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MUMBLINGS November 23, 2006
"Thou shalt not neither take a gift: for a gift doth blind
the eyes of the wise, and pervert the words of the righteous" Deuteronomy
16:19. In this great country it is good to see democratic elections come and
go…but I never remember being so glad to see one go as much as this year.
It was shameful and disgraceful.
It was shameful for the huge amount of money spent by many
candidates to get elected and disgraceful by the negative politics by many
candidates.
The number of people voting was not too bad-about 47% in
Baldwin. Statewide and nationally, it was somewhat better. Democracy is great
but something is wrong with it when you have to spend, as in this country this
year, $2 billion on elections.
Politically, the Republicans and Democrats almost divided
equally the winnings in Alabama. Republican Governor Bob Riley won handily
against a popular Lieutenant Governor Lucy Baxley. The elected Lieutenant
Governor was Jim Folsom, Jr., winning in a hard fought campaign against Luther
Strange who spent millions of dollars to get defeated. He was one of the
negative losers.
A very significant election was that of Chief Justice of
the Supreme Court where-in a Democratic Judge Sue Bell Cobb won over a
Republican sitting Chief Justice Drayton Nabers, Jr. Cobb's election is a ray
of sunshine and hope, so far as the Alabama State Supreme Court is concerned.
It is not balanced, out of 19 civil and criminal courts of appeals and the nine
members of the Supreme Court, there are no Blacks, only one Democrat and only
four women. It is the most expensive supreme court in the United States with
the big people spending almost $50 million to elect the present justices. You
can rest assured it will be more balanced in future elections.
There were many tight races in the state. Let me give you
a couple of examples of where negative advertising caused the loss of two
candidates. An interesting race where a popular local native, John McMillan of
Stockton was running trying to unseat the present Democratic Senator of the
22nd Senatorial District. The District includes parts of seven counties. In my
humble opinion, McMillan had the election won 10 days to two weeks before the
election but his advertising manager killed him. He ran an ad stating, which
was accurate, his opponent, Pat Lindsey had been fined by the Internal Revenue
Department in a case some 25 years ago. The advertising agent should have
realized two things…the I.R.S is very unpopular and something that
happened 25 years ago is not of current interest.
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