| After the event, Mother and I accompanied Nelson and the Presidents son Chip to the Hay-Adams Hotel, across Lafayette Square from the White House, where Willie sat at the piano and sang for us until two in the morning
For all those reasons, I was feeling good about my relationship with the White House as the National Governors Association meeting beganThe Democratic governors and their Republican counterparts held separate meetingsI had been elected vice chairman of the Democratic governors at the winter meeting, thanks to my nomination by Governor Jim Hunt of North Carolina, who would become one of my closest friends among the governors and an ally in the fight for education reform all the way through the White House yearsBob Strauss, the chairman of the Democratic National Committee, asked me to get the Democratic Governors Association to endorse President Carter over Senator KennedyAfter a quick canvass of the governors present, I told Strauss the vote would be twenty to four for CarterWe had a civilized debate, with Strauss speaking for the President and Governor Hugh Carey of New York arguing for KennedyAfter the 204 vote, Strauss and I spoke briefly to the press, touting the new prada replica handbags endorsement as a show of confidence in and political boost for President Carter at a time when he needed it
About fifteen minutes later, I was told the White House was trying to reach me on the phoneApparently the President wanted to thank me for helping line up the governors supportAppearances can be deceivingWhat the President wanted to tell me was that the weather was about to turn cold in Pennsylvania and Wisconsin, where the rest of the Cubans were being housedBecause those forts werent insulated from the winter weather, he said it would be necessary to move the refugeesNow that the security problems were solved at Fort Chaffee, they would be moved therePresident, you promised that no more refugees would be sent to ArkansasSend them to a fort in some warm place out west youre not going to win in November anywayThe President replied that hed considered that but couldnt do it because it would cost $10 million to outfit a facility out westPresident, your word to the people of Arkansas is worth $10 millionHe disagreed, and we ended the conversation
Now that Ive been President, I have some idea of the pressures Jimmy Carter was underHe was dealing with both rampant inflation and a stagnant gucci handbag new collection economyThe American hostages in Iran had been held by the Ayatollah Khomeini for almost a yearThe Cubans werent rioting anymore, so they were the least of his problemsPennsylvania and Wisconsin had both voted for him in 1976, and they had more electoral votes than Arkansas, which he had won with almost two-thirds of the voteI was still more than twenty points ahead of my opponent, Frank White, in the polls, so how could I be hurt?
At the time I saw it differentlyI knew the President would be hurt badly by breaking his commitment to ArkansasWhether or not the forts in Wisconsin and Pennsylvania had to be closed for weather or for political reasons, sending the remaining Cubans to the one place he had promised not to, in order to save $10 million, was nutsI called Rudy Moore and my campaign chairman, Dick Herget, to see what they thought I should doDick said I should fly directly to Washington to see the PresidentIf I couldnt change his mind, I should talk to the press outside the White House and withdraw my support for his reelectionBut I couldnt do that, for two reasonsFirst, I didnt want to look like a modern version of Orval Faubus and other southern governors who resisted federal omega speedmaster olympic special edition authority in the civil rights yearsSecond, I didnt want to do anything to help Ronald Reagan beat CarterReagan was running a great campaign, with a big head of steam, fueled by the hostages, the bad economy, and the intense support of right-wing groups outraged about everything from abortion to Carters turning the Panama Canal over to Panama
Gene Eidenberg asked me not to announce the relocation until he could come to Arkansas and put the best face on itThe story leaked anyway, and Genes visit to Arkansas did little to helpHe made a convincing case that there would be no further security problems, but he couldnt deny that the President was breaking a clear commitment to the state that had been more supportive of him than any other outside his native GeorgiaI won a larger role in controlling the security arrangements and made some improvements, but I was still the Presidents man in Arkansas who had failed to hold him to his word
I returned home from Denver to a very volatile political situationMy opponent in the general election, Frank White, was gaining groundWhite was a big man with a booming voice and a bombastic style that belied his background as a graduate of the Naval Academy, chanel quilted cheap handbag savings-and-loan executive, and former director of the Arkansas Industrial Development Commission under Governor PryorHe had strong support from all the interest groups Id taken on, including utility, poultry, trucking, and timber companies, and the medical associationsHe was a born-again Christian with the strong backing of the state chapter of the Moral Majority and other conservative activistsAnd he had the pulse of the country people and blue-collar workers upset about the car tagsHe also had the advantage of a generally disgruntled mood, due to the economy and the droughtWhen the bad economy led state revenues to decline below projections, I was forced to lower state spending to balance the budget, including education cuts that reduced the second years $1,200 pay raise for teachers to about $900Many teachers didnt care about the states budget problems; they had been promised $1,200 for two years and they wanted the second installmentWhen it didnt come, the intensity of their support for me faded considerably
Back in April, Hillary and I had seen Frank White at an event and I told her that no matter what the polls said, he was starting with 45 percent of the voteI had made that many chanel paper bag people |