Nashville Leader 05/07/2008 edition

This ran today in the Nashville Leader. I appreciate their kind words. Thanks guys!




M-C-R
EARLY VOTING began Monday across Arkansas. In Howard County, the place to go is the Grand Jury room on the first floor of the county courthouse. Election day is Tuesday, May 20. In Pike County vote at the courthouse annex in Murfreesboro. In Hempstead County, early voting is in the County Clerk’s office on the second floor of the courthouse in Hope. Remember to take a photo ID when you go to vote. I’ll keep my nose out of your ballot business except to remind you of something. When he first ran for the state legislature I wrote about what an excellent Nashville alderman Larry Teague had been. That city office was the first he had held. His humorous character can pop out at times, but it was evident how seriously he took the city’s business, and how much thought he gave to every issue. I noticed that it wasn’t long before other aldermen were asking him his opinion.He was the same when he was our state representative. I recall once when he was not present for a frivolous nighttime “meet and greet” cocktail event with state press people during a legislative session. One of his colleagues later told me that Rep. Teague was back in his room, reading up on the business he’d face the next day. It was the way he did things, his colleague told me. “He reads everything.” Larry never told me this, he was too modest. He was very independent, and did not take the word of lobbyists about the content --- or intent --- of legislation. This was evident when he was one of only two legislators who voted against a bill concerning deregulation of a certain public utility. He had concerns, and didn’t let the popular opinion of his fellow legislators and the lobbyists to sway him. He was right, of course, and the General Assembly had to come back a year later and reverse itself. If only they’d listened to him in the first place. When term limits ended his stay in the House of Representatives, I was one of many, many who expressed hopes that he would run for the Senate someday. Now he is. And we have a chance to put him there.
M-C-R