Small Town Progress, Clearly Seen, With James Fallows

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I don't know what he has come up with today to talk about.
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I'm not asking you to hide anything.
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Yeah.
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You know, put it out there.
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Let the people see it.
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I've never not worked in a hostile working environment.
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You can't argue with anybody when they're putting facts in your face.
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Zach, that's a hard question.
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I have no answer for it.
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From the opinion page of the commercial dispatch.
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This is between the headlines.
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Senator Cindy Hyde Smith is raising eyebrows with recent words and actions, and of course, that's not the first time we will talk about that.
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And we have a fantastic interview on tap today.
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Mr.
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James Fallows, who is a national name, and he's got good things to say about our town.
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But first, retirement looks different for everyone, so your plan should be built around you.
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In the heart of the friendly city, we welcome you again to Catfish Alley Studio in historic downtown Columbus, where it's a great day.
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Zach and I are both here.
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Zach is your host, he's the managing editor of the Dispatch, and my name is Dave Chisholm.
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We've had some interesting characters in this studio from time to time, and today is certainly no different.
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We are blessed to have Mr.
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James Fallows with us, who is a longtime national correspondent for The Atlantic and former White House speechwriter and co-author with his wife Deb of Our Towns, which um grew from their 100,000 mile journey through communities across America.
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Thanks for coming in here.
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This is going to be so much fun.
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Also in the studio is his friend, Mr.
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Rick, who is a uh mystery novel writer as well.
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So welcome to the studio, fellas.
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Thanks.
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It's great to be back in the Golden Triangle.
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Yeah, yeah.
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Well, let me start there.
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Like uh when when when you and your wife were traveling the country, what drew you here?
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And what brought you here and what what had did you notice?
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So there was something that brought there was a person who brought us here in specific, and then there was a reason we came back a dozen times.
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You know, bringing an HBO film crew with us, bringing a marketplace uh you know with Kyriezdal and his team here.
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So we had been over starting the the minimal backstory is my wife and I had been living in China for four years, and we were based in Shanghai and Beijing, but we spent most of our time on the road, two small towns of eight, you know, eight million people or whatever.
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So we came back to the U.S.
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We thought we'd do some more small town reporting in the U.S.
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of actual small towns.
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I have at the time I had a little single-engine airplane, a Cirrus SR-22.
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We'd flown around the country and and we had been in Kl in Greenville, South Carolina, reporting on the Governor's School for the Arts in Greenville.
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I wrote it up as, you know, this is really a great thing.
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And we got an an email from Thomas Easterling at MSMS saying, You think South Carolina is so hot, you need to come to Mississippi.
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So Well, I expect he's a reader of the Atlantic, sure.
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Yes, yes, uh, yes.
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And so I was working for the Atlantic then.
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Now mainly I write on a substack called Breaking the News.
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And so we came here for about uh four or five days on our own, and we thought, as we had around the country, good God, all the stuff that's going on in Columbus, Mississippi, and and on Verone.
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So we then came back, we brought the marketplace crew back, we um we uh our we came back to see the school, to see West Point, to see Starkville, to see the industries and all that.
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We wrote about it in our book, Our Towns, and then that was one of the places when we made an HBO movie.
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So we came back here for about a week with an HBO film crew.
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So we I feel like we're back home.
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Trevor Burrus, Jr.
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And HBO wasn't coming here to mock us.
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No, it was saying that that here is the point was there's all this stuff, a part of Mississippi.
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Um we it was just before the segment on West Virginia.
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And West Virginia we had a one of our good friends there said, I tell people from I'm from Charleston, you say, Oh, I love your seafood.
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He says, No, I mean West Virginia.
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And so he said, you know, West Virginia sort of is the land of burning sofas.
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Yeah.
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Exactly.
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And so we sort of played on the fact that people would be surprised by the educational, by the industrial, by all the other stuff that was happening here.
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And I guess what was uh what was your primary takeaway, your primary surprise that the the was really in Columbus?
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Aaron Ross Powell So it was it was a combination, and sorry to interrupt, so it was a combination of the school itself, which was really interesting, the historian.
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Uh MSMS.
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Okay.
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Yeah.
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And we went to the uh some of the um the Emancipation Day uh ceremony.
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We went to that, and the one we went to maybe twelve or thirteen years ago, they had a modest crowd.
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We've been back for three or four of them since then, and the crowd has grown and grown.
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And so uh so and I think we have tried to spread the word about this kind of historical reenactment.
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So the way in which the school was addressing all of the legacy that goes with being from Mississippi, the way that the industrial center, the Golden Triangle itself, was having all this advanced manufacturing and all that, that that was interesting.
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Um, the this the way in which the having a big-time university over in Starkville, they were partnering with people here.
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So it just was here's the stuff you don't know about Mississippi.
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We're gonna tell you.
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All right.
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So you're not being polite, you're simply saying that that the mix of old and new that meshes together in this particular town is unique and preferable.
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Well, we put a whole lot of words in your mouth.
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Is that fair?
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Aaron Ross Powell, Jr.
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I'm saying that it is the impression of smaller town America in general is most people feel better about the place they live than about the America they hear about and read about.
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Trevor Burrus, Jr.
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Right.
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It's kind of like everybody hates Congress, but they love their Congress.
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Trevor Burrus, Jr.
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Yes.
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And and and it's it's a version of that that that you all are aware here, both of the challenges that Mississippi has and the nation has and all the rest, but the ways in which this place has is doing interesting and progressive things.
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So that that was a it was a sincere, but not um a chamber of commerce style presentation.
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Trevor Burrus, Jr.
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Right.
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And speaking of Chamber of Commerce, they they like to come up with these criteria, okay, whether they be from this town or that town.
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You had what was it, was it eleven criteria?
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Trevor Burrus, Jr.: 10 and a half.
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Ten and a half signs of civic success.
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Why the half, you might ask?
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The the one half was having a craft brew industry.
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That was a sign of sort of civic renewal.
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You had the right kinds of entrepreneurs.
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You it was a way that that sort of um derelict parts of town, not derelict people, but derelict real estate, could was often redeveloped.
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And we saw that in Duluth, we saw it in Fresno, we saw it in uh rural Maine.
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So, yes.
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And it was other things like having a community college and having public-private partnerships and having a port, which you don't, but there's nothing you can do about.
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Well, you do have a industrial, but I forgot.
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You do have a port, as does.
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Yes.
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Yes.
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And you're developing some port-side entertainment venues, right?
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Well, we'll get back to that one.
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That's uh that's in question at the moment.
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Well uh and if I can interrupt, I've been here a million times for my friend Eric Rick Redman.
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This is your first time in the Golden Triangle.
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What impresses you here, Redmond?
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What impresses you that everybody's glad to see you back here, Jim?
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Jim undersells himself all the time, but what he has done, first of all, I consider him to be the foremost journalist of our day, uh observer of things, as well as being a great author.
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But what he and Deb did and where Columbus fits in it, they have all over the country finding towns or cities that have revitalized themselves somehow.
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Many of them have had a catastrophe of some sort of big industry moving away or something.
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And how did the people come together civically?
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It's the civic uh intermeshing of people, sort of no partisan politics, just people in the community trying to decide they want to-and that's what Jim and Deb celebrated.
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They celebrated it in their in all the stuff they wrote along the way, their book, Our Towns, which is an astonishing book, and then this movie.
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So Columbus features in it, but yours like a star in the firmament.
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But there's a firmament there of others.
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And what I wanted to do, coming following Jim around, I wanted to be with Jim in places that he and Deb had observed and to see what he thought now.
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It's more his impressions now that I'm interested in than my own impressions, but my impression of Columbus is it's it's quite vital.
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I mean, uh it seems to have a lot of vitality, um at least economically along the street.
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Your shops are are open, and and it seems like there's a lot happening here for a town that's not huge.
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Trevor Burrus, Jr.
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And it's only getting better.
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From what I understand, can I interrupt?
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I'm going to interrupt that.
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But but I just neglected to mention a family-owned newspaper, which is a distinguishing characteristic here.
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So sorry, I I didn't want to let that pass.
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Yeah, please.
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Aaron Powell Well, now from what I understand, uh uh Rick, you're maybe doing a little project that's Mississippi-related.
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Is that what I understand?
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Aaron Ross Powell, Jr.
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I had a project uh for from 2022 to 2025 over in Smith County.
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Uh we were going to produce liquid biofuels there from uh using uh uh really good southern yellow pine as a feedstock, and uh it was a very large project.
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But uh when the uh one big beautiful bill passed, it was no longer uh possible to do it, no longer economically possible to do it.
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So that that ended that.
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And it was too bad because I was very enamored of Smith County.
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Uh people there were great.
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It would have been a project that would have done a lot for the county and uh and would have you know been a very good thing.
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But it's that true is just one uh negative star, one black hole in a firmament of black holes that were created by that by that bill.
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But we're not doing any partisan politics here.
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Rickers from Seattle, I live in D.C.
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so.
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Well, we have politics in this town, but but you you had mentioned um the alehouses as I call them.
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Yes.
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And my experience therein is that the people aren't really big on talking about, you know, Trump or those those hard topics.
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They just want to talk about the price of gas and they want to talk about uh, hey, how are things going downtown?
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You know, uh what's the city doing with my money?
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Yeah.
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Well now, and I wanted to kind of piggyback off of that because uh I've I've kind of had that same observation.
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Uh I've worked in community journalism in uh two different states over the span of uh two decades.
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And you know, you talk about what you see on TV, and that's that's that's what you're talking about around November and things like that, but the the the day-to-day interactions are you know just kind of hitting the man in front of you.
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And and I mean, what what have been your observations in the communities that you is that is that typical of what you've seen?
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Aaron Ross Powell Very much so.
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And it's something that that's intentional on Debs and my part.
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So I've spent a lot of my life in partisan politics.
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Trevor Burrus, Jr.
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I worked for Jimmy Carter when he was uh president.
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I wasn't worked on his campaign, I was his White House speechwriter for for a couple of years.
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And I write a lot about sort of national politics.
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But when we traveled around, we would intentionally never start out saying, you know, in the day when you're starting to do this, oh, do you like Obama?
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You know, oh, do you hate Obama?
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Just because number one, no there's never any interesting answer to that kind of question.
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Trevor Burrus, Jr.: You know, the you know the range of answers just like you know, from one to five, and just and there's nothing you're gonna learn from that.
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Also, there's an interesting journalistic uh feature there.
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If you are showing up from out of town asking people, what do you think about the midterms, what do you think about this or that, you're in the role of expert, and they're you know, expert from out of town, they're in the role of guy from Mississippi.
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Whereas if you're asking them, what's happening in this town, what about the port?
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What about the school?
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What about the what about the W, et cetera?
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They are the experts, and everybody has a story.
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And so i i it they're their stories are about themselves and only peripherally about national politics.
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Trevor Burrus, Jr.
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Yeah.
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Nobody likes to be a lab rat.
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Yes.
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Well, and and the other thing is a good motto worthy of Tennessee Williams.
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Well, the the other thing, too, I mean, the the things that are affecting people are affecting them, and they have all a broad they're they're not strictly conservative or strictly liberal things that are happening to people.
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And uh people's experiences with their neighbors are not fully conservative or fully liberal either.
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But um I guess uh when you look at, say, the social media and kind of what happens on social media and how those conversations kind of bank one way or the other or just kind of go off the rails.
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It's very different when you're looking somebody in the face and saying, Yeah, and I think that's partly also why local news remain local news, obviously the economic basis for local news has been shot out from underneath it over the last fifty years, but it's still trusted.
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So local news, you know, the polls indicate that much as people don't like the national press, they don't like uh national politicians, they still trust local news sources.
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And I think it's partly of that in-person validation you're gonna see you might see the person on the street.
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Trevor Burrus They also trust good people.
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And if they if they believe in their hearts that someone is a good person, then they're gonna look beyond party lines.
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I'm sitting here, I'm the chairman of the Lowndes County Republican Party.
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But I think Jimmy Carter in his heart was a good man.
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He was a really good man.
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He was not a great success as president.
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There's a whole lot he was more successful than it seems, but he was a better person than a president.
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Trevor Burrus, Jr.
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Well, how how do you think that his legacy, especially I mean, he he lived a long time after he left office and did a lot of uh did a lot of philanthropy, did a lot with Habitat and different other organizations.
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How do you think, or how did you see his legacy kind of change in the viewpoint of the general public over time?
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Trevor Burrus, Jr.
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So it's you know, that there are not that many living Americans who were around even for Ronald Reagan.
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You know, the median American was born after Ronald Reagan left office.
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So there's not that you know, very few people even that makes me very sad for you to say that.
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Aaron Powell, I'm just I'm not sure.
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You know he and I are the same age.
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We were born we were born during his first year.
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Yes, well, you're breaking my heart.
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So it so it's um you know, the imprint he's had on most people is this kindly grandfather you figure who's building, you know, uh homes for homeless people and he's out dealing with the guinea worm and and all the rest, which he you know, his motto for the last two or three years of his life is he wanted to live longer than the last guinea worm.
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And I think he there are still about five guinea worms that that exist, but I think that he he lasted long enough, ten times as long as former president as he as he was as president, that people it's impossible to remember that when he was coming to office in 1976 during the campaign, from one percent name or recognition to being sworn in within one year, he was sort of the Obama of that era in a sense of being I kind of uh not you know in political views, but just people felt as if there was some kind of larger thing that that that he symbolized.
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And uh so so I I think he was lucky to become president.
00:16:34.399 --> 00:16:40.320
He was unlucky as president, but he was lucky in the 40-plus years after that with the things he was able to do.
00:16:40.399 --> 00:16:47.360
Trevor Burrus Plus there's the wonderful old line from Harry Truman that uh a statesman is a politician who's been dead for 15 years.
00:16:49.120 --> 00:16:49.600
Yeah.
00:16:50.159 --> 00:16:51.440
Time will tell, right?
00:16:51.840 --> 00:16:51.919
Yeah.
00:16:52.240 --> 00:16:55.360
Well, uh we were talking about local news a while ago.
00:16:56.080 --> 00:17:19.279
In the in the places that you've been, here included, uh what can local news sources do to better engage the public, better engage the community, and and and kind of help mitigate some of the that that sort of pall over the the uh political conversation right now.
00:17:20.640 --> 00:17:26.799
So if I had a a good short answer to that, you know, I would be more influential and successful than I am.
00:17:26.960 --> 00:17:34.720
I I I think it's interesting some of the local newspapers we found that have maintained an economic base and also a community reach.
00:17:34.960 --> 00:17:50.880
The one that I would most direct your attention to here is the Quadi Tides, Q-U-O-D-D-Y Tides of Eastport, Maine, which is a a weekly, a print weekly, and they are they have their own version of the Golden Triangle of their sort of area area.
00:17:51.039 --> 00:17:56.559
This is Eastport Maine is the last city in Maine before you hit Canada, our current, you know, faux Canada.
00:17:56.640 --> 00:17:58.720
It's uh right across from Campabello.
00:17:59.119 --> 00:18:02.880
And they believe in just having all the details of local life.
00:18:03.039 --> 00:18:10.319
And it includes sports and weddings and just, you know, letters to the editor, it's engaging people in all those ways, as I know you all do here.
00:18:10.480 --> 00:18:17.759
So I think that you know we hold the dispatch up as an example of doing of things people can learn from other places too.
00:18:19.359 --> 00:18:20.720
And it's peer-reviewed.
00:18:20.880 --> 00:18:29.279
Like um it's not just some uh Joe Blow out there saying, hey, I I saw something that looked like a ghost and I'm gonna talk about it.
00:18:29.519 --> 00:18:32.000
And uh yeah, it was waving to me at McDonald's.
00:18:32.400 --> 00:18:34.640
We've had some of those stories in our paper, actually.
00:18:34.720 --> 00:18:34.880
Trevor Burrus, Jr.
00:18:35.119 --> 00:18:41.599
Yeah, but but if I'm reading it in the dispatch, I'm I'm more likely to say, yeah, that that probably happened.
00:18:44.640 --> 00:18:49.759
I watched that HBO special, and if I'm remembering this right, and I'm gonna be very embarrassed if I'm not.
00:18:50.000 --> 00:18:51.440
Did y'all go to Bend, Oregon?
00:18:51.519 --> 00:18:52.079
Aaron Ross Powell We did.
00:18:52.240 --> 00:18:52.960
That was a yes.
00:18:53.519 --> 00:18:53.680
Okay.
00:18:54.160 --> 00:18:56.240
Did you stay the night in the blockbuster?
00:18:56.960 --> 00:19:07.680
So the blockbuster, no, we stayed in some place called the Wall Street Suites, which was an old kind of um by the hour motel that was sort of made over in a nice No The Blockbuster, I don't even know about the Blockbuster.
00:19:08.079 --> 00:19:10.559
Yeah, the Bend is where the last Blockbuster is.
00:19:10.960 --> 00:19:11.039
Right.
00:19:11.279 --> 00:19:12.160
Oh, oh okay.
00:19:12.319 --> 00:19:12.480
Yes.
00:19:13.279 --> 00:19:16.400
Yes, I know that blockbuster we it was not far from the blockbuster.
00:19:16.640 --> 00:19:16.720
Yes.
00:19:16.960 --> 00:19:17.440
Yes, yes.
00:19:18.640 --> 00:19:19.839
They're still going, aren't they?
00:19:19.920 --> 00:19:20.160
Aaron Ross Powell, Jr.
00:19:20.240 --> 00:19:25.440
They were as of it it's was like uh just before the pandemic we were there.
00:19:25.680 --> 00:19:30.799
So I haven't been so as of before, unless the pandemic swept them away, there was still a blockbuster invent.
00:19:31.119 --> 00:19:40.480
So I thought you were speaking metaphorically, but you know the actual No, it's it was in a a big shopping mall just to the east of where this place we stayed.
00:19:40.559 --> 00:19:41.119
Trevor Burrus Okay.
00:19:41.920 --> 00:19:43.279
Are you reassured to know it's there?
00:19:43.599 --> 00:19:43.920
Yeah, yeah.
00:19:44.559 --> 00:19:47.680
But one of these days, if it if it hangs on, one of these days, I'm going there.
00:19:47.759 --> 00:19:50.240
Aaron Ross Powell And the you can keep this in or not if you want.
00:19:50.319 --> 00:19:57.920
The camera crew from HBO had their van robbed in the parking lot of that blockbuster while we were having dinner in the nearby place.
00:19:58.000 --> 00:20:00.880
Aaron Powell Shout out to the former Ann Lee Motel.
00:20:03.039 --> 00:20:03.599
Wow.
00:20:04.079 --> 00:20:06.880
Well, you guys have anything else you all want to talk about today?
00:20:07.519 --> 00:20:10.640
So uh uh again, you're in your first 24 hours here.
00:20:11.279 --> 00:20:13.680
Parting thoughts of a voice from Seattle.
00:20:13.759 --> 00:20:14.160
Aaron Ross Powell Yeah.
00:20:14.319 --> 00:20:15.279
A voice from Seattle.
00:20:15.359 --> 00:20:15.519
Trevor Burrus, Jr.
00:20:15.759 --> 00:20:17.920
Well, first of all, um there's a lot of kudzu.
00:20:20.720 --> 00:20:21.359
There too?
00:20:21.519 --> 00:20:22.000
Aaron Ross Powell No.
00:20:25.200 --> 00:20:26.799
Impressions of the Mississippi.
00:20:27.279 --> 00:20:35.119
We were driving up from Alabama yesterday, and there are areas that are just completely covered with it, and you think this is kind of uh fascinating but also horrifying.
00:20:35.519 --> 00:20:35.920
Beautiful.
00:20:36.079 --> 00:20:37.759
Uh our drives have been just beautiful.
00:20:37.920 --> 00:20:43.200
We've driven over 500 miles, and it's all the scenery's been great, you know, and uh people have been great everywhere we've been.
00:20:43.599 --> 00:20:44.640
Well, where are you all headed next?
00:20:44.720 --> 00:20:48.079
Aaron Ross Powell So early tomorrow morning back to Atlanta, me to D.C.
00:20:48.240 --> 00:20:50.400
and Rick back to uh to Seattle.
00:20:50.640 --> 00:20:56.799
And I was actually surprised on the drive from Selma, where we'd spent a while, to see actual cotton fields.
00:20:57.039 --> 00:21:00.400
Uh that was I didn't realize actual cotton was still being grown here.
00:21:00.720 --> 00:21:02.079
And and actual rice, too.
00:21:03.200 --> 00:21:05.039
So that's um that was interesting to me.
00:21:05.119 --> 00:21:07.359
Aaron Ross Powell Well, fellows, thanks for coming in today.
00:21:07.440 --> 00:21:09.359
Our our special guest has been Mr.
00:21:09.440 --> 00:21:09.680
Rick.
00:21:09.920 --> 00:21:11.039
What's your last name again, Mr.
00:21:11.119 --> 00:21:11.279
Rick?
00:21:11.759 --> 00:21:12.559
Redmond, R-E D.
00:21:13.279 --> 00:21:13.359
Mr.
00:21:13.440 --> 00:21:14.799
Rick Redman, who's an author.
00:21:15.039 --> 00:21:18.480
Also author of Our Towns, Mr.
00:21:18.640 --> 00:21:24.079
James Fallows, who is also a frequenter of hourly rate motels.
00:21:25.599 --> 00:21:26.799
It's been good, fellas.
00:21:27.200 --> 00:21:28.559
Come see us anytime.
00:21:28.880 --> 00:21:30.000
The friendly city.
00:21:30.079 --> 00:21:30.559
It's been real.
00:21:30.960 --> 00:21:31.200
Thank you.
00:21:31.440 --> 00:21:31.759
Thanks.
00:21:32.240 --> 00:21:39.119
So top headline today is not a local topic, but it certainly is local enough.
00:21:40.000 --> 00:21:45.440
Scott Colomb, of course, being a native and local of Columbus right here.
00:21:45.599 --> 00:21:48.079
And Cindy Hyde from Brookhaven.
00:21:48.240 --> 00:21:49.359
Is that kind of her home trip?
00:21:50.400 --> 00:21:55.359
But anyway, we've got politics to talk about, and we'll get through that as best we can.
00:21:55.599 --> 00:21:58.400
What is the story we're dealing with today, Zach?
00:21:58.799 --> 00:21:59.599
Well, I mean her can.
00:22:00.240 --> 00:22:16.960
Campaign uh launched last week, late last week, a uh colognefor Senate.com website, and it looks like one of those old Angel Fire websites that you would build yourself when when you and I were in high school.
00:22:17.359 --> 00:22:19.119
Like it's got blue hyperlinks.
00:22:19.680 --> 00:22:33.359
Yeah, it's got all of the uh and and I mean it looks silly, but the but the messaging is this is who Scott Colomb is, and it's just her talking points that she she plays all the hits on it.
00:22:33.599 --> 00:22:39.680
Uh here's what he believes about this, believes about that, and it's and it's her version of his beliefs.
00:22:40.000 --> 00:22:47.440
All right, so just so we're crystal clear and just for the technical aspect of it, this is a uh shall we say, a fake website.
00:22:47.759 --> 00:22:50.240
It's not and and well, I mean it's a real website.
00:22:50.319 --> 00:22:50.799
You can go to it.
00:22:51.119 --> 00:22:53.119
You can go to it, but it's fake information.
00:22:53.440 --> 00:23:02.160
Any old Joe Blow can go out there and if the if the uh domain is available, you can claim it and you can put a website on it, and that's what they did.
00:23:02.480 --> 00:23:02.640
Right.
00:23:04.480 --> 00:23:04.720
Fine.
00:23:05.200 --> 00:23:11.680
Cologne for Senate dot com was the and here here's my problem with it.
00:23:12.480 --> 00:23:20.480
Um at at minimum, at its basic level, it's lazy as hell.
00:23:21.039 --> 00:23:23.440
And at most it's crazy as hell.
00:23:23.759 --> 00:23:25.680
And this is what I'm saying.
00:23:28.160 --> 00:23:42.079
We do this instead of campaigning, we do this instead of debating the man, we do this instead of all of the other things that uh are are acceptable in politics or used to be.
00:23:42.400 --> 00:23:47.599
Instead, it's like somebody rebooted the woman and gave her a Trump update when she turned back on.
00:23:48.079 --> 00:23:50.640
And and that's what this looks like to me.
00:23:51.440 --> 00:24:02.400
And and it it just seems beneath the United States Senator to do something like this, especially when and I mean you I know you're trying to beat the guy in an election, fine.
00:24:03.119 --> 00:24:08.799
But but i uh but this uh this isn't good faith politics.
00:24:09.359 --> 00:24:27.759
Well, let me say this, and and you may be surprised to hear me say this, but you know, we're we're ten years into the Trump era, and for all the things that I like about Trump, the thing that I don't like about Trump the most is how he soured the world of politics.
00:24:28.079 --> 00:24:36.559
He basically did uh uh I don't even think Happy Gilmore is a good allegory anymore because it's gotten so rancorous.
00:24:36.720 --> 00:24:41.839
It was never pretty, but people at least appreciated and respected each other.
00:24:42.160 --> 00:24:47.119
So I don't like the direction that politics is headed in general.
00:24:47.359 --> 00:24:53.920
And if I'm being real, which I always am when I sit here, this does kind of follow that model.
00:24:54.319 --> 00:24:55.200
It does.
00:24:55.519 --> 00:25:09.680
And and and and and David, here's the thing that I'm not sure you may understand this, but I'm not sure that everybody in your camp understands it.
00:25:11.279 --> 00:25:15.839
That website wasn't meant for people who supported Scott Cologne.
00:25:16.240 --> 00:25:20.640
That website exemplifies uh how she regards you.
00:25:21.759 --> 00:25:27.759
This website r exemplifies how she regards the her farmer neighbor.
00:25:28.000 --> 00:25:37.119
This it exemplifies sh her target audience was to gaslight the people who she needs to show up to fill in the bubble for.
00:25:37.200 --> 00:25:40.960
That's how she regards the people that she's depending on.
00:25:41.599 --> 00:25:49.119
And I don't think that everybody understands just how much of a slap in the face it is that your U.S.
00:25:49.359 --> 00:25:54.960
Senator This is how she regards her supposed friends.
00:25:55.599 --> 00:25:57.200
I'm not sure I follow you there.
00:25:57.279 --> 00:26:03.119
So this website was put up, it was satirical, it was somewhat an attack in nature.
00:26:03.519 --> 00:26:04.559
It was an attack in nature.
00:26:04.640 --> 00:26:06.160
I don't know if it was satirical.
00:26:06.400 --> 00:26:07.920
I don't know if you can call it a parody.
00:26:08.000 --> 00:26:12.079
I maybe she just has somebody on her staff that can't build websites very pretty.
00:26:12.240 --> 00:26:14.000
I'm not I'm not prepared to call it a parody.
00:26:14.160 --> 00:26:14.720
Well, I don't know.
00:26:14.880 --> 00:26:17.680
Because it says all the same shit that she says all of the time.
00:26:18.079 --> 00:26:23.359
I'm sure instead of like any politician.
00:26:24.000 --> 00:26:30.160
Like any politician, the henchmen that follow her around are gonna listen and they're gonna adopt her voice.
00:26:30.480 --> 00:26:35.680
But you know Cindy Hyde Smith wasn't at the computer putting in the code to create the website.
00:26:36.000 --> 00:26:38.160
No, she had somebody, she had somebody hired to do that.
00:26:38.240 --> 00:26:41.119
Cindy Hyde Smith and they made it look lazy on purpose.
00:26:41.200 --> 00:26:44.160
They're gonna say, you know, okay, well, it doesn't matter.
00:26:44.400 --> 00:26:47.119
Where's your boy Mike or Mark Hurst?
00:26:47.359 --> 00:26:48.720
I I don't I don't remember his name.
00:26:48.960 --> 00:26:49.519
It's Mike.
00:26:49.759 --> 00:26:54.160
Uh where's your boy in his press release decrying this?
00:26:54.480 --> 00:26:56.880
Because that's another thing that I have a problem with.
00:26:57.039 --> 00:27:06.720
Because when when Scott did that dumbness with the TikTok thing, and we talked about it, and your boy, would you say it was Mike Hurst?
00:27:06.960 --> 00:27:09.200
Um, I know his name, I'm being silly.
00:27:09.440 --> 00:27:18.480
But uh your boy Mike Hurst, he had a lot to say about it, but he wouldn't come on here and say it, but he had a lot to say about it, he has said nothing about this.
00:27:18.640 --> 00:27:20.559
And that's another problem I have with it.
00:27:20.720 --> 00:27:28.640
The problem that you should have with it is that it's it exemplifies how she regards you.
00:27:29.279 --> 00:27:34.880
It exemplifies how she regards people that she wants to go fill in the bubble for her.
00:27:35.200 --> 00:27:42.240
The problem that I have with it is the problem that I have with polarized politics, whether it's coming from the left or the right.
00:27:42.720 --> 00:27:45.279
Um, the I'm okay, you're not okay.
00:27:45.519 --> 00:27:52.480
The if it suits my purpose, I can set expectations for you that are different than the expectations that I have for myself.
00:27:52.640 --> 00:28:02.640
And I have said, whether it's on the left or whether it's on the right, on this show and in the public and in the paper, if it's wrong once, it's wrong all the damn time.
00:28:03.359 --> 00:28:09.839
And if it's a problem once and you've got to issue a press release about it, then it's a problem every damn time.
00:28:10.000 --> 00:28:11.279
So where are you at, Mr.
00:28:11.359 --> 00:28:11.920
Hurst?
00:28:12.640 --> 00:28:14.480
Well, Scott started it.
00:28:14.640 --> 00:28:16.640
He did that first with the phone call.
00:28:17.119 --> 00:28:22.880
And I want to give you credit because when we talked about that issue, you took it just as seriously.
00:28:23.039 --> 00:28:26.000
You had the same reaction to both, and I appreciate that.
00:28:26.240 --> 00:28:36.400
But right now in our polarized politics, and you know, we just live in a red state, that's why the Republican Party is the one we s we see most closely doing it all the time.
00:28:36.640 --> 00:28:42.799
If you lived in if you lived in Washington, you'd see, or California, you'd see the left doing this more often.
00:28:43.039 --> 00:28:50.880
But the expectations that we set for others in politics are not the expectations that we have for ourselves.
00:28:51.119 --> 00:28:56.720
The things that we think are funny when when it's uh when it's our people doing it.
00:28:56.960 --> 00:29:02.000
We think it's absurd and out of line when the other side is doing it.
00:29:02.079 --> 00:29:05.519
And that that's that's just not It's self-righteous, is what it is.
00:29:05.920 --> 00:29:06.160
It is.
00:29:06.240 --> 00:29:07.279
It is very self-righteous.
00:29:07.599 --> 00:29:09.920
And I tell you what else, it's also cheap.
00:29:10.960 --> 00:29:14.079
We've run into this thing, I call it cheap politics.
00:29:14.319 --> 00:29:16.720
I'll get these stupid test uh texts.
00:29:16.799 --> 00:29:19.200
It'll be, hey, it's Don Jr.
00:29:19.440 --> 00:29:20.240
Can you pitch in?
00:29:20.319 --> 00:29:22.880
Can you believe what Nancy Pelosi did?
00:29:23.039 --> 00:29:30.720
And you know, and I I guess there's people out there that are low IQ enough to think that that's actually J.D.
00:29:30.880 --> 00:29:37.119
Vance or Melania Trump texting them, but with it the the content out there is so cheap.
00:29:37.200 --> 00:29:38.880
Why can't it be higher?
00:29:39.039 --> 00:29:44.480
Why can't it be better elevated and actually talk about issues in a nuanced way?
00:29:44.640 --> 00:29:48.160
That's what that's what my frustration is with politics in general.
00:29:48.559 --> 00:29:50.480
That is my frustration too.
00:29:50.720 --> 00:29:54.880
And we're not that far removed from a society where we did that.
00:29:55.200 --> 00:29:57.440
In our local races, we still do.
00:29:57.920 --> 00:30:00.400
So why is it that a sitting U.S.
00:30:00.559 --> 00:30:09.119
senator has such low regard for her own supporters that this is what she this is how she campaigns.
00:30:10.319 --> 00:30:24.559
And why is it that why is it that we can't anymore regard people who we don't agree with as human unless we are looking at them in our own neighborhood.
00:30:25.440 --> 00:30:28.640
If you can dehumanize somebody from a distance, you will.
00:30:28.799 --> 00:30:31.519
And we're seeing that more and more and more often.
00:30:31.759 --> 00:30:37.039
And we're not even and and you just look at the content of that website, like I said, there she's playing the hits.
00:30:37.200 --> 00:30:44.799
There's no good faith effort to answer or acknowledge any of the any of the facts of any of these matters.
00:30:44.960 --> 00:31:02.799
We're just going to keep repeating the lie over and over and over again because Billy Bob in Brookhaven believes it, and he can get his church to believe it, and then they can get their whole community to believe it, and then it spreads and spreads and spreads, and she doesn't have to do any work to get re-elected.
00:31:03.039 --> 00:31:05.599
Yeah, it ends up being idiocracy.
00:31:05.839 --> 00:31:14.960
Um, as I hear you say these things, I am reminded uh just this last week about the 25th anniversary of 9-11.
00:31:15.039 --> 00:31:23.920
And I watched some old videos of the likes of Bill Clinton and his interactions with George Bush Sr.
00:31:24.079 --> 00:31:25.359
and George H.W.
00:31:25.680 --> 00:31:25.759
uh.
00:31:26.240 --> 00:31:26.960
George W.
00:31:27.119 --> 00:31:38.319
Bush, and and I just thought about the notes that they left in each other's desks and the fact that they were willing to sit with each other and say good things about each other as a person.
00:31:38.480 --> 00:31:40.480
Let me let me take that a step further.
00:31:40.640 --> 00:31:57.759
The pendulum is swinging, and Zach, I am hopeful that that once Trump has done his thing and goes off to his golden golf course out wherever it's gonna be, which will eventually happen, will the pendulum swing back the other way?
00:31:57.839 --> 00:32:13.039
And we have some folks like John Kasich and and not him personally, but but folks get in there to restore dignity to the White House and a dignity in such a manner that it'll trickle down to the senators and the representatives.
00:32:13.599 --> 00:32:22.400
Well, it and the question that Mississippians need to be asking right now is whether you're gonna vote for or not.
00:32:22.880 --> 00:32:27.519
Whether you're gonna vote for Scott, whether you're gonna vote for Cindy, I'm not gonna recommend one way or the other.
00:32:29.759 --> 00:32:34.960
Is this appropriate behavior for a sitting U.S.
00:32:35.119 --> 00:32:35.680
senator?
00:32:36.720 --> 00:32:37.680
I say no.
00:32:38.240 --> 00:32:42.880
Now, I also thought that the TikTok thing that Scott did was silly.
00:32:43.279 --> 00:32:45.680
But is it appropriate?
00:32:45.920 --> 00:32:47.200
No, I agree.
00:32:47.440 --> 00:32:49.039
Is it contemporary?
00:32:49.359 --> 00:32:50.000
Absolutely.
00:32:50.400 --> 00:32:54.000
Well, just because something is contemporary doesn't mean n doesn't make it right.
00:32:54.079 --> 00:32:56.240
And you sound like a deacon when you say that.
00:32:56.559 --> 00:33:01.279
Can you well uh I di I did grow up Baptist.
00:33:01.599 --> 00:33:10.400
And when are we going to Because the change that you're talking about, which is the change that I want to see too, it starts with a very basic question.
00:33:10.640 --> 00:33:16.720
Do I expect of my neighbor a different standard than I expect of myself?
00:33:16.960 --> 00:33:29.920
And right now politics gets away with junk like this, because the answer to that is almost certainly yes in all cases where uh especially in cases where you don't have to look at somebody.
00:33:30.400 --> 00:33:35.359
Well the prevailing rhetoric is that if we don't do it, the other guys are gonna do it.
00:33:35.440 --> 00:33:48.000
And so nobody's standing up and saying, hey, let's be the adult in the room and and not do this because they're afraid that if they don't do it, the other guys will do it, and it's like we're well uh who's gonna break the system?
00:33:48.799 --> 00:34:00.240
Well, and it's turned into what uh it it is turned into what Lewis Black uh once uh commented on in one of his uh stand-up specials.
00:34:00.319 --> 00:34:02.720
He was talking about the parties, the two-party system.
00:34:02.960 --> 00:34:12.880
And he said that the re uh that the Republicans were the party of bad ideas and the Democrats were the party of no ideas, and that just seems to be happening more and more and more.
00:34:13.280 --> 00:34:16.320
I mean this this this race has a local person in it.
00:34:16.480 --> 00:34:20.559
Uh you it it has a national implication and and state implication.
00:34:21.039 --> 00:34:22.000
And that's why we're talking about it.
00:34:22.559 --> 00:34:33.280
But we're talking about it because you know it's it's it's a local race here because uh one of the guys running works downtown in Columbus, so uh on occasion.
00:34:34.480 --> 00:34:34.719
Yeah.
00:34:34.880 --> 00:34:36.559
Well when he's not out campaigning.
00:34:36.800 --> 00:34:52.960
I met Cindy Hyde for the the first time actually a few weeks ago, and prior to having met her, I thought she was um just kind of a a canned and scripted person because that's the way that that television and you know video clips had portrayed her.
00:34:53.199 --> 00:35:02.639
But she's very much off the script, and that brings me to this other thing that we wanted to bring up today, and that is this audio recording that surfaced.
00:35:03.039 --> 00:35:05.039
So the Clarion Ledger got a hold of it.
00:35:05.199 --> 00:35:06.639
Okay, what happened there?
00:35:07.360 --> 00:35:37.360
Um uh I mean, from what I understand, she was uh talking off the cuff to some uh people at a at a an event where she just made a speech and was talking about some uh shooting in 2023, and as the more she talked about that, uh she started veering that conversation toward the inference that uh she's worried that Scott Colomb's supporters may radicalize and start trying to kill her.
00:35:38.719 --> 00:35:43.840
You know, I I listened to the audio and I I got a little bit of a different take on that.
00:35:44.079 --> 00:35:48.960
I think and by the way, this conversation took place in a cracker barrel.
00:35:49.199 --> 00:35:54.960
And so that it did, and so there were more forks clanging around than anything else to be heard.
00:35:55.119 --> 00:36:01.760
But um it sounded like she wanted to take the blame off of him and and so no, not him so much.
00:36:02.159 --> 00:36:03.039
Oh man.
00:36:03.280 --> 00:36:04.320
Oh no, that's what I heard.
00:36:04.400 --> 00:36:17.360
We can we can roll the tape if you'd like, but it's basically um what I gathered was look, it's nasty out there, it's violent out there, and I gotta have bodyguards.
00:36:17.440 --> 00:36:22.079
And she had bodyguards the other day when I met her, and and I don't disagree with that.
00:36:22.239 --> 00:36:23.360
I'll tell you this.
00:36:23.599 --> 00:36:37.760
We had a Republican fundraiser a year ago, and there was a certain podcaster slash substacker that was peddling some pretty unsavory things on Facebook, and among that there were these guys who you're talking about.
00:36:38.000 --> 00:36:46.639
Yeah, well, there were these guys on there that were joking about, hey, we should bring a rifle to this fundraiser, you know, an assault style rifle.
00:36:46.800 --> 00:36:51.360
And this was like, what, a week after Charlie Kirk had gotten assassinated.
00:36:51.599 --> 00:36:55.599
And so I'm simply saying there's crazies on both sides, they're out there.
00:36:56.000 --> 00:37:01.199
Do you think that Scott Cologne should have bodyguards so Cindy Hadsmith's supporters don't take a shot at him?
00:37:01.360 --> 00:37:08.960
I I think that that anybody that's on a national race needs to have bodyguards, whether the Secret Service pays for them or whatever.
00:37:09.519 --> 00:37:11.599
That's not a lot of tax money, David.
00:37:11.920 --> 00:37:14.000
It is, and I'm a fiscal conservative.
00:37:14.320 --> 00:37:16.960
I'll tell you this, we ought not need them.
00:37:17.280 --> 00:37:31.760
The temperature in the room ought to go down, and and um I don't have a solution for it because we I also believe in free speech, but there's no reason I should have been nervous the night of the fundraiser.
00:37:31.920 --> 00:37:42.719
Now, granted, it was a Republican fundraiser, so there would have been bullets going both ways, just saying, but I mean it it ought not be like that, especially local or anywhere.
00:37:43.199 --> 00:37:51.519
Well, if you would regard in a local race your opponent in a certain way, then I don't think those standards change when the venue gets bigger.
00:37:51.920 --> 00:37:52.559
Yeah.
00:37:52.960 --> 00:38:01.519
Well, and and I guess part of it is also the the advent of social media where people will just say absolutely anything.
00:38:02.159 --> 00:38:04.960
Because they have no accountability for it because they don't have to look at you when they do it.
00:38:05.199 --> 00:38:11.199
Yeah, and they also know things at a a record pace, and so the security issue.
00:38:15.840 --> 00:38:18.239
The internet experts as they are.
00:38:18.639 --> 00:38:19.039
That's right.
00:38:19.280 --> 00:38:29.360
That's why you need to listen to between the headlines, where uh hopefully we do our due diligence in here to bring you opinions that are at least fact-based.
00:38:29.599 --> 00:38:32.239
Well, anything else to say about that, Scott?
00:38:32.639 --> 00:38:33.760
I'm not Scott.
00:38:36.239 --> 00:38:38.000
But I was thinking about Scott.
00:38:38.400 --> 00:38:39.840
Well, I don't need to know about that.
00:38:40.159 --> 00:38:41.119
You're a good guy.
00:38:41.360 --> 00:38:43.679
Scott's also a good guy.
00:38:44.559 --> 00:38:46.800
I'm gonna take a little sip of caffeine.
00:38:47.039 --> 00:38:50.400
Good day as always here in Catfish Alley studio.
00:38:51.760 --> 00:38:59.440
Well, Zach, we normally have three things to know, but we've recorded on a Monday this week, and it's also been kind of a quiet Monday.
00:38:59.679 --> 00:39:02.559
I do know that the 100 Women Who Care didn't meet.
00:39:02.639 --> 00:39:03.519
You got some results on that.
00:39:14.880 --> 00:39:19.039
Uh plans to use the funds to finish its tiny home village on Airline Road.
00:39:19.360 --> 00:39:28.880
100 Plus Women Who Care gave uh a total of$23,800 uh in awards Sunday night.
00:39:29.119 --> 00:39:35.119
The big award was the$20,000, but the rest of the money went to other organizations, other nonprofits.
00:39:35.599 --> 00:39:37.440
Such a great organization.
00:39:37.599 --> 00:39:40.480
I want to thank all of our listeners for listening.
00:39:40.800 --> 00:39:43.119
As usual, you've been very, very faithful.
00:39:43.280 --> 00:39:44.800
Continue to contribute.
00:39:44.960 --> 00:39:46.320
We've got a Facebook group.
00:39:46.400 --> 00:39:48.159
If you're not in it, look it up.
00:39:48.639 --> 00:39:52.800
I'm just a simple old country boy, but uh I think that makes sense.
00:39:52.960 --> 00:39:55.599
I've stepped out and I've said what I had to say.
00:39:56.000 --> 00:39:58.960
You've been listening to Between the Headlines with Zach and David.
00:39:59.199 --> 00:40:00.480
That's what old people do.
00:40:03.119 --> 00:40:03.840
That is.