By far the best thing to come out of last week's spate of arrests of legislators and other hangers-on is that you, reader, will be spared an end-of-the-legislative-session wrap-up column. (Seriously, consider yourself fortunate.) Instead, we can bring you what you really came for, our own very special set of awards: the Tennessee Waltzies.
The Delicious-Political-Irony Award goes not to a person, but to a U.S. Supreme Court decision, Evans v. United States, which allows authorities to apply the federal "Hobbs Act" to incidents of bribery by public officials, even though the original intent of the legislation was to crack down on big-time federal racketeering and extortion (labor unions, mobs, etc.). We're going out on a limb here, suspecting that Democrats John Ford, Kathryn Bowers, Roscoe Dixon and Ward Crutchfield aren't big fans of Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas and his preference for the strict construction of statutory law. But, ironically, it was Thomas, joined by fellow conservatives Antonin Scalia and Chief Justice William Rehnquist, who dissented in Evans based upon that jurisprudential philosophy, arguing that the majority of the court was stretching the meaning of the Hobbs Act well beyond its original intent. If just two more justices had joined with them, the federal government couldn't have prosecuted this case. (State officials could have, but the question is, would they have?)
The Most-Insightful-Observation-to-Come-Out-of-Memphis Award goes to the anonymous individual who posted the following on a Memphis television station's website: "Although I've been in Memphis only three years, I've watched and listened to all the commentary about local politics. Most of it has both disgusted and saddened me. Almost every comment, editorial and interview I've seen vilifies the Fords for their corruption, yet they and others like them are still elected. Memphians truly deserve what they've gotten. Let's face it folks: until we stand up, shut up and do something about it, its not going to change." Amen to that—a refreshing departure from the ludicrous they-were-busted-because-they-were-black excuses coming from other quarters, including one of the defendants themselves.
The Wrong-Place-at-the-Wrong-Time Award goes to the following six poor saps who joined as sponsors of the legislation that became the McGuffin for the entire operation: Sen. Jeff Miller (R-Cleveland), and Reps. Ulysses Jones (D-Memphis), Charles Sargent (R-Franklin), Larry Miller (D-Memphis), Paul Stanley (R-Memphis) and Joe Armstrong (D-Knoxville). It appears that none of these people did anything wrong and that their names were on the bill for the usual innocent reasons. (They supported the general concept, they did it as a favor for the main sponsor, they wanted to have their name on something that would pass, etc.) In fact, the inclusion of these folks actually helped the investigation, given that they added to the verisimilitude of the sham bill. Regardless, the principle of guilt by association ensures they will be forever linked with legislation that brought down four of their colleagues, making it easy for campaign opponents to put them on the defensive whenever they please. Our recommendation to these guys: request an official statement from the feds affirming that you were neither suspects nor "persons of interest" in the investigation.
The Thanks-Ever-So-Much-for-Your-Half-Baked-Holier-Than-Thou-Conventional-Wisdom Award goes to every political pundit, newspaper editorial writer (not this newspaper, it should be noted) and every other self-appointed deep thinker out there who told us all at the start of session just how wonderful Lt. Gov. John Wilder was and just how perfectly awful those nasty Senate Republicans were for wanting to replace that not-so-grand old man with GOP Sen. Ron Ramsey. Never mind that Ramsey was a perfectly logical choice given that he was the leader of the senate's majority party and given that he was not a meandering octogenarian with a penchant for saying head-poundingly ridiculous things. Thanks to you folks, we all had the privilege of watching Tennessee's most embarrassing state senator (now that you-know-who has resigned) make a perfect fool of himself by implying that the arrestees were victims of a federal entrapment scheme and offering the following observation: "public sentiment is not constructive, it's destructive." That's right, according to John Wilder, public sentiment is destructive to our representative democracy.
The Perfect-Timing Award goes to Nashville's own Mayor Bill Purcell. Just two days after proposing not just one, but two, tax increases for the city, the legislative corruption cases shoved the local budget debate off the radar screen. It will be back soon enough, but for now the mayor's office can prepare responses to the initial reactions of its proposal without any distracting media glare.
And, on the flipside, the Perfectly-Awful-Timing Award goes, naturally, to Congressman Harold Ford Jr. who officially announced his candidacy for the U.S. Senate less than 24 hours before his uncle was hauled off to jail. Let the will-he-decide-to-withdraw watch commence.
Comments (0)