My granddaughter, a passionate Harry Potter fan, spotted a “Republicans for Voldemort” bumper sticker in a parking lot. Her parents more prudent than grandpa were definitely not interested, but I found it at stampandshout.com, a liberal button and sticker website. My granddaughter literally jumped with joy when she saw it on my Prius.  I suspected she’d be delighted, but I did not foresee the reactions of others. I’ve been chuckling for weeks.
 
Someone saw it and seriously asked me, “Dan, I thought you were a Democrat?”  After trying to explain the Harry Potter books and the sticker’s irony, I pleaded guilty. As readers of this column know, I am a registered Democrat with a capital “D”, although in the past I’ve voted for Nelson Rockefeller for governor, Amo Houghton for congress and Jack Glenzer for county executive.  As J. K. Rowings might say I’m a political muggle not a pure blood.
 
For readers, many of whom are not Harry Potter fans, here’s Voldemort’s resume.  Lord Voldemort, his name is from the French “flight from death,” is the Dark Lord, the quintessential evil wizard committed to Harry Potter’s destruction.  He’s the ultimate villain, the bad guy in the Harry Potter books. So bad in fact, that in the beginning he was referred to as You-Know-Who or He-Who-Must-Not-Be Named. In the end, of course, he was named and is on the bumper sticker.
 
I soon found out, unlike my granddaughter, that many adults didn’t have a clue about Voldemort.  Some one asked me what office is he running for?  I laughed out loud and to his credit so did the questioner.  I suppressed the smart-aleck answer that he’s a candidate for county legislator.
 
I’m glad I put the sticker on my car.  It has brought some humor to a presidential campaign, which has been too long and intense.  Someone said this year’s campaign has been on steroids. The race, gender and age factors intensified it, but humor has a way of dissipating that intensity. It was Pulitzer Prize-winning poet Mark Van Doren who said, “Wit is the only wall between us and the dark.”  Or on another continent, in another century Victor Hugo wrote, "Laughter is the sun that drives winter from the human face."

 

I know that humor can also be hurtful and mean.  It can be used as a weapon in both our personal and political lives. And sometimes it’s tricky to recognize when we or our political campaigns cross the line.  Personally, we sense in our hearts when we intend to hurt.   With candidates in a campaign, however, the rules are more fluid. In an open society candidates and public officials expect that their words and lives will be openly examined, criticized and even caricatured.  Some of this is so mean-spirited it has nothing to do with humor. The daisy-picking child/nuclear bomb TV-spot against Barry Goldwater in 1964, the Willie Horton ad against Michael Dukakis in 1988, and the swift boating of John Kerry in 2004 were malicious. Although politically effective, they were mean-spirited not funny. Real political humor, though, can be healthy for a democracy. 

 
I heard recently that Vladimir Putin and his new sidekick President Dmitry Medvedev have made it a crime in Russia to make fun of the government and government leaders.  That will only bring an even darker winter to Russia and bodes ill for its democracy -- if not for its mental health. Thank God we can still make fun of government officials and candidates in the United States, even if some call it unpatriotic. That’s why I like cartoonists -- and my Voldemort sticker.  The laughter shines some sunlight onto government and into political campaigns. God knows they need it.  So do we.

 

As I write this column the country is still mourning the death of Tim Russert, NBC News Washington Bureau Chief and moderator of “Meet the Press.” I identified with Russert, with his Irish lineage, his Catholic education, his blue-collar background and Western New York roots. I mourn him and think of the Irish love ballad: “it’s the warmness of welcome, the pangs of farewell; it’s the loneliness left by the funeral knell.”  I am lonely. Much of the nation is lonely. Although he was a tough interviewer and a shrew cross-examiner, he was never mean.  He had a sense of humor and a respect for people.  Even his adversaries never found him mean-spirited and remained his friend.  He brought clarity, humanity, joy and laughter to the political world where they are too often absent.

 

We need that joy and laughter. It insulates and cushions us. As the American clergyman Henry Ward Beecher reminds us, “A person without a sense of humor is like a wagon without springs; jolted by every pebble in the road.”

 
Chortling to myself, I finish this column with a few more observations on “Republicans for Voldemort”. Jonathan Rosenbers in a comic script on the bumper sticker wrote, “Finally, we have a candidate without a hidden agenda.”
 
My favorite reaction, however, came from someone who knew Harry Potter and Voldemort well and also understood the political scene.  In fairness I must also disclose he was a committed Democrat.  Straight-faced but with a twinkle in his eye, he said to me, “I didn’t think Dick Cheney was on the ticket this year.”
 
We should look for humor. It is always present. As Dr. Seuss teaches our children, “From there to here, and here to there, funny things are everywhere” even in politics -- especially in politics.  Let’s laugh at them.

 
Daniel O'Rourke is a married Catholic priest. Retired from the administration at SUNY Fredonia, he lives in Cassadaga, NY.  His column appears in The Observer, Dunkirk, NY on the second and fourth Thursday each month. He has published "The Spirit at Your Back," a book of previous columns. You may purchased it or send comments to orourke@netsync.net