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Paul Revere Starring Paul Sawyer
He came to town riding on his high horse he called truth, screaming loudly, waking up the neighborhood, putting fear into their hearts hoping to get people to rise up in arms against the Red coated Jenkins people.
Okay, so that may seem a little over dramatic. Maybe, maybe not. When I first heard that Sawyer accused Jenkins of being connected to David Duke, I thought that was rather distasteful. When he went on the radio and called Jenkins a liar, I cringed. When I heard that Richard Baker came out and said he wasn’t endorsing anybody in this race, and this was after Paul Sawyer said his former boss was endorsing him, I had to laugh. When the Chairman of the GOP chided him for these accusations after Sawyer agreed to abide by the eleventh commandment of the GOP, I sort of felt like pulling a Mike Tyson on Sawyer’s ear.
It raised my eyebrows slightly when I saw that the EBR Parish Republicans endorsed Woody Jenkins, as this normally would ruin my support for a candidate (I just don’t like to be told who to vote for, it’s so un-American). But tonight I saw that Sawyer ad, you know the one where “Our reputation is at stake” or whatever he’s whining about.
Who is Paul Sawyer? Have you ever heard of him before this election? Neither have I, or at least I don’t think I have. While his two Republican opponents have been down here in Baton Rouge working with us on a day to day basis, Mr. Sawyer has been up in Washington hobnobbing in the pits of hell with whoever the staffers hobnob with. Hopefully he was too old for Mark Foley and too Republican for Barney Franks, I’d certainly hate to have another Vitter on our hands.
He’s a Washingtonian, coming down here with his Washingtonian style politics of say anything, do anything, whatever it takes to win- approach to winning elections. He’s like the fat kid in a candy store who thinks everything in the store belongs to him, willing to tell the shopkeeper stories about the other kids so the shopkeeper keeps a watchful eye on them. Once the shopkeeper is distracted, the fat kid starts raiding the M&M’s.
Honorable. What a joke. He rides in on this idea that because he worked for Richard Baker that he’s the obvious choice, as if that’s going to work among Republicans at a time when Hillary Clinton’s running off of her experience of being Bill Clinton’s Tammy Wynette.
He has bragged about his ability to get funding for our roads, but if this guy actually spent anytime in Baton Rouge, the sixth district for that matter, he would have long ago abandoned that angle because our roads sure the hell ain’t worth bragging about. Maybe our roads are better than they are in Washington D.C. but I doubt it, bad roads ain’t made for politicians, just for us common folk.
But what is Paul Sawyer really telling us in his ads? Rather, what isn’t he telling us in his ads? He’s telling us about his Washingtonian experience, his good times having Washington balls or whatever parties they have there. But he’s not telling us what real job he’s had. Has this guy even turned a screw driver? Does he even know that a screw driver isn’t just a drink? What’s he done besides learn how to fill the budget with pork barrel spending? And judging by our roads, he still didn’t do that well enough.
Has he ever had a real job outside of Washington? Has he ever had to ride on those wonderful roads he got us money for like the rest of us, to go to real jobs where we actually do something to make people’s lives better? You know, I’m sick of these politicians public servants who think the only way to actually make the world a better place is to go to Washington.
I’m not going to turn this into a big Woody Jenkins rah rah fest, but at least Woody has used some of his life to help better our lives through his newspaper, helping us stay informed. And why should we listen to Paul Sawyer criticize a man who has started his own business, something that Paul Sawyer has apparently never done.
What’s really important work? Going to Washington to pass laws limiting individual freedom, standing in front of cameras to have your picture taken for the papers and sitting in back rooms, smoking cigars, coming up with lines that would make for great sound bites? Or is it the preacher who teaches how to live a better, happier life? Or the accountant who prepares your taxes that those people in Washington have complicated to the point that it gives you a headache, and the accountant simplifies it so much that you’re willing to pay him.
Who is really making our lives better? The guy in Washington who sees our needs in email complaints, or the guy working on our roads, sweating it out on a hot summer day while we drive by in our air conditioned cars?
Our reputation is at stake? Isn’t this guy who worked as a staffer as a Republican congress bloated the government and moved away from conservative principles to a point where we lost the congress in 2006? Do we really want to send back to Washington a guy who learned from the best on how to lose control of the congress?
Ultimately what we can learn from Paul Sawyers attack ads is that he isn’t qualified for the job. He’s got experience being a Washingtonian for so long, but he just doesn’t get the common guy who has to go to work day in and day out to put food on his table, and the necessary luxury of gas in his tank. Out of touch and out of ideas, Paul Sawyer comes riding into town like some modern day Paul Revere asking us to send him to Washington to fight the war. Too bad he doesn’t understand the real war is being fought here in the city streets, where the battles we fight actually matter. The battles we fight actually makes each others lives better. He ought to try the private sector out for a while, he might just discover a real purpose to his life. Do him a favor, send him home.
Editors note : On Friday morning we will have exclusive interviews with both Woody Jenkins (pre-attack ads) and Laurinda Calongne on Louisiana Conservative Dot com.
<ADMINNICENAME> @ March 5, 2008
Right on, right on, right on. I did some sourcing on Sawyers ad. His big source when you “google” Jenkins and Duke is Media Matters for America. That organization thrives on making conservatives look bad. Nice one, Sawyer. How ’bout you give us a nice paper cut and pour alchol on it.
When Sawyer first started his campaign, I was interested. While I like Woody and like his political views on most things, it occured to me that having worked in Baker’s congressional office might actually be pretty good experience. And his claims to support some of the things I value at least appear to link his views with mine. So I decided to keep an open mind, and pursue this: see what he had to offer.
That changed when his ad regarding Jenkins came out. I was around when those events occurred, so I know a little of the truth regarding what happened. I know that simply because Woody was forthright an open about it, and told us: he owned up to making an error, and took responsibility for it.
So I knew that the accusation was either a deliberate false representation or a negligent one. Which of course, leaves us with the choice whether Sawyer is a liar or just a poor researcher. Either way, not exactly a positive characteristic in an elected official.
But even if Woody had been guilty as charged by Sawyer, Sawyer lost my vote and support when I first heard the ad. Because even if true, that kind of back-biting, slanderous personal attack is exactly what we are tired of hearing and seeing. That is exactly the kind of thing we are trying to bring to an end in our political process.
Woody talks about his own record, and his own values (in concrete, specific terms). And he refuses to address anything at all toward the character of his opponent, preferring to stick to political issues.
So even if Sawyer argues he is a better political candidate and more conservative in his views, he won’t get my vote. Because now I know that I cannot trust what he says. If I can’t trust him about Woody, why would I trust him about Paul?