Anger could make difference in state for Democrats
By TOM HUMPHREY,
Tom Humphrey, chief of the News Sentinel's Nashville bureau, may be reached at 615-242-7782 or tomhumphrey3@aol.com.
Al Gore's loss in the 2000 presidential race still galls Tennessee Democrats, probably more than their counterparts in other states, and that seems to be a backdrop to their increasing anger in 2004.
The anger wasn't always there. Not so long ago, Democrats looking back at Tennessee in 2000 displayed mostly resignation, remorse and maybe a bit of disgust.
They felt Gore - or rather Gore's national campaign - let them down in a state that the former vice president should have won.
A tale from Ned Ray McWherter's 2000 experience, told to a reporter last week, will illustrate.
He had made a 10-day trip through the state, mostly in East Tennessee, as a Gore surrogate campaigner and returned, as instructed, to give a report to the campaign's national headquarters in Nashville.
His travels, McWherter says, left him with a sense that things were going badly for Gore in his home state.
He had a plan, involving some personal campaigning by Gore, for turning things around.
"I sat there for about an hour in the headquarters, wanting to make a report to the people running the campaign. They sent somebody out and said they were busy.
"They put me off another hour or two and, well, my old butt got tired, and I got up and left. They were so busy they wouldn't even talk to me and I was going to tell them they were about to get the hell beat out of them in East Tennessee," he said.
"I left word with Johnny Hayes. He said he couldn't get in to see them, either," McWherter said. "They had other places to worry about, I guess."
From the state Democrats' perspective, it seems, the Gore national campaign took Tennessee for granted initially, then - after the Bush handwriting appeared on the wall - did nothing to reverse the trend.
The Gore campaign spent far less in Tennessee than the Clinton campaigns of both 1992 and 1996. Clinton won the state both times.
"Al's campaign just never made any great effort in Tennessee," says McWherter.
"I don't believe Al Gore himself ever knew how his campaign was being operated in Tennessee and there was a way Al could have beat Bush in this state."
McWherter, of course, is something of a conservative, country-talking father figure to Tennessee Democrats. He has a lot of Republican friends, too.
His endorsement of Massachusetts Sen. John Kerry in the current campaign surprised some Democrats and reassured many of them.
It actually may have been a factor in Kerry's winning the state last week.
McWherter now wants Kerry to name North Carolina Sen. John Edwards or maybe some other Southerner as his running mate.
With that bow to regional loyalty, he says, the Democrats would have a shot at winning Gore's state in 2004 because of the rising anger aimed at Bush - assuming, of course, that Kerry does not write the state off.
That anger, McWherter says, has reached vicious levels recently.
Though he didn't say so, that was illustrated in Gore's speech last weekend to Tennessee Democrats, who cheered wildly as he declared Bush has "betrayed this country" and practices the "politics of fear" last used by President Nixon in his worst days.
Bush has no principles, he said.
For years, foam-at-the-mouth rhetorical rage has seemed the exclusive forte of right-wing Republicans. Some Democrats now seem ready to match them toe to toe, or maybe loudmouth to loudmouth, on the foaming front.
This polarization could make for a very nasty campaign year.
It's worth Democrats remembering, however, that successful members of their party in Tennessee - notably including McWherter and Gov. Phil Bredesen - have not been mean-mouthed.
The current and former governor, in fact, both balked at embracing some of Gore's contentious claims.
Gore was a pretty nice guy, all things considered, back in 2000. He was certainly outraged in Tennessee by the GOP, and he lost. Now he's mad.
But Gore was also outspent in the state, and Bush arguably out-campaigned him as well, making multiple visits to Tennessee. There's no assurance that madness would have made a difference.
Perhaps we'll find out this year. |
