SBOE showdown: Bell vs. Smithwick
By Jennifer J. Foster
Mike Huckabee’s endorsement of Twinkle Cavanaugh notwithstanding, the most intriguing race on the statewide stage tomorrow has to be the showdown between State Board of Education member Stephanie Bell and challenger Skip Smithwick.
It took long enough, but the race finally began heating up over the past week or so, as financial reports revealed the plethora of PACs that undergird Smithwick’s campaign.
Of some $240,000 Smithwick has raised, at least $220,000 of it—fully 92 percent—can be traced from Smithwick back to the Alabama Education Association and its executive director/treasure/uberlobbyist, Paul Hubbert.
Hubbert is also the vice chairman of the Alabama Democratic Party, which begged the question: Why would Hubbert divert funds to a Republican running for SBOE?
Well ... maybe he isn’t diverting funds to a Republican running for SBOE.
Smithwick has come under fire for being a GOP Johnny-come-lately. Bell told the Associated Press last week:
“Nobody’s ever seen him at any Republican events. His connections have been Democratic,“ Bell said. “He’s known in Talladega County as a Democrat and there are people who questioned whether or not he would run as a Democrat—they couldn’t figure out why he was running as a Republican.“
Smithwick defended the party switch as a necessity to run in a district that’s 62 percent Republican. According to the AP:
“The change is worth it ‘if it means I can help the kids. It’s all for the kids,‘ he said.“
To quote my eloquent three-year-old daughter: “BARF.“
Everyone knows this race is all about controlling the SBOE and Hubbert trying to get rid of policymakers—Randy McKinney is being similarly challenged by someone whose GOP credentials and financial ties to Hubbert’s AEA have come under scrutiny—whose decisions he doesn’t like. Chief among those decisions is the SBOE’s move last year to ban double-dipping.
The Birmingham News printed an unbelievably scathing editorial about this race today. And rightfully so: Newspaper people don’t care for being lied to, and that’s exactly what Smithwick is doing by insisting that he is not connected to the AEA, despite all the irrefutable and incontrovertible evidence to the contrary.
Either Smithwick really believes what he’s claiming—and that would make him the dimmest bulb in the lamp—or he doesn’t mind insulting the intelligence of Alabamians with his lies—meaning he thinks Alabamians are the dimmest bulbs in the lamp.
If I was in on that editorial meeting the News had with Smithwick, I would have asked him two sets of questions as follow-ups to his statement that he isn’t connected to the AEA:
One: What’s your position on the double-dipping ban passed by the SBOE? Do you pledge that, if elected, you would not seek to repeal it or support efforts by other members to do so?
Two: What positions regarding other recent SBOE issues do you hold that differ from positions held by the AEA on those issues? In other words, where do you disagree with the AEA?
Darn! It would have been fun to hear those answers—or, at least, the dodging of the questions.
Anyway, the News editorial all but calls Smithwick a liar. If you don’t read anything else before you vote on this race, read this editorial, which ran under the headline, “The best board money can buy.“ Here are a few excerpts:
Let there be no doubt: Paul Hubbert is trying to buy a state Board of Education more to his liking.
... Smithwick, apparently with a straight face, told a News reporter he is not being funded, directly or indirectly, by AEA.
Yes, and Paul Hubbert is one of Montgomery’s least effective lobbyists, the Alabama Legislature always earns its pay, and state senators regularly gather around the campfire to sing Kumbaya.
The stakes in this state school board race are high - so high Hubbert and AEA thought it was worth spending as much as $200,000 and maybe more on Smithwick’s campaign.
Finally, sometimes a visual representation of a problem puts that problem into a whole new perspective. Such is the case with this chart, complements of Republican activist and consultant Susan Fillippeli.
Go ahead and check it out; I’ll wait for you.
...
Interesting, huh?
I’m working on enlarging it, but specifically, the chart clearly demonstrates the depth and breadth of Smithwick’s AEA support.
In a more general sense, could there be a more perfect picture of why PAC-to-PAC reform is an absolute necessity in this state?
SIDEBAR: I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again, until they are defeated or until a miracle happens and they actually start doing their jobs: The Alabama Senate needs to be cleaned out, from top to bottom, and its members replaced with public servants who will serve the public’s interests and not their own.
If they can’t see the urgency of the need for PAC-to-PAC reform, and if they don’t care that most Alabamians are demanding it—which, if they did, they would have passed the legislation during any one of the past six years it’s come up—then we cannot trust that they have either the legislative ability or the personal scruples to faithfully dispense with any of their other official duties.
END SIDEBAR
Anyway, the decision facing us tomorrow is: Stephanie Bell? Or Skip Smithwick?
It’s rare that such a stark choice exists between two candidates for one office. Take advantage of it.
