Tennessee Democrats would like the world to believe that all of their divisions have ceased, and this is evidenced by the $600,000 they managed to raise at their annual Jackson Day dinner, an event where it can be safely presumed that Jacksonian principles such as States' rights, abolition of the Bank of the United States (in our day that would be the Federal Reserve), the right of property ownership, and the uniqueness and exceptionalism of the United States of America were not celebrated in the least. It would be fair to say that if Andrew Jackson himself were to walk in to the Jackson Day dinner and listen to the various speeches given there, he would not recognize that gathering as having anything to do with the political party he helped to found.
"I think this has really generated a lot of excitement," said Democratic Party spokesman Keith Talley, echoing the party hopes that the Clinton/Gore appearance would help the party rebuild after the bruising 2008 election cycle that lost them the statehouse and left them sitting on the sidelines of the presidential election race.
"If there's any doubt that we're united, let that be dispelled tonight," party Chairman Chip Forrester said in his opening remarks. "The Democratic Party is strong, vibrant and ready to go."
As to the Democrats being some newly reborn force in Tennessee, it should be realized that dyed-in-the-wool Democrats were saying that the day after the 2008 General Election when they lost their majority in the Tennessee House of Representatives. The strong delusion, fed by the political partisanship of which-to be fair-all of us who have strong political feelings are guilty to a degree, was fed by the presence of former President Bill Clinton and his sidekick Algore on the same stage.
Algore, it should be remembered, once ran for both the House and the Senate as a moderate-to-conservative Southern Democrat. He came from one of Tennessee's most notable political families, and followed his father into the Senate. During his 1988 presidential campaign, Gore once bragged to a group of tobacco farmers that like them, he had raised tobacco for at least part of his life. Gore had a change of heart due to his sister's passing (which was tobacco-related), but he also lost touch with ordinary Tennesseans and how they think and live in his years in Washington. Gore's views mysteriously changed on everything from school prayer to abortion to gun control, and he not only lost his own home State when he was the Democratic nominee for President, but surely must have been the first to do so after previously having carried all 95 Tennessee counties in a Statewide campaign, his 1990 U.S. Senate re-election bid.
Democratic unity does occur-when voting with Republicans in the Legislature. Major portions of the Republican agenda this past session frequently passed with 18, 19, 20 Democratic votes or more, leaving a 20-22 vote liberal rump as the holdouts. The Democrats crooning about "unity" and decrying the conservative Republican agenda need to remember that much of it passed with Democratic votes.
Bill Clinton and Al Gore raised $600,000 for the Democrats, and they were the lone factors in the money haul. Had the lead speaker been Nancy Pelosi, the Democratic Party might not have been lucky enough to get $60,000.
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