Leave Doug Henry Alone!

By Kleinheider Posted on October 2, 2009 at 10:19 am

In 2002, the rap against State Sen. Douglas Henry was that, while he was a fine gentleman legislator who had served his district well for 30 years, he was old, tired and resting on decade-old laurels.

That’s pretty much still the rap against him.

Back in ‘02 Henry’s Democratic challenger was Jeff Wilson, a former journalist turned software developer, who decided that someone should stand up for a new generation of Democrats in west Nashville. Wilson wondered aloud how long the state needed to continue to bear the burden while Henry pursued “his hobby of being in the state Senate.”

The answer from the district was four more years — and another four after that.

Now, in 2009, yet another young progressive, a downtown lawyer named Jeff Yarbro, is calling for Henry’s ouster. A co-founder of the “Kitchen Cabinet” meetings featuring young progressive professionals gripping and grinning with the party’s power elite, Yarbro is no stranger to either the grasstops or grassroots of the Democratic Party.

A fund-raising invitation which fell into media hands shortly after his campaign announcement boasted an impressive list of boosters that included both Obama fund-raiser Jerry Martin as well as Chip Forrester’s arch-nemesis in the race for party chair last year, Charles Robert Bone.

In only its first 24 hours, it was clear Jeff Yarbro’s campaign was no joke. After the first report by NashvillePost.com’s Ken Whitehouse, the announcement news was soon blanketing the media and the blogosphere. The campaign, even its embryonic stages was clearly calm, cool and coordinated — with a campaign kitty of 50K and rising.

Yarbro’s strategy seems similar to Republican Bob Krumm’s in 2006: heavy emphasis on honoring Sen. Henry’s service and little criticism of the man’s ideology or agenda. As Yarbro told the Associated Press, “I don’t think of this race as running against Douglas Henry. I’m running for the state Senate.”

Easy to say, of course, but harder to do. That’s the rub running against Henry. He is such a beloved figure, it is impossible to go negative against him. Not that there isn’t plenty of stuff that on paper looks damaging. But using it would provoke the kind of backlash you’d get if you hit your grandpa in the face — at Thanksgiving dinner.

Don’t get me wrong, I’ve got nothing against positive campaigns. Our politics would be much better if everyone was running for something rather than against it. But politics rarely works that way. You have to draw distinctions and communicate why change is urgent. All this talk of “working to continue Senator Henry’s legacy” doesn’t cut it.

An attractive young professional with progressive ideals and the establishment at his back can mount a formidable effort — but this is Doug-freaking-Henry. Elder statesman. Icon. A man who had been on the ballot longer than his challenger has been alive. It seems like, to win, Yarbro needs something more.

Of course, I wouldn’t be the first to suggest that a “win” for Yarbro in 2010 doesn’t necessarily have to achieve electoral victory.

A savvy young lawyer like Yarbro never knows what opportunities might pop up in the future — maybe a stint as party chair, maybe a run for Congress. Who knows? A respectable loss to the oldest of the old guard doesn’t hurt an ambitious young guy with an eye to the future.

The question that Democratic voters of the 21st District need to ask themselves is what it gains them to give the hook to Sen. Henry? What’s the rush?

Why work to unseat a Democratic state senator when what Democrats really need is an all out assault for control of the state House?

Democrats have limited time and resources at their disposal to save their future viability in state and federal politics. The state Senate is gonna be Republican — that’s a lock. But Democrats have a shot at taking back the House. A small shot, granted, but a shot nonetheless. A Democratic state House gets the party the seat at the redistricting table they desperately need. Without it, the GOP could wipe away the chances for Democratic revival in our time, literally, with the stroke of a pen.

Why expend the resources to defeat Henry now? He has been in the Senate this long, what is four more years? Is Henry that bad a senator?

Hell, not even Yarbro himself will say that. So what’s the reason? Is the need for progressive leadership that urgent or is this more about personal ambition? Is this less about what is at stake for the 21st district than what is at stake for Yarbro — now and in the future?

With all the problems Democrats have in Tennessee, one would think an effort to swap a Democrat with a Democrat in the state Senate would be the last thing they would concern themselves with.

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Tags: Doug Henry, Jeff Yarbro, State Senate