So there I am, waiting for an event to start with Harold Ford Jr. and there's a guy waiting too.
I see the bus outside and know it's the Ford Campaign bus driver, waiting to pick the Congressman up from a flight across the state.
"So, how long you been with him?"
"I've been driving him around for eight weeks now," Charles or Charlie the Vietnam Veteran who could pass for a redneck says.
"You support him, do you?"
move on to hear his reply
"Oh, absolutely," he says, adding "he's the real thing. What you see is what you get with him."
I met the Congressman not long after that, too. I'd sent him a note of support, with some poignant representation of my life and, let's just say he was touched. So touched he showed he had kept it and it was still on his blackberry.
To those who decry his positions, those who denounce his religiousity, those who think he panders, I ask you: what if those are truly his values, truly his beliefs, truly his morays?
Give the guy a chance. Give the guy your support. Give him the opportunity to prove himself beyond Republican-crafted legislation crafted to drive that wedge between us all. I think you'll see a great TENNESSEE statesman on the horizon. I know I do.