GEORGE HARDING – IS HE IN OR OUT?

By

Jimmy Joe Meeker

Originally published in The Wilson County Advocate, Vol. 2, No. 3 (misprinted as Vol. 1, No. 3) ©January 21, 1992 Donald W. Gillette

“There was a vague, unpleasant manginess about his appearance; he somehow seemed dirty, though a close glance showed him as carefully shaven as an actor, and clad in immaculate linen.”

-H.L. Mencken on William Jennings Bryant

It looks like the school bus issue has been put to rest now. Kip Puryear and the School Board are out to lunch for the duration. The whole fiasco has been buried, spit on, and overworked to death, so now it’s time to move on to something else.

And that something (or rather, someone) else is ex-Road Superintendent George Harding, a true good ole boy politician in the old style.

When I read that good, old George had come up with a last-minute plan to keep buses rolling, I thought I’d gone back in time. Hasn’t this guy been shown the door? How in the hell did he get involved in all this? I must have missed something somewhere.

A lot of people don’t like George Harding because he’s outspoken. Others don’t like him because he’s pompous and hardheaded. Still others can’t stand the sight of George Harding because they think he’s a crook.

Not me.

I don’t like George Harding because he’s a politician, whether he’s in office or not.

My Dad didn’t like him.

What’s it going to take to put Gorgeous George out to pasture in Wilson County affairs? Time. He’s not going to get out voluntarily, that’s for sure. The only thing that’ll put old Georgie Boy to rest is when they close the box on his tired, old ass and lower him into the ground.

And, you know…why not? He lives in Wilson County just like the rest of us. He pays taxes here, and he’s lived here for as long as anyone can remember. He’s actually got as much right to propose a solution to governmental problems as anyone else.

The problem is that ordinary people just don’t like George meddling in things because he has an opinion about everything under the sun and usually that opinion doesn’t match the opinion of any man, woman, or child on the planet.

The other problem with good, old George is that politicians, especially young and upcoming politicians, get information from him because he’s been in the game for so long. Like it or not, George Harding is the elder statesman in Wilson County. And he’s got dirt on every swinging John in the universe.

When this rag first began to print, our reporters got information from anybody who could talk, including George. He had some good, dirty information that helped expose some of the rotten deals going down right under our noses and allowed the public to see who was righteous and who was the devil’s henchman.

Of course, after a while, rumors began that George was buying us off, paying us to go after his enemies.

Well, I never saw a nickel, so if that was true, I am one pissed-off mother.

And then rumors started that George owned this scandal sheet. Baloney.

George Harding is a cantankerous, old curmudgeon with a nose for politics. And as I’ve said, I don’t like him. And as I’ve also said, his opinion is as good as anyone else’s.

I thought the plan he proposed to Kip Puryear was asinine and although the Kipster claims he didn’t give it any consideration, you can bet that that is a bald-faced lie.

When George speaks, people listen. The morons.

No one here gets out alive.

XXX