Bill Haslam’s quest to purchase the governor’s office in Tennessee is just about over. He’s spent more than $16 million on the race to buy the seat, including $3.5 million from his share of his family’s Pilot Oil fortune, and polls show he’s about to close the deal. Still, Tennesseans who have a hankering for a man with both a strong spine and higher vision for the state have a better alternative: Democrat Mike McWherter, who actually built his own business, and who is a stronger advocate for education and job creation.
We raise the spine issue about Haslam because we wonder why a candidate with such a front-runner advantage, a rich guy who has outspent his opponent 5-to-1 in a year when Republicans are expected to rebound with the force of a tornado, keeps waffling so badly over a simple question about the wisdom of keeping Tennessee’s gun-carry permit process in place.
After pitifully dodging the question, he finally told a recent Tennessee Firearms Association gathering that he would sign into law a bill to do away with state requirements to obtain a handgun-carry permit if the Legislature passed such a bill. He was asked later why he would agree to drop Tennessee’s sensible gun-carry permit process (a criminal background check, a four-hour safety course and a $115 administrative fee). He said he wouldn’t favor such a bill, but he wouldn’t stand in the Legislature’s way. In other words, he would not defend, even weakly, the current requirements to keep felons, abusive spouses and mentally unstable people from legally carrying guns.
It’s gotten nuttier. He’s since gone on to say that it should be up to owners of restaurants, bars and schools — never mind the state law forbidding guns in schools — to say whether guns should be allowed in.
If he would fold and obfuscate so shamelessly on a purely speculative issue like that, we have to wonder if he’s simply weak-kneed. We must question his resolve to take a tough stand on any hard issue. Indeed, this isn’t even a hard issue: the vast majority of Tennesseans would strongly support keeping the minimal (underscore minimal) current standards for gun permits.
McWherter, himself a longtime NRA member, immediately said he would discourage such a bill, and veto it if it came to him. There was none of Haslam’s jelly waffling.
Beyond that, we believe McWherter’s hard-earned understanding of how to build a successful business from the ground up gives him a distinct advantage over Haslam on the core issue of job creation, Tennessee’s central priority.
McWherter also possesses a well-rounded understanding of the state’s values and problems. Like outgoing Democratic Gov. Phil Bredesen, he recognizes that better education is the single most important key if Tennessee is to compete successfully with other states to attract the jobs of the future.
Unlike Haslam, McWherter strongly supports prekindergarten early learning programs for all children. That’s crucial to give the woefully large number of impoverished students in Tennessee’s rural and urban areas the chance to get on track to succeed in high school and college. It’s also crucial to the state’s goals of reducing Tennessee’s excessively high drop-out rate in high schools, and to raise the state’s relatively low percentage of college grads. Nothing could be more important to attracting the high-tech manufacturing plants and knowledge-based jobs that now represent this nation’s best hope for keeping jobs from being off-shored, and rebuilding a strong middle class.
McWherter further supports full funding for the Better Education Plan, which continues to leave Hamilton County’s school system more than $12 million short every year.
McWherter’s support for targeted tax abatement for new small businesses, in addition to the incentives already given large businesses, also make good sense.
It’s unfortunate, in our view, that McWherter, like outgoing Gov. Bredesen, has wholeheartedly shunned the idea of a state income tax. Until a champion for tax equity finally arises, the vast majority of Tennesseans will continue to suffer the burden of a regressively harsh sales tax inequity that makes fully two-thirds of Tennessee families pay more than they fairly should to support state government.
That relief won’t come from either candidate. But if given the chance, McWherter would follow well in the footsteps of his father, former Gov. Ned McWherter. He knows what the job requires, and he merits the opportunity. We recommend his election.