Lee N. Howell In just one term in office, U. S. Sen. Paul Coverdell, R-Atlanta, has become what is known -- in Washington’s corridors of power -- as a “real player.” He has become perhaps the most effective freshman senator in many a year -- and his ability to ingratiate himself with the leadership of his party is reminiscent of the almost mythological style of the early Lyndon Baines Johnson as described in Robert Cato’s “The Path To Power,” the first volume of his multi-volume biography of LBJ. That may be both Coverdell’s biggest asset and his biggest liability as he runs for an endorsement term this year. It may well be why he now seems destined to join former Sens. Mack Mattingly, R-St. Simon’s Island, and Wyche Fowler, D-Atlanta, his two predecessors in the seat long held by political legend Herman Talmadge, as one-term wonders. Georgians -- like their fellow citizens all across the South -- prefer their U. S. Senators to be able to come home and be just one of the folks. Sure, we like our guys -- unfortunately, we have not had any girls in the “club” -- to have power. But, as every successful Southern politician knows, the folks back home want their senator to be able to come home and “sling the slop,” as courtly Arkansas Sen. J. W. Fulbright once opined (though he used a more graphic word than slop when he said it). Coverdell does not even seem to come home much -- and, when he does, most folks don’t even notice. In poll after poll, Coverdell’s job performance approval rating hovers just below the 50 percent mark. And, by anyone’s definition, that means that he is extremely vulnerable. (In the authoritative Mason-Dixon Political Media Research poll taken in June, more than one-third of the respondents said they had no opinion of Coverdell, neither good nor bad, at all.) As University of Georgia political science professor Charles Bullock recently pointed out, Coverdell “gets some nice stories in the national media … but that doesn’t get you any votes in Georgia.” Now, Coverdell is not exactly a political novice. In fact, he was one of the first elected Republicans in the state. Back when he first took his seat in the Georgia State Senate some 25 or more years ago, he was one of just four members of his party in that 56-member body. (To show how the party caucus has grown, today there are 23 Republicans serving in the upper legislative chamber.) Of course, that Coverdell was -- to say the least -- a different breed of Republican than the Coverdell who is completing his first term in the U. S. Senate. To begin with, he was a political moderate, or -- U. S. House Speaker Newt Gingrich described him to me years ago over some late-night coffee at Truett Cathy’s original Dwarf House restaurant in Hapeville -- “a North Atlanta liberal.” In fact, he and Wyche Fowler -- the man he beat six years ago -- cut their teeth on the same brand of left-of-center politics which won city elections in Atlanta. But, from the moment he took his seat in the Senate, Coverdell has toed the conservative line, earning a perfect 100 percent ranking from the American Conservative Union and becoming the champion of providing tax credits to parents who send their kids to private schools. Some folks think Coverdell may have lurched too far to the right in his quest to establish some conservative credentials and enhance his power base in Washington. One of them is Michael Coles, the self-made, multimillionaire businessman who is challenging Coverdell for his seat this year. In fact, Coles goes as far as to say the things Coverdell holds up as reasons he should be re-elected -- being number four in the GOP leadership, for instance -- make little difference to the average Georgian. And, he points out that some of these ideologically pure pieces of legislation Coverdell supports -- like the so-called “Freedom To Farm” bill the GOP rammed through in 1996 -- are now back-firing and bankrupting family farms right and left. In fact, Coles points out, the only people prospering under the Coverdell-backed bill are his old compatriots in the insurance industry. (And, you thought back-scratching was something only Democrats did with the special interests, didn’t you?) In an effort to improve his name recognition (which is pitifully low for an incumbent), Coverdell has begun running some television ads which portray him as always on the run -- so much so that he doesn’t even have time to stop for lunch. Well, I learned a long time ago that there is a difference between working hard and working smart. And, frankly, I am not impressed with someone who has so little ability to pace themselves that they can not even find time to stop and eat! Especially someone who was a moderate back home and became a hard-core conservative after he stuck his finger in the air and found out the political winds had changed. Lee N Howell is an award-winning writer and the editor of this newspaper. |
