Ole Miss

Could Mike Espy be the Doug Jones of 2018?

The former U.S. Secretary of Agriculture and former Mississippi congressman is running against incumbent Republican U.S. Senator Cindy Hyde-Smith in a runoff of a special election (think of that, a special election, then a runoff!), and even though women are always excited to see female candidates triumph, this time they'll be mightily embarrassed if Hyde-Smith wins this one.

Hyde-Smith was appointed to fill the unexpired term of Republican Senator Thad Cochran, who resigned in April 2018 due to health reasons. Cochran epitomized the classic Southern gentleman with his cultured drawl, his pinstripe suits, and his courtly manner.  By contrast, Hyde-Smith has no dignified air to her whatsoever; she's crude, obnoxious, and blatantly racist, having made an insensitive remark about lynchings and being slow to apologize for it.  Espy, vying to be the first black U.S. Senator from Mississippi since Reconstruction, is running a campaign based on bringing people together, and he's doing it with the same message and campaign staffers that helped Doug Jones win his special Senate election in Alabama in 2017.     

Right now, the polls favor Hyde-Smith - because, hey, it's Mississippi.  Some pundits who say Espy can win point to the good numbers Stacey Abrams and Andrew Gillum racked up in their bids to win the governorships of Georgia and Florida, respectively, citing coalitions of blacks and left-of-center whites.  

There are two things wrong with that comparison.  First, Abrams and Gillum lost.  Secondly, while whites are more bipartisan in Georgia and Florida, Mississippi whites are solidly Republican, which has allowed the GOP to win every U.S. Senate election in the state from 1984 on.  If Abrams and Gillum couldn't gain enough white votes to win their respective races, how could Espy do the same in Mississippi?                            

But - and you know I was coming to a "but," and it's a heck of a "but" - Espy has a few things in his favor that can help him pull an upset.  First, Mississippi has the largest black population of any state per capita - 35 percent - which means that Espy would only need one out of four white votes if blacks turn out at high enough numbers.  Second, Espy is running as a moderate, which appeals to white voters - one Mississippi Republican told NBC News he plans to vote for Espy because of the wonderful job he did for his congressional district when Espy represented it in the House.  Thirdly, Hyde-Smith is so awful, she's lost corporate support for her campaign.  Espy is out to do what pundits said Doug Jones couldn't do in Alabama.  Since Alabama and Mississippi are neighbors, lightning, while it may not strike twice in the same place, could strike close enough this time down South.

The special runoff election is tomorrow.   

Marching To Pretoria

The country moved a little bit closer to apartheid-era South African-style fascism with Rick Santorum's twin primary victories in Alabama and Mississippi, forcing Mitt Romney - who still leads in the delegate count for the GOP presidential nomination - to become more reactionary in his sociopolitical views. The former supporter of Planned Parenthood now thinks we should stop supporting it. To respond to the inevitable insistence that a President Romney would moderate his views and go back to where he was as governor of Massachusetts once he's in the White House, it should be remembered that the senior George Bush held on to his adopted ultraconservative social views once he was elected President in 1988 . . . because he still had to please the right in 1992.

Liberals and moderate Democrats may be eagerly awaiting the prospect of President Obama facing either Romney or Santorum will full confidence in his ability to clean either of their clocks, but they should check Obama's own timepiece first. It turns out that Obama's approval rating is down to 41 percent in one poll taken this month, and he's only four points ahead of Santorum - yes, Santorum - in a hypothetical matchup, just outside the margin of error. Obama is getting blame for the high gas prices - which Republicans are helping to cause by talking about war with Iran, spooking commodity speculators - that even recent good news about the job market can't seem to neutralize. In an ideal world - France - people would be driving smaller cars and have plausible mass transit options, so maybe gasoline prices wouldn't be such a big deal. Or, at least people would be smart enough to understand that high gas prices are not Obama's fault.

Because of all that - and because of the fact that Republicans hold 29 state governorships, hold the most state legislature majorities since 1928, and are working to make sure fewer Democratic Party-friendly demographic groups vote in November - the sun may be setting on American progressivism (what there is of it) for years, maybe even decades. The GOP has the mechanism and the money to see to that.

And even though female voters in the Democratic party may be energized by the Republican war or women, the battle over contraception has energized Republican women like TV actress Patricia Heaton. By now you may know about her nasty, snide Twitter comments about Georgetown law student Sandra Fluke's testimony on birth control coverage. Referring to Fluke as "G-Town Gal" and addressing her in the second person, Heaton wrote comments on her Twitter page like: "Hey G-Town Gal: If your parents have to pay for your birth control, maybe they should get a say in who [sic] you sleep with! Instant birth control!"

How many of you who remember Heaton's performance as the caustic Debra on "Everybody Loves Raymond" got the feeling that she wasn't acting?

Though Heaton apologized for her tone, she's been known to offer nasty right-wing comments for years. She once declared Obama to be "completely wrong" for the Presidency and said she wanted a Republican presidential debate that would include Rush Limbaugh and Michael Medved asking "tough and intelligent" questions. The pro-life Heaton also insisted that women who may seek an abortion should give birth instead, regardless, commenting: "A woman experiencing an unplanned pregnancy also deserves to experience unplanned joy."

And yet, in spite of all this, no one has called for a boycott of her current ABC sitcom "The Middle." I myself watched it last week after having heard of Heaton's comments about Ms. Fluke, even though that particular episode was a rerun. But then everyone knows that there's a difference between Limbaugh and Patricia Heaton.

Heaton is just an entertainer.

An End To Barbourism

Haley Barbour, currently serving the last year of his second term as governor of Mississippi, announced that he would not run for the 2012 Republican presidential nomination. The 63-year-old Barbour cited his uneasiness with possibly spending the next ten years of his life running for and being President as too much energy for him to devote, but I think that the biggest reason for his non-candidacy is his baggage. First, he comes from Mississippi, a state known for its racist past and its racist present. Secondly, Barbour is a former Washington lobbyist, and lobbyists aren't very popular with Americans these days. Thirdly, for a smart guy, Barbour has said some stupid things, like when he accused President Obama of encouraging rising gasoline prices to encourage more use of public transit and the sales of smaller cars. Hah, I only wish Obama were that clever and devious!

Barbour's exit from the Republican presidential field makes it easier for Mitt Romney, the one Republican with a realistic chance of defeating Obama, to gain the GOP nomination. But with less serious candidates - this month, it's Donald Trump - sucking up the oxygen, the Republicans could be gasping for air indeed when ol' November says howdy-do late next year.

Mississippi has never produced a President of the United Staes, but it did produce the President of the Confederate States - Jefferson Davis. Yeah, how did that turn out?