THE MEANING OF BROTHERHOOD
July 24, 2003
by Joe Sobran
At a testimonial dinner for a famous family of movie
producers, Frank Sinatra offered this tribute: "The
Warner brothers showed Hollywood the true meaning of
brotherhood. They were brothers -- and they were hoods."
This brings me to my own brother Greg. He got off to
a rocky start in life, one that Charles Dickens would
weep to describe: he had me for a big brother. No sooner
had he come home from the hospital than I commenced years
of ruthless teasing.
But he rebounded from this early tragedy, and I was
finally unable to crush his spirit. Luckily for me,
tormenting a kid brother isn't officially recognized as
child abuse, or I might be writing this from a prison
cell. I have never understood why modern psychology has
never grasped that most childhood traumas are inflicted
by siblings. Parents still get all the blame. Was Freud
an only child?
Be that as it may, Greg has forgiven all. He has
inherited the artistic spirit and talent of our mother,
and he is a painter whose work is worthy of Edward
Hopper. He is too creative to hold grudges; his humor
remains unimpaired. He was the sweetest, merriest little
boy I ever knew, and now he is sweeter and funnier than
ever.
When I told Greg that I would be a write-in
candidate for the presidency in 2004, I asked him if I
could count on his vote. Without alluding to the dead
past, he assured me that he would certainly consider
voting for me, but he couldn't honestly promise anything
until he heard what Al Sharpton had to offer the
Republic.
For a moment I was stunned. Not only are we
brothers, but we agree on nearly everything. One more or
less assumes the support of one's own family. This is
especially important in a write-in campaign, where it is
vital that one's supporters know how to spell the
candidate's name. If all my relatives vote for me, I'm
sure to carry at least five states, Michigan, Virginia,
Massachusetts, Connecticut, and Arizona.
But on reflection, I saw that Greg's answer was that
of a true Sobran. Neither race nor consanguinity would
decide his vote. Unlike many political siblings, he had
no thought of capitalizing personally on his brother's
presidency. He was thinking of his country, and he would
vote strictly on the merits. If the Reverend Sharpton
presents a vision of America more inspiring than my own,
so be it. I can only hope that the Sharpton family is
equally prepared to put country before kinship.
But how much do families really matter in a national
election? It may seem that even a large family is too
demographically insignificant to sway the outcome. And
usually this is the case. But we have only recently had a
vivid counterexample. In the last presidential election,
the electoral vote was closely split between two
candidates. It came down to a single state: Florida,
which was also closely split.
It was an astonishingly close contest. But the
governor of Florida, Jeb Bush, just happened to be the
brother of one of the candidates, George W. Bush. Guess
who won?
Yes, Bush won. But his victory was tainted. And it
would have been tainted even worse if he had had brothers
on the U.S. Supreme Court, which finally decided the
outcome.
Greg and I agree that such a result is to be avoided
at all costs. If I win the presidency, we don't want my
victory to be under the shadow of a suspicion that I owed
it to my relatives. I'll have enough trouble just
avoiding impeachment. (I intend to veto every bill that
comes across my desk, except those repealing laws that
are already on the books. I also mean to use executive
orders to end Federal entitlement payments.)
So, dear reader, though I fervently want your vote,
I don't want it because you may happen to be related to
me, whether by blood, by marriage, or even by adoption. I
only want it if you are genuinely convinced, as an
American patriot, that I have more to offer all
Americans, and not just the Sobrans, than the Reverend
Sharpton.
As you step into the voting booth, you might even
ask yourself, "Which candidate would really be better for
the Sobrans and Sharptons alike?" Then follow your
conscience. Just like Greg.
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