Where I Stand — Mike O’Callaghan: Helping is a way of life

Friday, Feb. 1, 2002 | 9:41 a.m.

Mike O'Callaghan is the Las Vegas Sun executive editor.

TUESDAY EVENING I rushed home to hear President George W. Bush's State of the Union address. He hit many of the points about our battle with terrorists that Americans wanted to hear. He named North Korea, Iraq and Iran as countries developing weapons of mass destruction and also encouraging terrorism. I wondered why he didn't mention Syria as one of these problem states that supports Hezbollah and occupies Lebanon.

It was a good speech and the president's delivery was excellent. It also had a few domestic surprises. He told us, "Our country also needs citizens working to rebuild our communities. We need mentors to love children, especially children whose parents are in prison, and we need more talented teachers in troubled schools. USA Freedom Corps will expand and improve the good efforts of AmeriCorps and Senior Corps to recruit more than 200,000 new volunteers." What? Expand AmeriCorps?

AmeriCorps, when brought to life by President Bill Clinton was ridiculed by the Republicans. Sen. Rick Santorum, R-Pa., called it a program for "kids to stand around a campfire to hold hands and sing 'Kumbaya' at taxpayers' expense."

Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., was also a critic of AmeriCorps and tried to kill the program one time. Unlike Santorum, McCain saw the light before Bush came aboard this week. Last November McCain joined Sen. Evan Bayh, D-Ind., to expand AmeriCorps fivefold. After hearing Bush speak, McCain told the press, "I'm very glad he's doing this." Candidly he added, "I was skeptical at first of whether it would work or not, but it's worked extremely well." Now that Bush has given it his support there will be large numbers of other Republicans who will also see the good in that program promoted by Clinton when running for the White House in 1992.

President Clinton proposed AmeriCorps during his 1992 campaign. He told us that "national service will be America at its best -- building community, offering opportunity and rewarding responsibility. National service is a challenge for Americans from every background and way of life, and it values something far more than money."

Almost six years ago this column recognized the good work AmeriCorps volunteers were doing here in Clark County. There were seven young women and five young men here working with Catholic Workers Julia Occhiogrosso Cavalier and her husband Gary. The volunteers came to help them in their 15-year mission here in Las Vegas feeding the homeless and providing care and comfort for their children.

Because the AmeriCorps volunteers receive $360 a month for their necessities and later have $4,725 applied toward their higher education, some very conservative and sometimes unthinking writers and politicians have claimed it will kill volunteerism. When being interviewed, Ian Moon, then working with Julia, told me that "It promotes getting involved with helping others and meeting the needs of communities. This gets people used to working to help others as a way of life."

Bush's open support of AmeriCorps is refreshing when compared to so many other GOP reactions to Democrat sponsored programs. Roosevelt's Civilian Conservation Corps, despite political criticism, was a successful program. And, as I have previously pointed out, so was its successor, the Kennedy-Johnson created Job Corps Conservation Centers. Its Republican critics eventually gutted it when Richard Nixon entered office in 1969.

Our new president has shown a touch of class that has been missing for far too long among many of his political colleagues. His support to expand AmeriCorps for me was the highlight of his address.