Geraldine Ferraro.

GERLADINE FERRARO

SHE CAME TO Sutton Place Synagogue, where the Jew can worship God, and politicians can worship the Jew. Rather a sensual woman, in her grey DA haircut and St. Croix tan. Shallow-bright enough: tougher than the average liquor-store grille. Geraldine Ferraro is not an effective speaker really: she talks overfast, with throwaway emphasis and run-on sentence style, as if counting the lecture fee half aloud. Her political canary died one day after she was chosen by Mondale, just about. Geraldine Ferraro is a Trivial Pursuit question for the year 2050: hardly much more than that.

But she still represents the Democratic center-left. I'd like to scope out a phrase or three from her lecture now. We should remember the venue, of course: all politicians sound more sensible, about Russia in particular, when addressing a Jewish audience. Remember, too, that Mrs. Ferraro has probably done some kind of post-mortem on her bubble career by this time--and sees no significant elective office ahead. That can improve candor and free up the calculating heart.

Re her Russian junket: "Even their best experts seem to have no idea how public opinion realy shapes the policies of our country." Read great frustration there. Democratic liberals visit Moscow in an advisory role: This-is-how-to-improve-your-Harris-Pool-Rating. If necessary, they'd pass Gorbachev the ACU mailing list. But Russia has become a Vulgar Empire: lousy public image. After Poland, Afghanistan, Jewish repression, KAL 007 (and Republican profit therefrom), liberals are set to ask for their old engagement ring back. Worse than running with Zaccaro. No matter how cynical this adjustment might be, it is still a major advance for clarity. See below.

"You know all those outrageous stories about the KGB, the microphone in the chandelier. They're true." A wonderful statement: note how many logical dislocations are required to sustain it. First, the word "outrageous." In this context, naturally, it stands for "right-wing." Outrageous, gross, unbelievable but true. True, yet there is no attendant admission that conservative estimates of the KGB were accurate. (And, to underscore liberal thought pathology here, I can't believe Mrs. Ferraro just discovered this. It sure wasn't a revelation for her audience.) She has said, in effect, What-poor-taste-this-shouldn't-be-true-but-it-is. Finally, "outrageous" refers to conservative style, as characterized by the Left. You don't publish such "truth," it might antagonize our Soviet comrades. Next we'll hear: Yes, you can find a Communist under every bed, but he is just hotpatching the water mattress.

"I must say that--at least for the first month when I came back--I gave the most patriotic, table-thumping speeches you'd ever want to hear about America." Operative phrase there: "at least for the first month." Liberal politicians should be processed through Moscow on a thirty-day cycle. Their attention span is short.

President Reagan had said that he would allow no replay of the Carter hostage fiasco. "And two weeks later their embassy was bombed--our embassy was bombed." Expressive slip, that. When people get killed during the Reagan Administration, they aren't American. Those were Republican dead.

"I haven't seen them [the UN] solve too many problems." The Left has begun to lose patience with Gondwanaland and Mu. They keep voting against Israel, darn it. Another "outrageous" boost up for clarity.

"You know what'll happen in the Philippines, if there's not a democratic election that removes Marcos." Mrs. Ferraro brought this up gratuitously, while being interrogated about Central America. Meaning: When they revolt in Luzon, don't expect us to appropriate cash for yet another Contra movement. The Philippines will soon play at a liberal flagship theater near you. And Reagan better do some formula-one thinking about it soon. They intend to bury Marcos on the South Lawn.

"You can't just speak up when it's safe. Where the people aren't people you like--like the Soviet Union." This reverses a conservative locution. Selective liberal indignation against Chilean or South African intolerance: selective amnesia about Soviet repression. Plagiarism is the highest form of flummery. Could it be that conservatism has begun to develop an effective buzz track?

"I though they [women] would vote on the issues. They voted just the way the men did--their pocketbooks." Her most provocative remark by far, sinuous and impertinent as it may be. Let me try to spot-weld her logic here. 1) "Pocketbook." This is apparently a pejorative word. Pocketbooks and idealism don't cohabit well. 2) Your pocketbook is never an "issue." Not to Tip O'Neill anyhow. The usual disdain of socialists for self interest. 3) She expected women to be more idealistic i.e., barefoot, dumb, and unaware the rousing tax burden. Spoken by a man, this formulation would bristle with sexism. 4) Yet the inference is inescapable and she doesn't deny it: Rule by Democrats costs more. And Reagan did project a more responsible approach to the economic shark grip. 5) America, male female, has disappointed Geraldine Ferraro. Nonetheless, presume that the 1988 Democratic presidential candidate will feign interest in thrift. Just when Ted Kennedy was going to propose a 15 per cent tax on teenage allowances.

Someone asked Mrs. Ferraro for her definition of human rights. "Free from economic deprivation. Free from concern about the environment. Free to express feelings." A stranger trio than Moe, Shemp, and Curly. The first two, note, are free froms. Only hospitalize state intervention could implement those. As for feelings . . . Typical of liberalism to favor emotion over uncompassionate thought. That's how the Supreme Court has reinterpreted constitutional law, by "feeling" it.

I put this question to Mrs. Ferraro afterward: Why had she not once spoken about Russian persecution of Christians? "I just didn't bring it up. But you don't see the same amount of pressure put on by those people. You don't see them as being put in jail for the same thing as Jews are." Good night, Geraldine. I guess Christians are so numerous in America that they just don't represent a constituency.