Friday, June 26, 2009
Politics / Woods Bredesen Discusses Going Off the Grid, Sherri Goforth and More
Posted by Jeff Woods on Fri, Jun 26, 2009 at 5:06 AM
Gov. Phil Bredesen, fresh from an economic development trip to Europe, sat down with reporters yesterday for a wide-ranging interview, as they say. Topics included governors who go off the grid, Sherri Goforth and Republican insensitivity, and cancer victims at risk of losing their TennCare coverage. Here's the Q&A:
Q: In light of the South Carolina governor's situation, do you think it's ever acceptable for a governor to go off the grid? Do you think the public expects too much from you in terms of knowing where you are at all times? You go on vacation and you don't tell reporters. When you were ill with your tick bite, you were in the hospital for at least a day before telling anyone.
Bredesen: There has never been an occasion that I can think of in which I was not instantly reachable. When I go places, people know where I am. Security knows where I am. I have a satellite phone with me so you've got a separate line of communication and all that. Somebody in elected office, I don't feel, has to tell everybody what they're doing every moment of the time. But I think they are obligated to be in contact, so that if there were an issue that came up that required the governor's attention, you've got an instant and quick way to do that. Last summer when the Volkswagen deal was coming to a close, that was the week on vacation that I spend with my son and I spent an inordinate amount of time on that vacation holding a satellite phone and talking to people, including the Volkswagen people. When you say off the grid, I think going to ground in the sense of you are not contactable in the case of an emergency is a huge problem. But the ability of a governor or anybody else to take a vacation and not necessarily announce to the whole world exactly what they're doing day by day I think is perfectly within the zone of reasonableness.
Q: What do you have to say about Sherri Goforth's email picture of Obama?
Bredesen: There have been two of those instances in the state here recently and I think certainly one of them was handled very appropriately. I have to say I'm a little concerned that probably less so these things but some of the things that were done over the last year with the Republican Party and the song that was put out, I think they're casting Tennessee in an unattractive light. I guess I would ask everybody in the state, whatever their politics, to be thinking pretty carefully about what they're doing, what the impact is in a much broader way on Tennessee and its reputation in the nation. There have been some problems with that.
Q: Do state employees need sensitivity training?
Bredesen: I think the legislature is going to have to decide that. But I think in any modern corporation you need in some way to sensitize people to these kinds of things. That's certainly something they could look at.
Q: Why didn't you say something about this earlier?
Bredesen: I don't weigh in on every issue of that particular sort. I mean, I tend to be a little differential to the legislature in terms of them conducting the internals of their own business.
Q: We've been talking to cancer patients in Cookeville who are losing their TennCare coverage. Do you have anything to say to these folks who are on the brink of having surgery they can't pay for?
Bredesen: Let's remember what this thing is about. We have been told by the federal government and by the state's auditors for several years now that we needed to deal with the issue where there were people who were receiving TennCare benefits who were arguably not qualified to be in TennCare. We've been criticized by both HHS and the comptroller's office for failing to deal with that. ... If you're not qualified legally to be on TennCare, we need to deal with that issue as a matter of program integrity. As you know, I'm a total believer in universal health care, but there are lots of people in this world who need access to health care but don't have it because they're not insured. But I mean, you know, I need to run a program which is consistent with the law and that's what we're trying to do.
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