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POLITICS CAN BE HAZARDOUS
2-9-10
I
am reluctant to write this column because I would never wish to
discourage good people from running for office but reading about threats
to the life of Commissioner Curtis Adams reminds me how hazardous
political jobs can be. It also reminds me of some of my own experiences
in 16 years as county mayor.
One Friday night I came home to find a half dozen phone messages from
Sheriff Evatt on my machine. I returned his call and he asked, “Are the
lights on in your house?” I told him they were and he said, “Turn them
off and come back to the phone.”
He told me he had to fire a man and the man told his partner he thought
I was responsible for his firing because he was in a divorce suit with a
lady who was my friend. He said he was going to kill me. His suspicions
were not true but I had no idea how to find him and tell him that fact.
The sheriff said, “I am sending an officer and he will take you where
you will be safe until we can find the threatening officer.”
In minutes an officer pulled up in my driveway. He took my wife and I to
the Read House and checked us in under another name.
The next day I was scheduled to play a street dance in Ducktown and the
officer urged me to cancel. I told him I had never failed to show up for
a booking. I played the gig but I realized how ironic it was to be
playing in a place called Ducktown because I was a sitting duck standing
on a flatbed truck in the middle of town.
After two days I told the sheriff I did not want the officer to remain
with me. I sad, “I am not going to let any man or any job make me live
in fear. I think dying would be better than living your life like that.”
I had an even hairier experience during my second re-election campaign
but my focus today is to create thought around the question, “What makes
politicians so vulnerable to hate and violence?”
It’s real simple: they control our lives. They decide the quality of the
air we breath, the jobs available to us, the condition of the roads
leading to our jobs, the quality of the schools our children attend ...
need I go any further? So we have a love-hate relationship with them. It
is absolutely impossible to serve a term in any high-profile office
without generating a lot of hate.
Once a real estate man told me he had sold a house to a nearby neighbor
of mine. He said, “I thought they’d love living near you but they told
me they both hate politicians.” Sure enough, they never responded to my
attempts to be a good neighbor.
When the county was debating installation of metal detectors I spoke
against it. I said, “Judges are in no more danger than the county mayor
and commissioners and any angry fool with an IQ of 80 can find a way to
harm you.”
It’s not that I am so brave. It’s just that I always knew it’s one of a
politician’s job hazards like black lung is to a coal miner.
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