Taking on a column of contradiction

Rex Nelson’s recent attack on the governor, the Legislature, and me is a remarkable combination of error and contradiction.

He complains that in the Legislature the “largest group remains the Cowards, men and women who know better but refuse to stand up to the governor and Know Nothings.” At the same time, Nelson proclaims that “During last month’s legislative session, we saw a coalition from the right and left come together to oppose [the governor’s] gutting of FOIA.” And finally Nelson admits that only roughly 15 percent of the Legislature is Democrat.

So, which is it? If you put all of Nelson’s contradictions together, he asserts that the Legislature is controlled by Republicans who kowtow to the governor until they don’t. Another way to say this is that the Legislature, like the governor, is largely conservative and will agree on many issues and not on others. Sorry Rex, that’s not a bug, it’s a feature. This is precisely the balance of power envisioned by our founders in creating three separate and equal branches of government.

Nelson also grumbles that the governor and the Legislature have pushed what he calls “a national political agenda.” Apparently his complaint is that the policies being pursued today aren’t all unique to Arkansas. This is an odd objection, because legislatures are commonly referred to as “laboratories of experimentation.” So Nelson is objecting to the idea that ideas will start in one state and good ones will spread to other states, including Arkansas. Good ideas aren’t good any longer if they came from out of state? Does Nelson understand who the Know Nothings were? (They were xenophobic, as is his complaint here.)

While the Arkansas Legislature undoubtedly has originated several solid ideas over its history, we’ve also happily copied good policies from other states. But I can’t believe Nelson believes his own critique. It’s just a convenient argument for his disagreement with the conservative ideas being implemented in Arkansas. Nelson exhibits a remarkable if not obvious level of selective parochialism.

Nelson’s primary example of innovative ideas that aren’t homegrown is the governor’s education policy. What’s particularly interesting about Nelson’s beef here is that he apparently prefers the status quo of a clearly failing institutional education system that is particularly bad in Arkansas. No better circumstance gives rise to the defense “thank goodness for Mississippi.” Arkansas needed outside help, and the governor brought it here.

Whether Arkansas has been first or not in adopting innovative ideas, we’ve been at or near the top in advancing conservative legislation that has swept the nation, including several bills that I sponsored such as campus free speech, protecting women in school athletics and bathrooms, and ending state-sponsored discrimination falsely called affirmative action.

Nelson asserts that the governor “angered teachers and administrators, using her Trump training to brand anyone who dares question her education bill as ‘extremists.’ This is Arkansas, a state of only 3 million people. These ‘extremists’ are people we see in the grocery store, sit next to in church and visit with in the front yard.”

As a state senator, I’ve certainly heard from folks who disagree with me. Some are reasonable in demeanor and position, and others are clearly extremists. I rarely hear from the latter in conservative circles in my community and throughout the state. Regardless, Nelson’s attempt to intimidate conservatives from highlighting extremism in Arkansas or elsewhere won’t succeed. Arkansas like other states has a loud minority of leftists whose views don’t reflect the general population, and they need to be called out as the self-described “radical-left progressive democrats” they are.

Then comes Nelson’s attack on me and the act I introduced to protect children in public libraries and schools. His broadside attack is made without substance and lacks merit. Nelson complains about

Act 372, which removes public libraries’ odd exemption from obscenity law, amends and clarifies certain language regulating the possession and distribution of obscenity, requires public schools and libraries to adopt their own policies for selection, relocation, and retention of physical materials and challenges to physical materials, allows parents to see what their children have checked out of the library (suggested by the representative for the Library Association), and prohibits furnishing items to minors that are obscene for children.

In particular, Nelson accuses me of favoring book banning, a cheap, transparently false claim. The only book banning occurring in Arkansas transpired at library-board, schoolboard, and quorum-court meetings in which concerned citizens tried to read the books currently in the libraries to these bodies overseeing them.

So drag-queen reading to children in libraries is OK, but exposing the actual books insidiously presenting highly sexualized scenes to our children is forbidden. Where does allegedly Republican Nelson come out in this debate? He is free to disagree with the provisions in the law I wrote; I’m just curious specifically which child-protection provision he dislikes.

Furthermore, Nelson defends merely with words the Arkansas FOIA but never once mentions that I’ve been a consistent leader in doing so with legislation. Arkansas is recognized as a national leader in Freedom of Information law; I’ve sponsored several bills strengthening transparency in the past few years, including free speech on campuses, broadly defining the statutory rights of FOIA requesters of records, bringing in line with openness principles (in bipartisan legislation) the specific language in the law regarding awarding citizens attorney’s fees when they succeed against government bodies that didn’t do right, broadening the language defining the scope of the entities covered in the FOIA, and establishing in the act when citizens are entitled to see the deliberations of governing bodies.

Not all of these efforts passed, but many did. And I continue to seek transparency of government and use the FOIA to expose wrongful behavior, such as politicking occurring at Central Arkansas Water, use of public funds at the Central Arkansas Library System to lobby against conservative legislation, and awarding of non-bid contracts at Arkansas PBS. So where are my kudos, Rex? And why haven’t I seen you come to the Legislature to testify in favor of the FOIA?

Then Nelson spends a considerable amount of words complaining about the firing of the director of the state Department of Parks, Heritage and Tourism. I have no idea what occurred there, and Nelson makes no effort to explain. The fact that a new governor replaced an agency head hardly seems novel. Nelson hasn’t disclosed his relationship with the fired director, but his critique seems rather personal.

Relatedly, Nelson says, “The first gentleman could best serve our state by getting a real job in the private sector so he doesn’t have time to meddle.” I wonder whether Nelson would make a similar claim if we had a first lady.

Finally, I’m baffled by Nelson’s claim that the “governor’s office … lack[s] … joy,” an odd criticism. I’ve spent time with the governor and her staff. I’ve seen the governor stay late to take photographs with well-wishers and interacting happily with kids and adults. Nelson is just wrong in this fact-free claim. And that his psychobabble has become commonplace among talking heads is a sad state of affairs.

Seems to me the one who lacks joy is Nelson, largely because he’s become irrelevant.