COLUMN LEFT / ALEXANDER COCKBURN : A Spotlight on Single-Issue Cynicism : The Packwood case shows how a politician’s support can deflect the character question.

Talk to Oregonians about Bob Packwood, their recently reelected senator, now beleaguered with charges of predatory sexual behavior, and steam comes out of the telephone. No one likes to feel taken, and suddenly it’s embarrassingly plain that Packwood had been taking them for years. It adds up to a sour parable about the nature of politics.

Start with the National Abortion Rights Action League (NARAL), whose board endorsed Packwood back in the spring. A few weeks later, Oregon NARAL, a separate group, endorsed both Packwood and his Democratic adversary, Rep. Les AuCoin.

Rumors about Packwood’s philandering have been floating about Washington and Oregon for years. So, did those folks in the NARAL meetings endorse the man by reason of his pro-choice position while knowing the extent of his coarse behavior towards women?

The policy of NARAL as a national political action committee dictates that when two “fully pro-choice” candidates run against each other, NARAL endorses the incumbent, said press secretary Sara Pines. That meant Packwood, and in New York it meant Republican Bill Green over Democrat Carolyn Maloney for Congress.

Pines then added, “We haven’t taken any position on the charges against Sen. Packwood. We look forward to a thorough investigation by the Senate. . . . This has been painful for everyone involved, Packwood and the women.”

Diane Lynn, director of Oregon NARAL, was less circumspect. “If I had known, if the board had known how he had been treating women for 24 years, he would not have got the endorsement.” To win in Oregon, Lynn said, Packwood “had to get women Democrats. He picked his issue, and it was very ingenious of him. Now our job is to hold the guy accountable for these actions. If he’d really believed in women’s rights he would never have smeared the women involved.”

An absolute pragmatist in the business of single-issue politics would presumably have had no qualms endorsing Packwood, even if every detail of his comportment toward women was known. By conceding that if they had known more about Packwood’s predatory behavior, Oregon NARAL’s board would have withheld endorsement, Diane Lynn was opening the door to the very antithesis of single-issue politics: Packwood’s character over and above his posture on choice.

Where, then, should a largely liberal group draw the line? If Packwood’s treatment of women mattered, why wouldn’t it matter that he was a major mover of the 1986 tax reform act that funneled wealth up the social pyramid and encouraged social arrangements that penalize low-income women?

How long can you look at politics through a single-issue optic? Peering down its gun-sights, the National Rifle Assn. would probably say, “Forever.” But does NARAL have as tight a perspective as the NRA, or does it see the matter of choice as part of a wider politics?

As it was, Oregon NARAL’s twin endorsement outraged many women who felt that Packwood was obviously awful, particularly in contrast to his liberal Democratic challenger, AuCoin. Packwood’s record on Central America through the Reagan-Bush years infuriated Oregon’s peace movement. Environmentalists were also angered by a Packwood volte-face as opportunistic as his position on choice.

For years, Packwood had won relatively good ratings from such organizations as the League of Conservation Voters. Then, in 1990, with a reelection fight in the offing, Packwood did a 180-degree turn. Scenting a change in political temperature on the entirely bogus “owls versus jobs” issue concocted by the timber industry, he nearly engineered an amendment to the Endangered Species Act that would have seriously sabotaged what effectiveness it still has. He campaigned on an anti-environmental platform.

It was a successful piece of single-issue cynicism, just as his single-issue cynicism on choice had helped him to earlier victories. Packwood played that game and NARAL played it with him. That’s why Oregonians are mad now, because the game smells so bad. Bellowing the loudest is the Portland newspaper, the Oregonian, which on Dec. 13 called for Packwood to resign.

But even now, the Oregonian suspends judgment on whether Packwood’s predatory behavior requires him to step down. It’s the senator’s handing of the scandal that angers the newspaper that endorsed him down the years. And that’s why the Packwood affair is such an interesting litmus test. It forces people to reveal what they expect from their politicians. The answers aren’t very pretty.