Words to Live By Since 1993 A SPIFF Publication Vol. 3, No. 30 A WTLB extra! Strike Three? Editor's note: We hope you'll read the entire issue, but if you're pressed for time and you already support the winner-take-all Tennessee primary, skip down to where it says "Here's the News." We hope that part bothers you as much as it bothers us. You can read the rest later. You may have noticed that this is the second edition of WTLB that's crawled into your office from your fax machine this week. If you're a long-time reader, you will probably know that this is not a normal thing. In fact, it's never happened before. We hope it will never happen again. We wish it weren't happening now. Why is it happening? Because when our friends are threatened, we get mad. Because by the time Vol. 3 No. 31 comes out, it will be too late. And because we certainly can't expect the Evening Tennessean to tell you about this mess. You may recall several issues back when we told you about the state GOP's plan to make the Tennessee presidential primary a winner-take-all affair. You may also recall that we here at Spiff didn't exactly support this plan with all our collective heart. You may even recall that reaction to our opposition was so fierce that one of our members was forced to flee the Spiff Executive Tower, on the banks of the mighty Cumberland River, following some relatively serious threats to him. Well, tomorrow (That's Saturday, in case you're taking Friday off.) the state GOP executive committee will vote on the plan to force our state into a winner-take-all primary. From the looks of things, the plan will pass. This is, of course, not good. We here at Spiff oppose any plan that does not at least attempt to give proportional representation to presidential candidates who, although they are supported by a very large number of Tennessee Republicans, didn't happen to come in first. They call it the Texas plan. Why? Probably because it's big and arrogant, although it could be because that's the way Texas Republicans pick their delegates. The state GOP folks like it. The Governor, Don Sundquist, likes it. Why? Because Lamar (Sorry. That's "Lamar!") is running for president. They support Lamar!'s campaign. They think that Lamar! will win in Tennessee, and they're doing whatever they can to ensure that Tennessee has a Lamar!-take-all presidential primary. There are, however, other men running for the GOP nomination. Bob Dole. Phil Gramm. Alan Keyes. Pat Buchanan. There are others, of course. The point is that if the Lamar!-take-all primary is adopted, none of the delegates from Tennessee will be allowed to support these men. Once upon a time, there were countries in eastern Europe that ran that way. Have the state big-shots not thought this through? Don't they remember 1992 when Pat Buchanan ran against President Bush? By the time the convention rolled around, President Bush had the nomination locked up, and certain members of the Tennessee delegation were whining and complaining and threatening in order to get Buchanan delegates to vote for President Bush so Tennessee wouldn't be seen as supporting the loser. Well, we hate to break it to them, but if Lamar! isn't the clear winner by convention time (and who really thinks he will be anyway?), the same thing is going to happen again. Tennessee will be supporting the loser. It's not that we're anti-Lamar! We're not (although this type of thing does sway us in that direction). It's not that we're supporting someone else. If we were, we'd have told you. It's just too early for that. If Lamar! gets all of the votes in the GOP primary, he deserves to have all of the delegates. If he gets half of the votes, he deserves half of the delegates. If he gets half of the votes, he doesn't deserve all of the delegates. We've heard from Spiff fans who happen to be Lamar! supporters who agree with us on this. We're also aware of several GOP organizations who have taken their own straw polls on the issue. Every one we know has rejected the Lamar!-take-all primary plan unanimously. But then again, what does it matter what these small organizations think? What do we think the Republican party is? A grassroots organization or something? Here's the News. There's been a lot of arm-twisting on this one. State executive committee members have received phone calls from all over, and that's ok. We've called some executive committee members, and we hope you will, too. Sadly, though, at least one executive committee member, who also happens to be a state representative, got a phone call the other day from the Governor's office. The representative was told to vote for the Lamar!-take-all primary, or forget about having any power in the General Assembly, or any help during reelection time. Another committee member from east Tennessee has family members who are state employees. Implications were made that things might just become a little rough if that member didn't vote the right way. Maybe this shouldn't be so surprising to us. After all, this type of thing has been coming out of the Governor's office for years. It's just that we were hoping that Governor Sundquist would be above this. You'd think that if a Lamar!-take-all primary were worth having, it could win on its own merit, rather than on the merit of threats. Does this bother you? We'd like you to do something. We'd like you to call your executive committee members and tell them you oppose the Texas plan. We'd like you to call Lamar!'s office and tell him that you oppose the plan, even if you support Lamar! We'd like you to call the Governor's office and tell him that you oppose his strong-arm tactics, even if you support the plan. If we do this right, by the time the GOP convention rolls around, Tennessee will be sending a whole bunch of Lamar! delegates, as well as a whole bunch of delegates who support other candidates. Words to Live By is published every week at about this time by Spiff. You can send a fax to us here in the Spiff Executive Tower, on the banks of the mighty Cumberland River, at 615-847-2259, or you can e-mail us at spiff@nashville.com.