CHUCK, YOU NEVER HAD A CHANCE

By

Jimmy Joe Meeker

Originally published in The Wilson County Advocate, Vol 3., No. 1, ©January 12, 1993 by Donald W. Gillette

“Out here in the perimeter there are no stars. Out here we is stoned.”

-Jim Morrison

Nobody in Wilson County really had a personal problem with Chuck Howell. I met him once and although he had no idea who I was he impressed me as an okay guy. In person, he wasn’t the prick that The Wilson County Advocate and other local media made him out to be, but that’s because okay guy statements don’t make the news. Prick statements do.

Howell’s major problem, really his only problem was that he attacked the public officials we all elected. He, on the other hand, wasn’t elected to his position. He was hired.

Howell had several county commissioners on his side throughout his tenure as Finance Director, but he also had several who thought he overstepped his bounds. Obviously, his major opponent was Don Simpson, the Wilson County Executive.

In retrospect, it seems that Howell never fully grasped the fact that Big Don was elected by the entire county—not a district here and a district there. That should have told him something, but it never really sank in. Howell was getting his information from a select few county commissioner who absolutely, positively hate Don Simpson because his concept of Wilson County differs from theirs. And we all know from experience that if you disagree with one of the morons on the county commission, then you’re wrong. Most lunatics think their dog can talk, but when a psychiatrist tells them it can’t they think he’s wrong, too. And I have it on good authority that most commissioners carry on conversations with their house pets on a daily basis. Except for one, who’s reportedly extremely fond of his farm animals.

When you go to work for Wilson County in a high level position, you have no choice but to throw in with one of the opposing factions in county politics. Anyone who thinks they can remain above the stench and decay of the festering snake pit we know as the county commission is sadly mistaken. Even if you walk in the door and make the conscious choice to work for the people and not get involved in petty bickering, something about it pulls you in. The courthouse is like some decaying magnet: if you get too close, you end up stuck to either a negative or a positive pole. Howell got stuck to the negative pole of a few commissioners who basically don’t like Don Simpson because he has more influence than they do.

What these select few commissioners failed (and still fail) to realize is that the vast majority of people in Wilson County have a lot of faith in Don Simpson’s judgment and experience, primarily because they’ve known him for years and they know what kind of a man he is. It takes time to build up this kind of reputation. You don’t cruise in from Florida on Sunday and become King of the Hill on Monday morning. Especially if the first thing you do on that Monday morning is call the County Executive a bum on the courthouse steps.

For some bizarre reason, Chuck Howell came into his position thinking that we were all a pack of backwards-ass rubes and that he could play us like an old violin. But that ain't the way it works in Wilson County politics. It’d take two hundred Chuck Howells to break this mob.

Face it. We’re famous for dirty politics and we like it that way. From the outside, it looks like fifty vicious thugs stabbing each other in the back, but when you look closely—well, hell, it’s still fifty vicious thugs stabbing each other in the back. But they’re our thugs and we love to watch them in action. It’s good for talk and rumor. It’s also more fun than a barrel of monkeys.

The hub-bub about the Financial Management Act of 1981 is probably the stupidest thing that’s ever hit Wilson County. Basically, all it really did was nothing. Personally, I haven’t noticed a bit of difference except that it generated some headlines and a lot of laughs. I’d guess that none of you have noticed any difference, either. It was supposed to streamline the way county government did business and it was supposed to save us millions of dollars and ultimately, it’s done neither. If it had been the Constitutional Monarchy Act of 1981 the results would have been the same. Where are the big savings? Streamlines? Are you wolfing me? The Finance Committee is the most hilarious thing I’ve seen in years. None of them know what they’re doing, they know they don’t know what they’re doing, and they won’t admit it because they don’t want us to think they’re stupid. News flash: They’re not fooling anyone. With the possible exception of Jimmy Carter’s family, they’re the most pathetic clowns ever gathered under one roof in the history of the world. And they’re the reason the Financial Management Act of 1981 isn’t working. It’s not Chuck Howell’s fault, although he did think he was the Lone Ranger, and it’s not Don Simpson’s fault. It’s their fault.

Any government act or management theory is only as good as the people who put it into practice. So long as we have idiots and good ole boys and back-stabbers on the county commission, nothing is going to pull Wilson County out of this black hole. But the ride down is going to be hilarious.

And eventually, we’ll all come to understand that no one here gets out alive.

XXX