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Thanks,
The Management
Greetings. Go get a drink and a snack folks, this might be a long one.
Host, thanks for the questions. I can tell you have thought this through very thoroughly, and can appreciate your candor and obvious intelligence. You might want to know, though, that you have come into a battle of wits against an unarmed opponent.
For the past two decades I have not lived in Tennessee full time. I have lived in various places in Asia, mostly in Japan (7 and a half years - I'm hoping this will get some solidarity with Grace sympathy) and Thailand (hoping for some "awe, she works with impoverished kids" sympathy)
(edit: Since Grace is with Gilda and not Host, I'm hoping that I will get Gilda/Grace sympathy by proxy
)
Actually, I am not looking for sympathy, just a bit of consideration as I write from my feelings on being a Tennessean who did not vote for our son, Al. I am joined by millions of others who did the same, and because of the number of D's and R's in our state, I am joined by some good number of Tennessee democrats.
Your points are in
BOLD ITALIC.
1.)The prestige, recognition, and tourism that would have flowed into Tennessee, if Gore had been elected.
Tennessee, the Volunteer State, already has egads! loads of tourism, what with being birthplace of the blues and the home of the ever living Elvis (West Tennessee/Memphis), Country Music Capital of the World (Middle Tennessee/Nashville), and the wonder that is the Great Smoky Mountains (East Tennessee/Knoxville). Lesser well-known are the, 1) Tennessee Walking Horse Celebration in Shelbyville, 2) Columbia Mule Festival in, well, Columbia, 3) the Hermitage, birthplace and family home of Pres. Andrew Jackson in Donelson, 4) the Museum of Appalacia, in Norris, 5) Oak Ridge Atomic Energy Museum in, well, Oak Ridge, and 6) Davy Crocket's Log Cabin outside of Jefferson City, which is my favorite because my uncle took me there when I was six and bought me a tomahawk which I promptly used to hit my big brother over the head. Plus, there's always the world famous Bucksnort Trout Farm, in lovely scenic McEwen, just west of Nashville, for those who really want to live on the edge.
Recognition is fine and all that, but we've already produced three presidents - Mr. Jackson, James K. Polk, and Andrew Johnson - more than any of our other bordering states except for Virginia.
Prestige from being Al Gore's home state? Hah! Al hadn't spent hardly more than three days straight in our fair state since he was running for Senate. Most of Al's life (pre 2000) has been spent in D.C., what with his dad being in politics. None of his primary or secondary schooling was in Tennessee, if I am not mistaken. And he often spent down times in Tipper's parents' home state Virginia.
2.)The political influence, translated into a higher flow of federal funds into Tennessee, if Tennessee had voted for Gore.
Oh, but you see, our state has a balanced budget that has come from something called "Tobacco Money" (having not been around so much in the past 2 decades, I'm not really sure what that is.) We have a state run healthcare program (TennCare), which is, incidentally, eating into that Tobacco Money quicker than a Southern Baptist does a casserole. We have the TVA, which is the world's largest electricity provider (or something like that.) And we have the Tennessee Titans, which we're hoping will generate some sympathy donations from kind-hearted football lovin' folk.
3.)The planning, right about now, and then the completion of a Gore presidential library, in Tennessee, that, along with Gore's birthplace, and his residence, would stimulate worldwide interest, and tourist dollars, and jobs, in Tennessee, as it will, for a long time to come, in Clinton's Arkansas.
Don't want it. With a man so boring as Al, do you think people would actually plan their vacations around visiting the "Al Gore Presidential Library"? We could have offered a package deal - catch the Gore Library, and then take a day enjoying the Bucksnort Trout Farm or the Columbia Mule festival, which, incidentally, actually draws thousands from all over the world. Seriously, it could only be possible to build it in Nashville (he's from Carthage/Sparta, which is a couple of hours outside Nashville, and not a tremendously easy to visit area), but a Gore Library visit would only be another half-day visit tacked on by those who have come to see the Country Music Hall of Fame Museum/Grand Ol' Opry.
Now if he could have built a replica of the very office in which he had invented the internet, now, that I would even pay to see.
4.)A balanced federal budget, replaced by an addition to the federal treasury debt that will mushroom the debt from $5414 billion, in 2001, to at least $9000 billion by Sept. 30, 2009.
Now you're speculating - no one can tell what he would have done. He might have run us into debt investing gajillions of dollars in solar corn windmills. Or, what's more likely, he might have plundered the military and left us in very dire straights in the aftermath of 9/11.
5.)Open government....it's gone....reversed from a trend towards justification of the classification of every federal government document, to a new paradigm that began in 2001.....instead free access to documents must be justified, release to the public of presidential documents was delayed in a 2001 executive order, to the point that the presidential libraries complained about the emptiness of their stacks. Documents that had been de-classified, were reclassified, much to the chagrin, and puzzlement of historians who already possessed them.
Have no idea about this...... but again, speculation. He might have opened ALL documents to historians, and vital secrets could have been revealed. On the internet. Which he invented. Or he could have hired Sandy Berger to go in to the Archives and stash more documents down his pants. Who knows?
6.)The peace, and a reputation of the US as a country that was reluctant to ever go to war, and only did so when it was first attacked by another country. The US is now mired in an avoidable war in Iraq that disproportionally claims the lives and limbs of military personnel from less affluent, and more rural states....like Tennessee. The other loss is the opportunity cost of sinking money and a hopelessly flawed military strategy in Iraq, vs. the lost opportunity to lessen the amount of the federal treasury debt, or spend some of the money wasted in Iraq, on new schools, and infrastructure repair, in Tennessee and in other US states.
Good relations and the trust of many other nations' governments, and their citizenry, has also been lost because Iraq was invaded and occupied.
Or, because of his tree-hugging ozone-sniffing beliefs, we could have been a laughing stock of all technologically advanced nations, not to mention put in financial straights because of countries like China and India who were not included in the Gore-generated Kyoto Protocols, which he would have probably tried to enforce by retooling it into some sort of Executive Order. We could have been buddy buddy with everyone, never upsetting anyone - particularly the Europeans, keeping a warm and fuzzy kumbaya feeling, and been attacked by terrorists anyway. And, I might add, the list of democratic leaders who said "Sadaam has/is pursuing WMD, he must be stopped" is a long one. Look it up, it'll probably have Al's name.
But again - you're speculating. He might have not done anything to Sadaam, leaving him in power, and Sadaam could have decimated another 100 villages of Kurds or Shiites. Sadaam might have built up his chemical/biological weapons stash, and used it again. Al might have moved the UN for more resolutions, and more resolutions and more resolutions, and then UN resolutions would become even more meaningless and powerless than they are now, fit to only become recycled toilet tissue, which is basically what they've become anyways.
7.)The boundary between church and state....it has definitely been blurred since the 2000 election.
Where? Show me. I want to know. I see no law that has been enacted by congress that has interfered with or endorsed religion of any kind. But if you're saying that a citizen doesn't have the right to practice his/her religious beliefs freely - even if the citizen is the President - then that's a bit more than a blurring, it's an infringement of one person's rights.
8.)The compact between the federal government and workers rights and workplace safety. The NLRB has been stacked, since 2001, with 5 appointees who comprise the entire board, who are pro-management, none come from a labor, or union organzing background. OSHA has, until the deaths of several miners last year, adopted a policy of lax enforcement and industry self inspection of workplace safety hazards and remedies.
A president has the right to put whomever he/she wants on the various boards of government, as was evidenced by the Clinton administration's loading of the Civil Rights Commission. Now, I'll agree the mine safety issue has been a disaster for decades, encompassing the presidencies of D's and R's. It's a mess, for sure, and does need to be reformed so that the protection of miners is at the top of all other issues. A better labor union solution for miners is something I would go for. But I'm a Teamser's daughter, so labor is not such a "right-wingy" topic for me. My mom is more financially secure because she receives my dad's Teamster's survivor pension, and I'm grateful for that. Granted, that money probably has come from some hefty Vegas winnings...... hee
9.)Strong federal Environmental protection iniatives, with a focus on improving air quality. The enforcement intiatives that resulted in TECO in Tampa, Fl, dramatically cleaning up it's act.
I'm not familiar with your example, and I'm too caught up in my cold right now to try and think through the research on it - sorry. But "strong" initiatives? At the expense of what? And what responsibility have the individual states in this? Would Al have come down hard on businesses and thrown tens of thousands out of work just for faster results? The business community was afraid of that, if I remember the various news/economic reports and polls at that time. (sorry again - can't site any sources but my memory)
10.) Bankruptcy protection for individuals. Did the tradeoff of legal protection from debt collection....the ability to make a clean start, after what reputable studies demonstrated is more often bankruptcy induced by illness, worth lowered interest on credit card borrowing, or increased profits to the banks that issue the credit cards, vs. the loss of the option, by Tennesseans, who "enjoy", on average, lower per capita income to begin with, after a financial setback caused by an illness, a fresh start with their debts erased?
Hasn't the only beneficiary of "the Bankruptcy Reform Act", been the financial corps. who successfully lobbied for it's passage?
Here I have personal family anecdotal evidence (hee - I call it evidence.) My brother's wife (ex now) loved getting those credit card offers in the mail, and by the time they were going to be evicted from their home because she hadn't been paying their mortgage, they had accumulated tens of thousands of dollars in credit card debt, with nothing really to show for it but mountains of toys for my nephews and records of cash advances which promptly went to her cocaine dealer. As she was supposed to be paying the bills, he was devastated to discover the extent to which she had gone for her various habits (Xanax, valium, coke, crack, booze, boyfriends, toys, videos). He found all the credit card bills - in a literally huge pile - on the floor of a closet. And before you feel sorry for her for addiction, don't. She took my nephews along for numerous meetings with her dealer/boyfriend, and by all accounts even drove stoned with them in the car. In the fall out, she filed for divorce, using the services of a lawyer who was her mother's friend from highschool (also an ex-judge in our county, very respected.) My brother didn't have the money to pay a simple 1,000 dollar retainer for a lawyer, so HER sister loaned him the money (my mom is on a limited income and couldn't afford to help him.)
And now? She isn't working - hasn't in several years - and has remarried. My brother didn't file for bankruptcy, he's paying off those debts little by little, while paying child support and getting the boys on weekends. My brother wouldn't think of filing - our dad taught us that a man pays his debts. He works two jobs to do so. She bitched when he stopped paying spousal support after her marriage.
The kicker? She volunteered in Al Gore's 2000 campaign.
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Yes, I could go on as well, and as you've noticed, I already have!!!
I'm not so sure that we could have benefited materially from Al's having been president - again, speculation. But what I do know is this: Tennessee did not forsake Al Gore, Al Gore forsook Tennessee. He did not represent the values of our state, so our state did not vote for him. West Tennessee is very democratic, East Tennessee is very republican. Middle Tennessee is where the battle is won, and he couldn't win the hearts and minds of Nashville. Period. Full stop.
We have 2 Republican Senators, and have since Al left the senate. Our Representatives are 5/4, dems to reps. Right now our Gov is a dem, but the one before him wasn't. And even our democrats are fairly conservative, compared to many nationally. So when you castigate us for not voting for more liberals, you might want to check and see just what kind of state Tennessee is first, and what we hold as important in regards to values. We are southern, and we are for the most part, conservative, even democrats.
We didn't kill the Limburgh baby, we didn't cause the stock market crash of '29, we didn't cause the great depression, we didn't kill Kennedy, we didn't shoot J.R., and we didn't cause Albert Gore, Jr. to lose the 2000 election. He did that, all by himself (not the other things, just the election.)