Spacing Out on Politics

CAMBRIDGE was invaded by a man from Outer Space Tuesday night. He was warm and witty and he charmed a standing-room-only crowd at the Nightstage club in Central Square. This peculiar visitor from another time and place came not to terrorize and pillage, but to deliver a strange and wonderful philosophy made up of equal parts hope, common sense and baseball lore. This Spaceman is running for the Presidency of the United States.

Most people have probably never heard of Bill Lee, a former southpaw pitcher for the Boston Red Sox and later the Montreal Expos. Lee, nicknamed "The Spaceman" by his teammates and the local press for his eccentricity and outrageous antics, is the standard-bearer of the newly-formed American wing of the Rhinoceros Party. Running on a slogan of "No guns, no butter--they'll both kill ya," Lee represents a satirical political party based in Canada. More than 100,000 of our Northern neighbors voted Rhino in 1984.

With recent political returns in this country making it more likely that George Bush and Michael Dukakis will be the two major party candidates in the fall, America needs Bill Lee--if only for the simple reason that he has a personality. He's not a very serious candidate--he hopes to abolish the law of gravity, for instance--but he often makes too much sense to be dismissed as a simple joker.

I got to meet Bill Lee when I was eleven years old. He was my hero even then. My father and I sat next to him in a local pub, watching him swill beer and listening to him talk about Eastern mysticism and the concept of infinity. No doubt my admiration for such an odd figure was disturbing to my parents. Lee had admitted to being a frequent user of marijuana, and to avoid penalty from the Baseball Commission for smoking it, he fabricated a story of sprinkling pot on his organic buckwheat pancakes. The THC, he claimed, would be activated in his bloodstream as he jogged to practice. Then-baseball commissioner Bowie Kuhn never did figure out if he could charge Lee with anything.

LEE is still a frequent user of drugs. He even took some painkillers from a member of the audience, which he drank down with one of the many Corona beers he consumed during his performance. In fact, Lee's campaign platform calls for the legalization of drugs. He praised some Florida residents he had recently met who wore T-shirts with the slogan, "Save the Bales."

For George Bush, loyalty is refusing to disagree with an incompetent president--loyalty is hiding. For Bill Lee, loyalty is standing up. Shortly before being traded to Montreal in 1978, Lee went on a one-day strike when friend and teammate Bernie Carbo was sold to Cleveland for $15,000. The press and many fans criticized Lee for his walkout, but he stood firm and still defends his actions.

"It's a form of protesting," he says. "You've got to stick up for your friends. I never held out for money. I rebel for nothing but the truth."

On international relations, Lee offers a refreshingly simple perspective. "I see the world as a planet, not a checkerboard," he says. "I think we should do away with boundaries. I don't like borders. Everytime you stop, they check your trunk."

To solve tension in the Middle East, Lee proposes to merge all the nations in the area and rename them either Pasrael or Isaelstein, thereby eliminating the major cause for the violence and strife now taking place.

Unlike some of the other candiates, Lee is not a lifetime bureaucrat. The political process is far too tedious a game for Lee, who offers practical solutions. "If someone's doing something wrong," he says, "slap him upside the head and tell him he's full of shit." Lee, a long-time vegetarian, explains he means that literally--that some people, specifically those who eat red meat, actually are full of it.

Lee talked a lot about prophets Tuesday night; the crowd seemed to think of him as one. He named Martin Luther King, Jr. and the character of Elias in the hit movie Platoon as meeting his definition of prophets, meaning "someone who says something unfavorable, jeopardizing their own life." Lee's determined irreverance and outspokeness have never jeopardized his life, but as he admits, "I could've pitched until I was 45 years old if I was just born without a tongue."

Bill Lee is no prophet. He's just a regular guy who speaks his mind. Most people never get to meet their heroes, and when they do they are usually disappointed. That's because they look too high and too far away. All I did was a look a little bit askew, and I found a spaceman who earned my vote for President.