort or another.

Just a few weeks ago I was in Napier trying to find a house I had built when working there as a newspaper reporter. I couldn't remember the address but thought it might be in Maraenui. When I lived there, the suburb was a new subdivision, all veins and no flesh. Now, it is clad in trees and shrubs and is 10 times the size it was then.

For some reason, Dawson St came to mind. After driving around for some time I stopped the car and asked a young woman pushing a baby along the footpath, "Is there a Dawson St in Maraenui?"

"Don't know," she said, and added without hesitation, "but there's a Darwin Crescent."

And that was the name of the street. Spooky, eh.