A great eulogy for a fightin' Dem, Ann Richards....
A great eulogy for a fightin' Dem, Ann Richards....
(We wish we could close down C-dems.blgspt.com and write about nothing but saluting fighting Dems, but the 2000, 2002, 2004, and 2006 elections have made that an unlikely prosect...)
A Last Dance with Ann
James Moore
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/jim-moore/a-last-dance-with-ann_b_29658.html
Destiny is not a matter of chance, it is a matter of choice; it is not a thing to be waited for, it is a thing to be achieved.
William Jennings Bryan
We were in East Texas during the Ann Richards gubernatorial campaign against George W. Bush. Even for Texas, the early October heat was uncharacteristic.
Richards had taken her media entourage to a factory back in the piney woods to show us how one of the programs adopted during her administration was changing lives. Smart Jobs was designed to retrain people losing employment in the oil patch and other sectors of the Texas economy.
The factory made aluminum trailers for a trucking company in Israel and the Smart Jobs funding had taught workers a new technique for welding. Unfortunately, it had been a long day on the campaign trail flying back and forth across Texas; the tour went on too long without air conditioning and tired reporters grew cranky. As we did, the governor grew more patient with the men on the factory floor. She invited some of them to join her in a boardroom to tell her more about what they were doing.
There was no air-conditioning in the boardroom, either, and even Texans have a limit on how much heat is tolerable. Traveling journalists began to show their impatience. Richards didn't care. She was interested and probably even forgot we were even along for the tour.
Afterwards, we adjourned to another steamy room also lacking the modernity of air-conditioning. The governor had decided she was going to conduct a news conference to educate reporters on what had been accomplished by Smart Jobs. There was no podium so TV crews put a light stand in front of her and taped their microphones on its top. My photographer asked me to continue working the wireless microphone on a boom, which is a long, extendable pole with the mic attached to a swivel at the end.
Almost all of the reporters were assembled behind the bank of cameras; except for me. I was standing a few feet in front of Ann Richards with the microphone balanced in front of me on the boom. And I was dripping in sweat, tired, and less tolerant than usual of the potential glories of government programs like Smart Jobs. The governor turned to me to begin her news conference.
"Well, Jeem, do you have a question to get us going?" Her drawl even seemed designed to slow things down.
I did have a question, but it was impertinent and a product of my own disinterest at what was going on at the end of an agonizing day.
"Sure, governor, I've got a question," I answered. "If welding is a smart job, what's a dumb job?"
There was laughter from my colleagues but not from Ms. Richards. She smiled. In front of her was someone who was about to learn not to match wits with a seasoned campaigner. Her cobalt blue eyes sized up my smiling absurdity, a grown adult holding a plastic stick with a battery operated transmitter at the end. Everyone saw it coming but me.
"You know, Jeem," she smiled. "It don't look to me it takes a whole lotta smarts to be a microphone holder."
Humility wasn't the only thing Ann Richards taught. As a housewife who surrendered her privacy, her accomplishments through active involvement have become almost an icon of what the democratic process is presently lacking. She could have stayed home and raised her children. Instead, she believed in her state and her country and the almost naïve notion that she might make a difference. And she did. Democracy only works well when there are people like Ann Richards who take their citizenship seriously and begin to make things happen for the better. And that, too, she did.
I met her in 1979 when she was a Travis County commissioner and eventually reported on her entire political career. As a TV news correspondent, my style tended toward the confrontational and Ann Richards thought reporters were her friends. The governor and I had an almost antagonistic relationship, probably because she was as dedicated to her work as I was to mine. Personally, I had issues with many of her policies and political decisions but I immensely admired the way she opened Texas government to people who had viewed it as an impossible bureaucracy that did little good. The governor knew, though, that her greatest achievement was something considerably more than running a state.
She was a symbol for every little girl who wanted to grow up and do great things.
My daughter met the governor when she was only four and a friendship was born. Richards was always interested in Amanda and when she left office she began to write her letters at the end of the year to tell her what had been going on in her life and to admonish my daughter to read and study and dream big. When Amanda was confirmed in her church, the governor sent her a beautiful piece of jewelry and when she graduated from high school, a crystal bowl with a sterling silver top was delivered to our house. Amanda's name, high school, date of graduation, and the governor's name were all engraved on the underside. The governor had recently written Amanda a note urging her to attend a university outside of Texas and go see more of the world, which she has done, in part, because she got a fine recommendation letter from the former governor of Texas to send in with her student application. The course of my daughter's life has been positively influenced by this woman of great strength and determination. And I am pleased.
Richards was always acutely aware of the influence she had on girls and younger women. She was fond of telling a story about a friend of hers whose own seven year old daughter was having a vocal disagreement with a neighbor boy of the same age. This was during Richards' time in office and the girl had begun to regularly watch the governor on the news. Her dispute with the boy next door, it turned out, was about who can become a governor. The little girl had not been aware when there was a man in the office. Deciding to settle her argument with her friend, she grabbed him by the hand and led him into her house to ask a profound question of her mother, which had been prompted by the little boy's insistence.
Defiantly, she put her hands on her hips and asked, "Momma, is it true that boys can be governors, too?"
Yes, they can, but Ann Richards made us wonder if men can do the job as well as a woman. She had her detractors, of course, and her enemies and they were glad to defeat her in the race for reelection. They will not miss her.
But there are fathers of little girls grown and gone who'd love to have one last dance with Ann.
(We wish we could close down C-dems.blgspt.com and write about nothing but saluting fighting Dems, but the 2000, 2002, 2004, and 2006 elections have made that an unlikely prosect...)
A Last Dance with Ann
James Moore
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/jim-moore/a-last-dance-with-ann_b_29658.html
Destiny is not a matter of chance, it is a matter of choice; it is not a thing to be waited for, it is a thing to be achieved.
William Jennings Bryan
We were in East Texas during the Ann Richards gubernatorial campaign against George W. Bush. Even for Texas, the early October heat was uncharacteristic.
Richards had taken her media entourage to a factory back in the piney woods to show us how one of the programs adopted during her administration was changing lives. Smart Jobs was designed to retrain people losing employment in the oil patch and other sectors of the Texas economy.
The factory made aluminum trailers for a trucking company in Israel and the Smart Jobs funding had taught workers a new technique for welding. Unfortunately, it had been a long day on the campaign trail flying back and forth across Texas; the tour went on too long without air conditioning and tired reporters grew cranky. As we did, the governor grew more patient with the men on the factory floor. She invited some of them to join her in a boardroom to tell her more about what they were doing.
There was no air-conditioning in the boardroom, either, and even Texans have a limit on how much heat is tolerable. Traveling journalists began to show their impatience. Richards didn't care. She was interested and probably even forgot we were even along for the tour.
Afterwards, we adjourned to another steamy room also lacking the modernity of air-conditioning. The governor had decided she was going to conduct a news conference to educate reporters on what had been accomplished by Smart Jobs. There was no podium so TV crews put a light stand in front of her and taped their microphones on its top. My photographer asked me to continue working the wireless microphone on a boom, which is a long, extendable pole with the mic attached to a swivel at the end.
Almost all of the reporters were assembled behind the bank of cameras; except for me. I was standing a few feet in front of Ann Richards with the microphone balanced in front of me on the boom. And I was dripping in sweat, tired, and less tolerant than usual of the potential glories of government programs like Smart Jobs. The governor turned to me to begin her news conference.
"Well, Jeem, do you have a question to get us going?" Her drawl even seemed designed to slow things down.
I did have a question, but it was impertinent and a product of my own disinterest at what was going on at the end of an agonizing day.
"Sure, governor, I've got a question," I answered. "If welding is a smart job, what's a dumb job?"
There was laughter from my colleagues but not from Ms. Richards. She smiled. In front of her was someone who was about to learn not to match wits with a seasoned campaigner. Her cobalt blue eyes sized up my smiling absurdity, a grown adult holding a plastic stick with a battery operated transmitter at the end. Everyone saw it coming but me.
"You know, Jeem," she smiled. "It don't look to me it takes a whole lotta smarts to be a microphone holder."
Humility wasn't the only thing Ann Richards taught. As a housewife who surrendered her privacy, her accomplishments through active involvement have become almost an icon of what the democratic process is presently lacking. She could have stayed home and raised her children. Instead, she believed in her state and her country and the almost naïve notion that she might make a difference. And she did. Democracy only works well when there are people like Ann Richards who take their citizenship seriously and begin to make things happen for the better. And that, too, she did.
I met her in 1979 when she was a Travis County commissioner and eventually reported on her entire political career. As a TV news correspondent, my style tended toward the confrontational and Ann Richards thought reporters were her friends. The governor and I had an almost antagonistic relationship, probably because she was as dedicated to her work as I was to mine. Personally, I had issues with many of her policies and political decisions but I immensely admired the way she opened Texas government to people who had viewed it as an impossible bureaucracy that did little good. The governor knew, though, that her greatest achievement was something considerably more than running a state.
She was a symbol for every little girl who wanted to grow up and do great things.
My daughter met the governor when she was only four and a friendship was born. Richards was always interested in Amanda and when she left office she began to write her letters at the end of the year to tell her what had been going on in her life and to admonish my daughter to read and study and dream big. When Amanda was confirmed in her church, the governor sent her a beautiful piece of jewelry and when she graduated from high school, a crystal bowl with a sterling silver top was delivered to our house. Amanda's name, high school, date of graduation, and the governor's name were all engraved on the underside. The governor had recently written Amanda a note urging her to attend a university outside of Texas and go see more of the world, which she has done, in part, because she got a fine recommendation letter from the former governor of Texas to send in with her student application. The course of my daughter's life has been positively influenced by this woman of great strength and determination. And I am pleased.
Richards was always acutely aware of the influence she had on girls and younger women. She was fond of telling a story about a friend of hers whose own seven year old daughter was having a vocal disagreement with a neighbor boy of the same age. This was during Richards' time in office and the girl had begun to regularly watch the governor on the news. Her dispute with the boy next door, it turned out, was about who can become a governor. The little girl had not been aware when there was a man in the office. Deciding to settle her argument with her friend, she grabbed him by the hand and led him into her house to ask a profound question of her mother, which had been prompted by the little boy's insistence.
Defiantly, she put her hands on her hips and asked, "Momma, is it true that boys can be governors, too?"
Yes, they can, but Ann Richards made us wonder if men can do the job as well as a woman. She had her detractors, of course, and her enemies and they were glad to defeat her in the race for reelection. They will not miss her.
But there are fathers of little girls grown and gone who'd love to have one last dance with Ann.
posted by verifi at 12:50 AM
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