Tag: Bob Corker

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Politics Politics Feature

Solitary Man: Reflections on John McCain

CREDIT: Traceywood | Dreamstime.com

I first encountered John McCain in 1983 when I was a newish grunt on the Washington scene, then serving as an aide to a Democratic congressman, Bill Alexander of Arkansas. McCain himself was in his first year as a member of the House, not yet the iconic presence that the world would get to know so well.

My only awareness of McCain was gained from seeing the occasional appearances on the House floor of the then relatively unknown Arizonan, from my perch in the office of the Chief Deputy Majority Whip (that was Alexander) in the Capitol. One of the major issues confronting the House that year was President Ronald Reagan‘s decision to infuse American military forces as “peacekeepers” into the cauldron of Lebanon, at the time the focus of an ongoing civil war involving guerilla-level combat between factions and near anarchy.

Like most Democrats — in particular the party leadership, which he represented — my boss viewed the situation with alarm. Republicans, on the other hand, tended to fall in line behind the president. The debate on the floor followed that all-too-predictable binary course, until McCain, a freshman GOP member, took the floor and stated his unequivocal opposition to what he viewed as an unnecessary and dangerous course.

Traceywood | Dreamstime.com

Senator John McCain

McCain was no peacenik. He had been a military careerist until leaving the Navy in the wake of an active career as a pilot who, as we all would subsequently learn, had been downed in a mission over North Vietnam and confined and tortured for years as a P.O.W. His opposition to the Lebanese involvement was a matter of Realpolitik, earned via experience. It turned out to be prescient when hundreds of Marines were killed in their barracks by a truck-driving suicide bomber. Shortly thereafter, Reagan withdrew the remainder of the American military contingent.

All that was in the future on the day of McCain’s speech in the House. Later that day, I was walking from one point to another on the grounds of Capitol Hill when I saw McCain treading the same pathway, more or less, and coming in my direction.

As we crossed paths, I spoke to him, identified myself, and told him how impressed I had been by his speech. McCain gave me that grateful, vaguely mischievous, and somewhat self-satisfied smile that would later become so familiar on national television, and thanked me. There were many times later on when I would reflect on the fact of my getting so early a glimpse of the great contrarian — and on the occasion of his first official maverick act, no less.

Subsequently, of course, McCain moved on to the Senate, became a truly national figure, and made an upstart race for president in 2000 aboard his famously media-friendly “Straight Talk Express” presidential-campaign tour bus, winning the New Hampshire primary but later falling short to the well-endowed establishment campaign of George W. Bush.

McCain was well aware of the corrupting power of big money, having suffered from it in that first presidential race. Working in harness with Wisconsin Senator Russ Feingold, a Democrat, McCain sponsored the McCain-Feingold Act, which imposed reasonable curbs on campaign fund-raising, until a conservative Supreme Court’s “Citizens United” decision in 2010 in effect nullified it. 

Meanwhile, McCain warmed up for another presidential run in 2008 and, as part of that mission, came to Memphis in April 2007 to address the Economics Club. Before a turnaway crowd at the University of Memphis Holiday Inn, he unveiled an economics program that was hardcore conservative Republican — all laissez-faire and belt-tightening measures. 

Not very exciting, but the kind of thing, he might have hoped, that would soften the GOP establishment’s  memory of him as the reform-minded party-line-crossing outlier who had almost stolen the party’s presidential nomination away from Bush in 2000.

The fact was, McCain’s second presidential campaign was slumping badly, and at a press conference after his economics speech, encouraged by his courtly manner as he insisted on shaking hands in advance with each member of the attendant media, I made bold to ask him to account for his relatively dismal fund-raising thus far (he was in third place in Republican ranks, behind both Massachusetts governor Mitt Romney and former New York mayor Rudy Giuliani).  

The senator said flatly, “Because I didn’t do a better job.” Asked why that was, McCain answered, “Because I’m not competent enough, I guess.” It’s hard to imagine another candidate being quite that self-effacing — or candid.

Competent fund-raiser or not, McCain had the staying power, or the stature, or the what-have-you to endure in that race, even when most of his money ran out and his staff evaporated. Not quite a year later, he had won the New Hampshire primary again, would go on to win the Republican nomination and ran an honorable race for the presidency against Barack Obama.

Along with his defiant independent streak and his compulsive truth-telling, McCain was also blessed, it is reliably said, with a short fuse and an explosive, near-volcanic temper. Hearing about this, I made it a point to ask each of Tennessee’s two U.S. Senators if they had ever been on the receiving end of it. 

Said Lamar Alexander: “Yes, I have,” adding after a pause, “There are very few of us [senators] who haven’t.”  Said Bob Corker: “Yes. Very early on, I was a party to that. It’s not an urban myth. It’s just a fact.”

Corker added: “But at the same time, John has been a true American hero, and he feels very strongly about the positions he holds, and when he disagrees with you, he lets you know.” 

It is well known, surely,  that McCain had serious disagreements with Donald Trump, and equally well known that he let the president know — most recently after Trump’s Helsinki summit with Russia’s Vladimir Putin, when, bravely waiting out his inevitable death from incurable brain cancer in Arizona, McCain issued a statement lamenting that, in “one of the most disgraceful performances by an American president,” Trump had “abased himself … abjectly before a tyrant.”

John McCain never abased himself, not in captivity in Hanoi and not in his distinguished public life thereafter. We should salute this solitary, honorable man, even if Trump won’t.  

• With several of its newly elected eight members-to-be looking on, the 13-member Shelby County Commission that was elected in 2014 held its last public meeting on Monday. They voted to override the veto of outgoing county Mayor Mark Luttrell of a commission ordinance prohibiting the mayor’s office from hiring special counsel to sue the commission — one last shot in a two-year battle between the legislative and executive powers. 

And, with time running out, the commission shelved a resolution calling for change in the functioning of EDGE, the city/county board charged with spurring economic growth. As one of her last acts, outgoing Commission chair Heidi Shafer has appointed a blue-ribbon task force of returning commissioners and community leaders to begin meeting with an eye toward making recommendations for further action.

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Opinion The Last Word

Bredesen Can’t Be GOP-Lite

CREDIT: Wikimedia Commons

There’s talk of a “blue wave” sweeping the country in 2018. It already has elevated Democrats in impossible places such as Alabama and Pennsylvania and scared the likes of Paul Ryan into retirement.

And it is going to graze Tennessee like a fizzling tropical depression. I don’t want it to be true, and I hope I’m wrong. When it comes to Bob Corker’s soon-to-be-vacant U.S. Senate seat, Tennessee has two options: flip it or get used to hearing the words “Senator Marsha Blackburn.” Recent polling has shown Blackburn lagging behind her opponent, former Governor Phil Bredesen, by up to a double-digit margin, prompting behind-the-scenes pleading for Corker to reconsider. Of the 600 registered voters surveyed, more independents said they would pick Bredesen over Blackburn.

Cool. So this strategy of finding the one Democrat who has proven an ability to win a statewide election in Tennessee is working so far. Not my first choice, but keep doing what you’re doing, I guess. How long will it work if he sticks with the message of “There’s no reason the president and I can’t work together?” Just because half the state hasn’t figured out that nobody can work with the guy doesn’t mean their votes are gettable. Trusting Marsha to stick to her proven track record of being The Actual Worst and hoping it all works out seems a little naive.

Wikimedia Commons

Phil Bredesen

The president announced on a Friday night he’d done another little war, and totally not to distract us from the avalanche of scandal that befell him in that particular week, by the way. No dog-wagging here. He doesn’t even like dogs. He’s a germaphobe, okay? I checked Twitter, as I usually do when these things go down, and I swear I heard a TV-show record-scratch sound effect when I read this tweet from Bredesen:

“The President is justified in his actions. The chemical attacks in Syria compel us to act decisively in cooperation with our allies. If the President intends further action, I trust Congress will take up its Constitutional war-making responsibilities. Godspeed to our military.”

I usually abhor articles about other people’s tweets. I think it’s lazy. But I have been stewing about this particular post for days now, and I just have to ask: why? Why tweet this, Phil Bredesen? Who put you up to this? Who even asked? It looks to me as if someone got a little too confident and decided to let that tepid neoliberal flag fly on a Friday night.

If Marsha Blackburn wins the Senate election, it will not be because the people of Tennessee abhor net neutrality and funding disaster relief, and love Blackburn’s folksy brand of Bought and Paid For. It will be because the Democratic candidate let his eagerness to be Reach Across the Aisle Guy overshadow the fact that there is ostensibly a (D) next to his name. “Reaching across the aisle” isn’t a thing anymore. It’s a nice notion, but it doesn’t work when the people on the other side only reach back only to steal your watch.

“Bomb first, explain later” is never a good look. “The president was justified” is not the way to say that. Especially as a Democrat. Especially with this president.

“I trust Congress” should have stayed in the Drafts folder. Nobody trusts Congress. Not even Congress trusts Congress. That’s why Trump didn’t ask for their permission. Even though the majority party has not yet displayed a willingness to defy him, they can’t afford for their war votes to become a talking point when they’re up for re-election.

I’m out of the social media management game for now, but if I worked on the Bredesen campaign, I would have advised staying mum on this and focusing on localized issues. But here’s what he should have said: What Assad is doing is wrong, and we deplore his actions. We turn to violence only as a last resort and in a way that minimizes harm to civilians. The Syrian people need our support, and as your Senator I’ll do my best to ensure any future action is taken with their human rights in mind.

The state of Tennessee ranks in the bottom 10 in education, median household income, and employment rate. We’re top 15 in opioid deaths. There’s plenty of evidence that the people who represent this state in our federal government aren’t fighting for us. Pandering to the people who elected them — the same ones who’d rather die than vote Democrat — won’t get it done.

Jen Clarke is a digital marketing specialist and an unapologetic Memphian.

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Politics Politics Beat Blog

Weekend Review: Focus on Willie Herenton, Phil Bredesen, and Bob Corker

CREDIT: Jackson Baker

Jackson Baker

Bredesen, Corker, Herenton

Willie Herenton became an epochal cultural figure upon his election in 1991 as Memphis’ first elected African-American mayor. He went on to run the city for 18 years before retiring under pressure in 2009. He tried a comeback in 2010, with a race for the 9th District Congressional seat, but lost by a 79-to-21 percent margin to Congressman Steve Cohen in the overwhelmingly black district.

Now Herenton is embarked on a new race for mayor in 2019, announced last Thursday in the wake of the MLK50 commemorations in honor of the 1968 sanitation workers’ strike and assassination in Memphis of Martin Luther King Jr. Though the former mayor’s announcement engendered real excitement for many of his former supporters, some political observers see his race against Cohen — haphazard, impulsive, underfunded, and ill-prepared — as foreshadowing the likely result of the 78-year-old Herenton’s latest surprise comeback attempt.

Herenton’s declared reason for running again is to “complete the mission” of Dr. King, and the difficulty of his undertaking is amplified by Mayor Jim Strickland’s relatively good 2015 showing among black voters and by Strickland’s success in increasing black business contracts with the city and in removing Confederate war memorials.

Herenton disclosed some of his views in an interview this week with podcaster Brian Clay at Crosstown Concourse: “I had the privilege of marching with Dr. King on two occasions when he came to Memphis, 28 years ago,” said Herenton, then a Memphis city schools principal and later schools superintendent. “I stood in front of City Hall wearing an ‘I Am a Man’ sign. I always had a social conscience. I’m always addressing injustice.”

The former mayor said that “50 years later, I had to look in the mirror again.” He quoted the Socratic axiom: “The unexamined life is not worth living.” Herenton added, ”We have become a very, very poor city. … We cannot separate economics from education, history has taught me.” He spoke of “a correlation” between failing schools, failing health care, housing, and numerous other issues.

But Herenton cautioned voters to have “reasonable expectations” and said that, while he could promise to “give the very best managerial skill, vision, and boldness” he had, “no magic wand and could not by himself, cure ‘generational poverty.’” He said, “I’m not going to promise you that poverty is going to go away or that people will stop killing each other.”
The former mayor faulted himself for not having prepared a proper successor during his 18 years as mayor. While making a point of not criticizing the current administration of Strickland, Herenton said he had the “energy and passion now to make some needed changes. It’s a new economy now. … Memphis cannot be a growth city paying people starvation wages.”

In addition to earlier reports in the Flyer, here is additional information on recent appearances and statements in Memphis by former Governor Phil Bredesen and retiring U.S. Senator Bob Corker:

In an interview with the Flyer last week, Bredesen, now a Democratic candidate for the U.S. Senate, made it clear that his middle-of-the-road campaign rhetoric is no accident: “In our state, I need to capture a lot of middle-of-the-road voters — even a few of what I would call economic Republicans.” To that end, the former governor acknowledged he was “not crazy” about the Affordable Care Act, but “it’s on the books, and we’ve got to try to make it work.”

In general, said Bredesen, the Democratic Party has “narrowed too much” and adopted “too many litmus tests. … We have to win if we want to govern again.”

Bredesen theorized about the desirability of having a close working relationship with Republican Senator Lamar Alexander, if elected: “I haven’t talked to Lamar about linking, but he’s a good example of people in both parties who, if they got together, could make a comprehensive start to be a block of 10 or 12 to start to do something. I’d like to be a part of a movement like that.”

Two days later, Alexander announced his support in the Senate race for fellow Republican Marsha Blackburn.

Referring to retiring GOP Senator Bob Corker as “a thought leader in the Senate” and a “straight shooter,” Mayor Strickland introduced Corker at a luncheon meeting of the rotary club of Memphis at Clayborn Temple last week.

Corker said he continued to have disagreements with President Trump, though he hadn’t made a point of emphasizing the fact on each occasion. But, among other things, the Senator declared that the president’s tweeting habit was “very harmful, and he expressed concern about the strong likelihood that Trump intends to abrogate U.S. adherence to the current multinational agreement withholding sanctions on Iran if that nation maintains a freeze on its development of nuclear-weapon capability.

Corker said that Iran could be “off and running” on a nuclear pathway if the agreement ceased to be, and he said a better course than renouncing the agreement would be to seek modification, in tandem with America’s European allies, of the pact’s current 10-year “sunset” provision. Otherwise, he said, it was doubtful that the Europeans would follow Trump’s lead in scrapping the agreement.

“I personally think we’d be better off keeping the agreement in place,” Corker said.
The senator also deplored Congress’ recent passage of a $1.3 trillion omnibus spending bill but said, “The system works better than you think. … Believe it or not, Washington reflects the country much more fully than you think.”

And he said he’d been “terribly impressed” by the vigor and commitment of the students from Parkland High School who have launched an ongoing national campaign for anti-gun legislation.

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Politics Politics Feature

Political Works in Progress During MLK50 Week

CREDIT: Jackson Baker

In this week of worldwide remembrance of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., focused on his martyrdom here in Memphis, many eminent visitors will have come to celebrate his name and commemorate his mission. One of the first to speak on the subject was Eric Holder, the former U.S. Attorney General under President Obama.

Holder, introduced by the newly elected Democratic U.S. Senator from Alabama, Doug Jones, was keynote speaker at a Monday luncheon at the Peabody held in tandem with a two-day symposium co-sponsored by the University of Memphis Law School and the National Civil Rights Museum. 

Holder reminded his listeners that, “Dr. King’s dream has not been fully realized,” further noting that there has been backsliding on voting rights, criminal justice reform, and the unexpected re-empowerment of white supremacists and white nationalists. The struggle for social justice, Holder said, remains as difficult as it was during the time of King, who, he noted, was seen by many as a “threatening, polarizing, and disliked figure.”

“The age of bullies and bigots is not entirely behind us,” Holder continued. “We have not yet reached the promised land.” He suggested that, as was the case with King, “it is necessary to be indignant and impatient so that it impels us to take action. … We cannot look back toward a past that was comforting to few. That is not how to make America great.”

Holder was complimentary toward Memphis. “I love this city, its energy, its sense of possibility, and its extraordinary progress,” he said, specifically paying tribute to the 901 Take ‘Em Down movement for its successful agitation to remove symbols of Confederate domination from the Memphis landscape.

But he enumerated several problems still much in need of correcting, including continued economic inequality and systematic voter suppression and gerrymandering.

• The subject of voting rights was the subject of one of the most well-attended symposium panels conducted Monday, moderated by UM law professor Steve Mulroy. It was also one of the subjects on the mind of former Tennessee Governor Phil Bredesen, now running as a Democratic candidate for the U.S. Senate and one of the many political figures of note on hand for the MLK50 week of commemorations.

In an interview with the Flyer at the Peabody on Monday, Bredesen mentioned the existence of various “efforts to suppress African American voters [as] one of the things as senator I’d like to address.”

Bredesen said as the former state’s chief executive, he was able to solve vexing problems by governing from the middle, working with both parties, including those he called “economic Republicans.” If elected Senator, he said he would continue in that vein.

As a successful health-care executive before entering politics, Bredesen said he would address the issue of the nation’s medical insurance system, currently at risk because of uncertainty about the fate of the Affordable Care Act. “The act is still on the books,” he said, “and we’ve got to make it work. As was the case with Medicare and Social Security,” he added, “it requires modifications.”

Bredesen sees his ability to compromise across the political aisle as an asset in his forthcoming Senate race against expected Republican foe, the ultra-conservative U.S. Representative Marsha Blackburn, whom he currently leads in statewide polls.

• Meanwhile, retiring incumbent Republican Senator Bob Corker, the man whom Bredesen and Blackburn would replace, was also in town, addressing members of the Rotary club of Memphis on Tuesday and warning of a spendthrift Congress and the importance of the Iran nuclear pact. “The President should know: you can only tear up the agreement one time,” he said. (More at memphisflyer.com, Political Beat blog.)

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Politics Politics Beat Blog

Shelby GOP Does Another Lincoln Day, With a Few Differences

CREDIT: JB

JB

Senators Tim Scott and Bob Corker at Lincoln Day

As usual, the ballroom of the University of Memphis Holiday Inn on Saturday was filled to capacity for this year’s version of the Shelby County Republican Party’s Lincoln Day banquet. But, in what is shaping up as a year of serious competition in GOP primary races, there were some interesting deviations in party harmony.

A couple of them came from the event’s keynote speaker, U.S. Senator Tim Scott of South Carolina, who told an odd joke that was probably meant affectionately but came off, no doubt inadvertently, as seeming to be at the expense of U.S. Rep. Diane Black, who had introduced him and whom Scott had acknowledged to be a friend.

The joke’s beginning was itself inauspicious. Scott began to describe a “dream” in which U.S. Senator Bob Corker, U.S. Rep. Marsha Blackburn, and Black had all died the same day. As “big shots,” they were all instructed by St. Peter about the special rules of Heaven. Corker, caught trying to turn a real estate deal, was the first to be charged with a transgression.

The Senator ended up being chained to Democratic Senate Leader Chuck Schumer as a punishment, while “a voice that sounded like thunder” proclaimed: “Bob Corker,you have broken the rules of Heaven, and this is your punishment, for all eternity!”

Next, Blackburn was chained to House Democratic Leader Nancy Pelosi for some obsure misprision, and the same voice thundered, “Marsha Blackburn,you have broken the rules of Heaven, and this is your punishment, for all eternity!”

Then the clincher. In the dream Scott saw Rep. Black chained to Super Bowl quarterback Tom Brady, and, inevitably, the thunderous voice began to sound again: “Tom Brady, you have broken the rules of Heaven….” Etc., etc.

That quirky knee-slapper was followed immediately with a sentimental recollection by Scott, an African-American and the first Republican of his race to be elected to the Senate from South Carolina, of his grandfather’s being enabled to cast a vote for Barack Obama as the first African American to be elected President. The fact that Obama was a Democrat apparently compelled the Senator to tell the Republican audience, “Of course, I canceled his vote out.”

All of that was the fun stuff. But there was some intra-party dissension for real, in the course of the evening — some of it stemming from the fact of Black, one of several Republican candidates for Governor, being asked to introduce Scott, whose presence she had been helpful in arranging.

That didn’t sit well with the camp of at least one other candidate, former state Economic Development Commissioner Randy Boyd. According to several accounts, Chip Saltsman, Boyd’s campaign manager, confronted County Republican chair Lee Mills, impresario for this year’s Lincoln Day affair, and upbraided him for what the Boyd people saw as giving Black an unfair advantage. Saltsman allegedly used the ‘p’ word.

Meanwhile, Boyd’s press aide, Bonnie Brezina, got into something of a tangle with Shelby County Commissioner Terry Roland, a candidate for County Mayor who had purchased three tables at the banquet for friends and supporters. According to Roland and others, Brezina attempted to claim one of the tables, close to the dais, for Boyd and supporters, and an argument ensued before she relented.

Saturday was otherwise a good day for Boyd, Saltsman, and Brazina, who opened up a Shelby County headquarters for the gubernatorial candidate in the same Poplar Plaza space that had been used by Jim Strickland in his victorious 2015 race for Mayor. On hand for the affair were such supporters as Shelby County Mayor Mark Luttrell and two new Boyd endorsers, Germantown Mayor Mike Palazzolo and County Commissioner David Reaves, all three of whom delivered extended statements of praise for Boyd.

Another candidate who did a previous event in Memphis before attending the Lincoln Day festivities was Beth Harwell, the Speaker of the state House of Representatives. At the request of former Memphis Mayor A C Wharton and Shelby County Defender Stephen Busch, both principals of the Adverse Childhood Experiences Foundation, Harwell went to the South Memphis headquarters of the Foundation to discuss with them the Foundation’s activities in mitigating the effects on children of adverse experience early in life.

From a news-media point of view, the dominant point of interest at Lincoln Day was the chance to ask Senator Corker about newly prevalent rumors that he is reconsidering his previously expressed decision not to run for reelection. To several reporters individually, and to a whole scrum of them after the banquet, Corker said he had nothing new to say about the matter and disclaimed any adverse feeling about either Rep. Blackburn, who has become the obvious frontrunner in the GOP primary, or “the Democrat running,” former Governor Phil Bredesen.

JB

Germantown Mayor Mike Palazzolo, gubernatorial candidate Randy Boyd, Commissioner David Reaves, Mayor Mark Luttrell, and Boyd aide Bonnie Brezina at the candidate’s Memphis headquarters opening

JB

House Speaker/gubernatorial candidate Beth Harwell, Public Defender Stephen Busch and former Mayor A C Wharton discuss the work of the ACE foundation on Saturday.

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Letter From The Editor Opinion

Taxing Times

CREDIT: Jackson Baker

“The average American family would get a $4,000 raise under the president’s tax cut plan. So how could any member of Congress be against it?”

That was Sarah Huckabee Sanders, speaking about President Trump’s tax “plan” last week. Trump claimed (falsely, amazingly enough) that his plan would be the “largest tax cut in American history.” Not even close, but who’s even counting the lies these days?

As writer Franklin Leonard smartly pointed out: “If I give 10 apples to one person and no apples to nine people, the average person has one apple. Why are nine people mad at me?”

This is a spot-on analogy for Trump’s approach. The real tax breaks under the plans being put forth by the administration and the GOP will go to the wealthy and corporations. The middle class will get squat, and as a bonus, the plan just passed by the Senate cuts $473 billion from Medicare and nearly $1 trillion from Medicaid over the next 10 years. These cuts will affect 125 million Americans.

Some break, eh?

Factcheck.org analyzed the Senate tax plan and released a report that stated in part: “For the highest earners — those in the top 1 percent and top 0.1 percent — nearly all would see lower taxes. Ninety percent of the top 1 percent — those earning about $900,000 and above in 2027 — would get a tax cut, averaging $234,050.”
Conversely, middle-income households ($50,000 to $90,000 incomes) would receive an average tax break of $660, and, according to Politifact.com, “by 2027, more than one of every four middle-income families would pay more in taxes.”

As has been the case in recent weeks, there was pushback from Tennessee Senator Bob Corker, who urged the president to quit negotiating before the final budget process begins. Corker has seldom been a warrior for the middle class, but at least he’s not groveling before Trump. That won’t be the case with the Republicans running to take Corker’s seat in 2018 — Congresswoman Marsha Blackburn and former Congressman Stephen Fincher.

Fincher was in the Flyer offices last week being interviewed by Senior Editor Jackson Baker. He talked a good game: “People want somebody to represent us and not fall into the trap of status quo politics, caring only about the next rung up on the ladder,” Fincher said. “Marsha’s a career politician, a career candidate, used to being on Fox News every night. I’m just a farmer from Frog Jump.”

That sounds good, but then the Frog Jump farmer added: “I intend to support President Trump. I think his policies are 100 percent spot-on.”

Lord help us. I keep wondering when the American public will begin to see this Tea Party/Trump agenda for what it is — a total capitulation to corporatism and oligarchy. It is not “Christian.” It is not “conservative.” It is not “patriotic.” It is a greed-based perversion of our democracy. And Trump’s divisive, childish, self-absorbed antics are dividing us more with each passing day.

I posted a column by satirist Andy Borowitz on Facebook the other day. The title was: “Trump Says He Is Only President in History with Courage to Stand Up to War Widows.” Borowitz “quoted” Trump as saying “You look at guys like Obama and Clinton and the Bushes, when it came to war widows, they all blinked. For years, we weren’t winning at widows.”

I count it as an indication of how far down the Trump rabbit hole we have gone that some people who read this weren’t sure it was satire. “Is this real?” one woman wrote.

Not yet. But when the president of the United States is so mentally fragile that he would attack the pregnant widow of a soldier killed in combat and call her a liar on Twitter, we’re getting close.

One assumes Fincher and Blackburn would approve.

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Editorial Opinion

Trump’s “Achievements”

We have now reached the final quarter of the calendar year, and one of the modish political commentaries of the season is a lament, usually delivered with utmost solemnity by a talking head on cable TV, that President Trump has failed to deliver on his legislative agenda — the idea being that is a seriously unfortunate mischance for the nation.

Really? We can barely restrain ourselves from having a celebration and leading a march down Mid-America Mall. Trump’s “agenda,” to dignify the whimsically erratic and ever-changing stream-of-consciousness that seems to guide him, is, so far as we can tell, a toxic and dangerous stew of things that augur no good for the nation. If only the protestation of the pundits, that the president can’t get anything done, were true! The fact is — and this definitely cools our joy — that Trump has been able to make some momentous changes by abundant use of the kind of independent presidential directive that he used to condemn when President Obama employed the strategy.

Obama issued his directives — on behalf of DACA (the Dream Act for Childhood Arrivals), for example — in order to advance overdue action when Republican-imposed gridlock had stymied it. Trump uses the device to achieve ends that have never even been taken through an established congressional process. To name just a few: Trump has struck down DACA, eliminated vital environmental safeguards, endangered an important international agreement restricting nuclear activity in Iran, and, most recently, withheld prime-the-pump funding from insurance companies participating in the Affordable Care Act.

And Trump is at war not only with congressional Democrats but with responsible members of his own Republican Party. Just ask the two GOP Senators from Tennessee — Bob Corker, whom circumstances have induced to itemize out loud the ways in which this president menaces the country, and Lamar Alexander, who has seen his bipartisan efforts to maintain the premium supports for the ACA undermined by Trump.

So we do not grieve over the president’s inability to achieve legislative results in tandem with Congress. The rude truth is that, like all tyrant types, he does enough harm on his own.

Bernal Smith As  members of the Memphis community — and the journalistic calling — we mourn the unexpected and untimely passing this weekend of Bernal Smith, the innovative and public-spirited publisher of The Tri-State Defender.  

Bernal Smith

During the four years of his stewardship, Rhodes graduate Smith advanced the long tradition of the Defender as an outlet for the aspirations of Memphis’ African-American population, made it a beacon as well for the entire local community, and all the while he was making the paper a fully independent local publication for the first time.

Beyond all that, Smith was a capital fellow, a genuinely companionable and compassionate friend, a consistent pleasure to be around for all who encountered him. His trajectory was toward ever more productive relationships and achievements. That he died in his prime is to be regretted and mourned. That he lived among us and left an important legacy behind is a memory for which we remain thankful.

Categories
Letter From The Editor Opinion

The Greatest Golfer Ever

CREDIT: © Kevin Carden | Dreamstime

Standing on the tee box, I survey the fairway, a slight downhill dogleg left. It’s a par four, but it’s not a long hole, especially for me. Birdie is a possibility if I can put the ball on the short grass, and believe me, that I can do. The morning sun is rising over the hills to the east. It’s going to be a good day. I can feel it.

I pull out my driver, insert a tee into the soft ground, and place my brand-new Titleist Pro V1 atop it. I step back and choose my line, just to the right of the first bunker, about 200 yards out. I take a couple of smooth practice swings, getting the feel, finding my tempo. As I address the ball, I’m feeling confident, like I own this course. I swing through the ball and feel it connect with the center of my clubhead. I watch as the little white ball — my ball — soars majestically into the morning air, splitting the fairway, just as I’d planned.

I’m a good golfer, believe me. In fact, many people say I’m the greatest golfer to ever be president. And that’s not by accident. It’s because I practice. I work at this game, that I can tell you. I never let more than a few days pass without getting out and playing a couple of rounds. Because that’s how you get good, folks. Not just sitting around the office and hoping you get better. You get out here and you put in the work.

And that’s why it makes me so mad when people don’t appreciate the job I’m doing for America. I need this time on the course to clear my head from all the negativity and the haters. Like that uppity little mayor in Puerto Rico. Did you see what I tweeted yesterday after I rolled in that seven-foot par putt on number 11? “Nobody could have done what I’ve done for #PuertoRico with so little appreciation. So much work!” Precisely.

The truth is, out here is where I think of all my good words — like “Rocket Man.” I thought that one up at Bedminster a couple weeks ago, right after that stupid double bogey that never would have happened if I hadn’t been thinking about North Korea. And out here on one of my courses is where I came up with the word “fake,” which not many people had heard of until I thought of it.

And fake news is everywhere, believe me. Just this week, Fake NBC reported that Rex Tillerson called me a “f**king moron.” Folks, it never happened, that I can tell you. If you believe that happened, then you believe the American people would elect a moron as president, and what does that say about your patriotism and your faith in our country, huh? Ever think about that?

And now, I’m having to deal with this bad little hombre from Tennessee, “Tiny Bomb” Corker. I’ve played golf with this guy, and let me tell you, he sucks. Can’t hit it out of his shadow, and he’s got a pretty small shadow, believe me. All through the round, I kept telling him he had a good short game, you know, because that’s a pretty good joke, right? Son of a bitch never cracked a smile.

Now he’s saying Tillerson and Mattis and Kelly are the only people keeping the country from chaos. And then he has the nerve to say the White House is an “adult daycare center.” Let me tell you, it’s Corker who’s the moron, not me. Think about it: If the country’s in such bad shape that the White House is in chaos and the president needs adult daycare, why are General Kelly and General Mattis (great generals, by the way, the best) always urging me to go play golf? Game, set, and match, folks.

Wow, those were good words. Where’s my phone?

Bruce VanWyngarden
brucev@memphisflyer.com

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Politics Politics Feature

Filling in the Blanks

If Rip Van Winkle happened to be not a fictional character from a previous century but  a current resident of Shelby County, Tennessee, he would not have had to nod off for a full score of years to wake up to a drastically changed landscape.
If he’d just blinked his eyes about midway through last week, he might have missed significant doings in the race for Shelby County mayor and that for United States senator.

State Senator Lee Harris

The first major change in the projected 2018 political lineup occurred on Wednesday with the carefully stage-managed entry into the county mayor’s race of Lee Harris, a Democratic state senator and former Memphis City Council member whose ambitions to keep on moving up in the political hierarchy were clearly signaled back in 2016 when he flirted with the idea of challenging 9th District Congressman Steve Cohen in that year’s Democratic primary but thought better of it.

As the senator confided in a recent conversation, “I can serve anywhere” — the choice of a particular political office being something of a pure variable.
Harris’ interests in running for county mayor had been obvious for most of the current year but were screened somewhat by an elaborate Alphonse-Gaston scenario in which he appeared to be deliberating along with close friend and University of Memphis law faculty colleague Steve Mulroy, a former county commissioner and a mayoral candidate in 2014, as to which of them would actually make the 2018 race.

The veil was dropped abruptly on Wednesday via an interview in The Commercial Appeal, a venue choice made after scouting out the possible advantages of announcing in other media.

Harris has a reputation as a progressive but one adept at working across the aisle, a fact indicated by his partnership with Republican lawmakers on criminal justice issues and with GOP state Senator Brian Kelsey in seeking to safeguard the Memphis Sand aquifer.
As of now, Harris would appear to be the likely Democratic nominee against the winner of the three-way Republican mayoral primary between County Commissioner Terry Roland, County Trustee David Lenoir, and Juvenile Court Clerk Joy Touliatos.

But two other eminences with credentials both with Shelby County Democrats and with the civic and social universe at large are still meditating on a possible mayoral entry. Bank of Bartlett president Harold Byrd holds numerous political IOUs as a political donor and broker, a holdover following from his past as a Democratic state representative and two previous near-runs for mayor, and ample access to financial support.

Equally well-positioned is Shea Flinn, currently an influential Memphis Chamber of Commerce vice president and a former progressive spark-plug on the city council. Flinn’s access to funding, too, would be considerable, and, in a political environment not over-stocked with charisma, he has more than his share.
Either one of these figures, running in the Democratic primary or even as an independent, would have a dramatic effect on the outcome.
The other major development last week was in the race for the seat being vacated by Republican U.S. Senator Bob Corker, whose decision not to seek reelection did not prevent him from continuing to make political waves. (See Editorial, p. 8) To no one’s surprise, 7th District U.S. Representative Marsha Blackburn, an arch-conservative, quickly announced as a GOP candidate, though she withheld her announcement until Governor Bill Haslam, a favorite of moderate Republicans, publicly opted out.

Another conservative GOP prospect is former 8th District Congressman Stephen Fincher. And the party’s centrist wing still hopes to convince Memphis philanthropist and longtime party eminence Brad Martin to make the race.

The state’s Democrats may end up fielding a serious candidate, as well. Chattanooga Mayor Andy Berke is seriously contemplating a Senate race, while Nashville lawyer and Iraq war vet James Mackler is already in the field.

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Politics Politics Feature

TN Races for Governor, Senator, Heat Up!

The deluge is upon us. At a geometrically increasing rate, aspirants for significant public office on the 2018 ballot are coming front and center with announcements of candidacy, kickoff events, and the like.

By the time this issue hits the streets, the previous week or so will  have seen appearances in Shelby County by two major gubernatorial candidates, a new announcement for Shelby County mayor, fund-raisers for several more candidates, and continuing waves of speculation about new candidacies to come.

It was already apparent that Tennessee will have a hotly contested governor’s race in both major political parties (and a couple of potshots delivered at primary opponents by Republicans Diane Black and Mae Beavers in Memphis appearances emphasized the point). 

Now, with the announcement by U.S. Senator Bob Corker that he won’t seek reelection next year, the number of prospective Senatorial candidates, Republican and Democrat, is beginning to proliferate as well.

It seems a certainty that Corker’s seat will be sought by 7th District U.S. Representative Marsha Blackburn (a Republican whose district included portions of Memphis before reapportionment in 2011). Governor Bill Haslam has also hinted he may run for the Senate, and there have been serious efforts to draft philanthropist/industrialist Brad Martin, a longtime Memphis GOP eminence who once served as a state representative but has figured mainly in the donor ranks for decades.

Possible new Senate entries on the Democratic side include former state senator and current Chattanooga Mayor Andy Berke, who has begun to send out emails advertising his interest, and current state Senator Jeff Yarbro of Nashville. Nashville lawyer and Iraq war vet James Mackler is already a declared candidate.

Inasmuch as Tennessee Democrats have been unable even to field serious candidates in statewide races for several years, this show of interest has to be a boost to the party faithful, especially since two Democrats of note — Nashville Mayor Karl Dean and state House minority leader Craig Fitzhugh of Ripley — are declared (and active) candidates for governor.

The state’s Republicans feel, with some justification, that the real races will be run in their primary ranks, and two of their hopefuls were in town during the last week — 6th District Congresswoman Black and state Senator Beavers (who resigned her seat in August to focus on her race for governor).

Black was the beneficiary of a meet-and-greet breakfast at Owen Brennan’s Restaurant on Friday, and her status as a potential front-runner was signaled by the number of mainstream Republicans on hand, including longtime GOP national committeeman and former RNC general counsel John Ryder, who introduced her.

Black presented herself as a laissez-faire conservative and a believer in local options whenever possible. She also made a strong pitch for “values” as an issue and suggested that “one or two opponents,” who went unnamed, had latched on to that issue in a copycat way.

One of those opponents may have been Beavers, who was the sole gubernatorial candidate to show up at a well-attended forum held at the Germantown home of John Williams on Saturday. She certainly hit the values issue hard, confirming that, as the Nashville Scene had averred, she saw Jesus as a universal answer to governmental problems. “True, but that’s not all I said” was her response.

Beavers filled in some of the other blanks: opposition to Common Core, to transgenders’ freedom to use bathrooms of their choice, to state aid of any kind to illegal immigrants, to medical marijuana, and to add-on taxes in general. (Meanwhile, her husband Jerry Beavers and other supporters on hand circulated in the crowd and accused other candidates, notably Black and House Speaker Beth Harwell of Nashville, of various insufficiencies.)