Choose Your Battles - Carefully

Sometimes it’s best to choose your battles carefully. There are some battles that really aren’t worth the stress of fighting, no matter how strong your case may be. And there are some battles that really aren’t winnable. The Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee has chosen a battle that would best be left alone for both of these reasons.

As noted in the Tennessean earlier this week, Democrats have decided to respond to the National Republican Senatorial Committee’s Fancy Ford website – that shines the light on the Memphis Representative’s lavish lifestyle (To read my earlier piece on this, go here) – with a website of their own. Only their’s shines the light on the lifestyle lived by retiring Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist, whose seat Ford hopes to occupy come next January.

Designed to look very much like the Fancy Ford website, Very Fancy Frist is obviously an attempt on the part of the minority party’s campaign leadership to “take the battle” to those nasty Republicans who had the temerity to reveal how “in touch” Mr. Ford could be expected to be with the average Tennessean, by virtue of his very “un-Tennessean-ish” lifestyle. Unfortunately for the Democrats, this site is at best a waste of their time, and at worst, a fight they can’t win.

While it is true that Bill Frist eats, sleeps, and travels in a manner more luxurious than most Americans, few would find this fact surprising in view of the fact that he is arguably one of the five most powerful elected officials in the nation. And the fact is that we all tend to live as well as we can, given our means – Who among us is going to stay in a one-star hotel when he can stay in a three-star?

It so happens that even before his 1994 election to the Senate, Bill Frist, by virtue of his training, skills, and entrepreneurial prowess could afford everything he now enjoys. The fact is that he took a major pay cut to become a senator. And Harold Ford can boast of no charitable endeavors to compare with Bill Frist’s frequent trips to Africa to provide medical care for people there at no charge – often flying the plane into the villages in question himself.

Besides, it’s unlikely that eating and traveling habits are what’s going to make the biggest impression on people who are trying to decide who can relate to them better. Such questions are more likely to be raised by the company one keeps and the way in which one relaxes. And interestingly enough, unlike Representative Ford, Senator Frist has no pedicures or parties with Playboy Playmates to “expose” (sorry). Trying to compare the lifestyle of a father of three who made his way in both the medical and corporate worlds with that of a swinging bachelor who has lived in a political bubble his whole life is simply a fight from which Democrats would be well-advised to stay away.

But even if this were an argument that was winnable for the pro-Ford forces, so what? Bill Frist isn’t going to be on the ballot in November. Facing off against Harold Ford in the general election will be one of three men who have demonstrated willingness to serve in the armed forces, prove themselves in the business world, and actually spend a significant portion of their time with their families (all are fathers) and the citizens of the state they desire to serve.

Of course, the only alternative to this silliness for the Ford advocates is to actually debate the respective positions of their candidate and his party against those of the Republicans in the race and convince the voters that his positions are best for Tennessee and the nation. But then, that’s a battle that wouldn’t be too pleasant for them either.