U.S. Senator Lamar Alexander, a Republican up for reelection, got some
bigtime help from Democratic friends Friday night. Memphis mayor Willie Herenton
hosted a reception for Alexander at the Majestic Grille in downtown Memphis in
tandem with MPact Memphis, 100 Black Men, and the Black Business Association of
Memphis. And Shelby County Mayor A C Wharton, who along with Herenton has
endorsed Alexander, was also an attendee.
The affair was described by Alexander’s staff as
“political” but not a campaign event. The senator faces opposition in November from Democratic nominee Bob Tuke of Nashville.
Both in a brief interview and in his prepared remarks,
Alexander, the GOP’s caucus chairman in the Senate, defended the amended $700
billion bailout bill just passed by both houses of Congress and signed on Friday
by President Bush.
Acknowledging that the bailout plan was unpopular with the
American public, Alexander compared the situation confronting members of
Congress to one in which “a big ole wreck out on the highway” had occurred,
blocking other drivers whose first instinct was to get angry and blame the
careless drivers who’d caused the accident.
Among the blocked vehicles might be one car “carrying money
for your auto loan,” others carrying the funds for “your mortgage loan or
somebody’s farm credit loan,” and yet another “carrying the money for your
payroll check.” Under those circumstances, the senator argued, the only feasible
thing to do was to clear the highway of the obstructing vehicles, “getting ’em
off the highway,” so that ordinary commerce could resume.
That, in essence, was what had been done with the bailout
package. “Next week we can have our philosophical discussion about what we can
do so as not to have another wreck. But this was Step One in making this
economic downtown shorter and easier to get out of.”
In his introduction of Alexander, Herenton had praised the
senator for his work on behalf of a ” rescue package vital to this community
getting back on its feet. Boasting a friendship with Alexander that went back
two decades (“three and a half decades,” Alexander would offer by way of
correction), the Memphis mayor said, “His service deserves the support of all
great American thinkers and all great Tennesseans.”
Alexander told reporters the bailout package had been
improved during the past week with add-ons, the so-called “extenders,” that
included several provisions useful to Tennesseans – including a continuation of the
state and local income-tax deduction for Tennessee residents and a solar tax
credit that would benefit Sharpe Manufacturing.
Asked to appraise the previous evening’s debate performance
by Republican vice-presidential candidate Sarah Palin, Alexander said that
Palin had performed well in the debate , especially when compared to Democratic
opponent Joe Biden, whose Washington insider lingo might strike most Americans
as “a foreign language.”
The senator added, “That was the second time – the first
was the convention – when she had to get up in front of 70 million Americans and
perform. Not many people could do that.”
