Stories by John Brummett

OPINION | JOHN BRUMMETT: Bubba breaks it down I called Bubba McCoy and told him I wanted to talk about transgender youth and charging stations for electric cars. "Well, ain't that a coincidence," he said. "I've got a transgender kid out here in ... April 18, 2021

OPINION | JOHN BRUMMETT: Presidential dreamin' There was a profound moment on national television last Sunday morning. Gov. Asa Hutchinson was making his weekly appearance. Jake Tapper of CNN asked him without guffawing if he was running for pres... April 15, 2021

OPINION | JOHN BRUMMETT: Meanwhile in Trumpland ... That was an interesting Thursday and Friday last week in Trumpland, previously known as Arkansas. The story begins with a big issue that penetrated the national news cycle. Our Legislature's determi... April 14, 2021

OPINION | JOHN BRUMMETT: The Arkansas way Gov. Asa Hutchinson says the hate-crime bill by another name that he and the state's business community have been peddling is an "Arkansas solution." He is saying that Arkansas is a peculiar place th... April 13, 2021

OPINION | JOHN BRUMMETT: Moments beneath the tree Others may be writing today about Paul Greenberg, as they should. But I'd wager none of them ever got called an old shade tree in one of his columns or penned a response column saying, yeah, well, Gr... April 11, 2021

OPINION | JOHN BRUMMETT: A less toxic path I had a dream that the U.S. Congress would begin separating issues into narrowly focused bills to stand on their own individual merit. By that, I meant reforming the raging practice of consolidating ... April 8, 2021

OPINION | JOHN BRUMMETT: In a state of convulsion Republicans hadn't figured on losing the presidential race in Georgia and two big U.S. Senate races there. It happened narrowly, but epically, because of an uncommonly high turnout facilitated by Dem... April 7, 2021

OPINION | JOHN BRUMMETT: Trying out the side door Gov. Asa Hutchinson and his big-business allies who agree with him that Arkansas needs a hate-crimes law couldn't hope to pass one straight-up in this mean-spirited Legislature. So, they're coming in... April 6, 2021

OPINION | JOHN BRUMMETT: Fear as policy State laws or policies calling for federal lawlessness have fared poorly in the United States. You remember reading about the Civil War. Arkansas and other Southern secessionists shed mountains of bl... April 4, 2021

OPINION | JOHN BRUMMETT: Mixed messaging April Fool's Day seems an appropriate occasion for holding forth on Gov. Asa Hutchinson's announcing that the need to wear masks isn't over, but the state's mandate is. Y'all do the best you can. Tha... April 1, 2021

OPINION | JOHN BRUMMETT: Signifying nothing What you don't want when you call 911 is to encounter on the other end of the line a meeting of the Arkansas Legislative Council. You don't want your pleas to confront a roomful of politicians insert... March 31, 2021

OPINION | JOHN BRUMMETT: Asa and the culture wars Political alienation and culture wars rage. So, it came to pass that there was social media chatter before and during the basketball game between Arkansas and Oral Roberts. Some people were saying on... March 30, 2021

OPINION | JOHN BRUMMETT: Throwing away our shots This should be a big week for virus and vaccine news in Arkansas. Some of it will be iffy. Some will be good. None will be indifferent. First. Gov. Asa Hutchinson has made clear for several days that... March 28, 2021

OPINION | JOHN BRUMMETT: Mission vague, but hopeful I told state Sen. Jim Hendren that it sounded as if his fledgling Common Ground Arkansas will turn out either to be hype or great. "I'm too old for hype, so it's going to be great," he said. Hendren... March 25, 2021

OPINION | JOHN BRUMMETT: A clumsy cookie-cutter Apart from whether Attorney General Leslie Rutledge actually files next year to face the juggernaut of Donald Trump's right hand, the burning question in Arkansas Republican circles has been whether R... March 24, 2021

OPINION | JOHN BRUMMETT: Indefinite meanness The magic words the weary of Arkansas seek but will not soon hear are "sine die." That means to adjourn without resumption, which this orgy of meanness that is our state legislative session won't. L... March 23, 2021

OPINION | JOHN BRUMMETT: Bullies in the bathroom The meanness of the pseudo-religious right-wing extremism of the state legislative session makes me think about the preacher Jim Wallis. He's the founder of Sojourners, a national Christian group adv... March 21, 2021

OPINION | JOHN BRUMMETT: Plotting the path Readers pay for subscriptions and thus ought to be in on the conversation about Arkansas politics in which I found myself the other evening. Other participants in the conversation will remain anonymo... March 18, 2021

OPINION | JOHN BRUMMETT: Bubba takes his shot Bubba McCoy told me he got vaccinated because he had no choice considering his marital circumstance. He said that he and I run a close race in the "most over-married" sweepstakes. The ever-responsibl... March 17, 2021

OPINION | JOHN BRUMMETT: Arkansas just incidental Sarah the Liberal Slayer will become the next governor of Arkansas almost incidentally and by taking it for granted. As a confirmed pragmatist, I've been trying to think of ways this mostly tragic fa... March 16, 2021

OPINION | JOHN BRUMMETT: Get a shot in the arm The states' performances in delivering vaccines get ranked in several ways. By any averaging, Arkansas languishes in the bottom tier. That's the case even as Gov. Asa Hutchinson makes the rounds of n... March 14, 2021

OPINION | JOHN BRUMMETT: Making hate feel at home Seldom if ever has a governor's declared legislative priority been treated as disrespectfully as Gov. Asa Hutchinson's push that Arkansas become the 48th state with a law allowing penalty supplements ... March 11, 2021

OPINION | JOHN BRUMMETT: A superficial justification The greatest source of destructive political resentment in America is the chasm between Democratic places where a lot of people live close together and more open Republican spaces where fewer people l... March 10, 2021

OPINION | JOHN BRUMMETT: Supremely sticky Over the weekend Arkansas found itself with more vaccines than people in line to receive them. So, on Monday morning, Gov. Asa Hutchinson authorized vaccine eligibility for all persons in the categor... March 9, 2021

OPINION | JOHN BRUMMETT: In the balance, unbalanced You might be asking what it would take for Gov. Asa Hutchinson to veto a bill. And I would answer that it would take futile adherence to personal principle and a better state Constitution. I'm neithe... March 7, 2021

OPINION | JOHN BRUMMETT: Passion in the middle The latest Gallup public opinion polls show a surge in independence in America that indicates political parties make noise and nonmembers make the difference. Persons identifying as Democrats or Repu... March 4, 2021

OPINION | JOHN BRUMMETT: Not broken? We can fix it! News item: The state Legislature is considering legislation to reapply for a federal waiver to keep Medicaid expansion alive by making changes in its nationally regarded program. This is why Arkansas... March 3, 2021

OPINION | JOHN BRUMMETT: A new level of insult Sarah Huckabee Sanders got asked Saturday night at the CPAC national right-winger festival why she would venture back into the political wars by running for governor of Arkansas. She answered without... March 2, 2021

OPINION | JOHN BRUMMETT: Those dirty, rotten voters Recent news events remind me of the conspicuous mid-American swath revealed by a map in The New York Times in November 2008. The strip extended from Oklahoma through Arkansas and Tennessee and up to ... February 28, 2021

OPINION | JOHN BRUMMETT: Presidential dreamin' Decades ago, I thought no one from Arkansas could be elected president. Now I'm beginning to think that anyone from Arkansas might. The thought as late as the 1980s was that Arkansas was too inconseq... February 25, 2021

OPINION | JOHN BRUMMETT: Grandstander on the stage A stout majority of state senators voted Monday to break federal law and sacrifice women and girls to rape and incest. It was just another day at the office for modern Arkansas conservativism. These... February 24, 2021

OPINION | JOHN BRUMMETT: Lagniappes and poison pills It happened in part from demographic migration and in part from lightning striking. Now the issue is whether Democrats can govern as they won, by the skin of their teeth. We'll begin finding out this... February 23, 2021

OPINION | JOHN BRUMMETT: Leaving the cult behind Arkansas Republicanism has become a Donald Trump cult. A perfectly fine Karl Rove Republican such as Lt. Gov. Tim Griffin couldn't compete for governor for 2022 after Trump's former official falsifie... February 21, 2021

OPINION | JOHN BRUMMETT: Seeking a new charade Gov. Asa Hutchinson happened to be in the Oval Office with President Biden on Friday. On that day, the Biden administration was notifying Arkansas and other affected states that they no longer could ... February 18, 2021

OPINION | JOHN BRUMMETT: Local politics? Not anymore It's way early, so plenty of time remains for someone demonstrating an interest in Arkansas to seek high Arkansas office on the state Republican ticket. So far, the state's ticket-topping Republican ... February 17, 2021

OPINION | JOHN BRUMMETT: The path ahead The left-of-center panelists on "This Week" on ABC got into a spat Sunday. It was over the path Democrats should follow now that Republicans have disgraced themselves by defying the Constitution and ... February 16, 2021

OPINION | JOHN BRUMMETT: Which is the greater insult? A state senator should not refer to a colleague as a dumb-bleep, even if it's an arguable case, at least during formal Senate proceedings. The more common practice is for one of the better senators t... February 14, 2021

OPINION | JOHN BRUMMETT: Bubba on the ball Bubba McCoy matriculated at the hearts and dominoes table in the student union at Fayetteville in 1969 and 1970 before flunking out and having to get married. How and why such an exemplary young woma... February 11, 2021

OPINION | JOHN BRUMMETT: Meeting in the middle Aging rocker and neo-sage Bruce Springsteen appeared in a two-minute Super Bowl that was cringe-worthy in its naïve self-seriousness, but on target in its moral and political prescription for a countr... February 10, 2021

OPINION | JOHN BRUMMETT: At the whims of wingers Arkansas has never really deserved its smart and thriving Medicaid expansion program, considering its primitive politics of the last decade. Poor people have deserved the health care. Rural hospitals... February 9, 2021

OPINION | JOHN BRUMMETT: Was it the right thing? Freshman Republican U.S. Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene was hitting email in-boxes with an urgent fundraising solicitation Thursday afternoon. The mailing decried what the House Democrats wouldn't get a... February 7, 2021

OPINION | JOHN BRUMMETT: How education can work To me, education is the light bulb over the head. It's that time when I, a third-grader maybe, sat in front of a mirror at home blowing in exhausting vain into a newly rented clarinet. I was trying a... February 4, 2021

OPINION | JOHN BRUMMETT: Not ready for the big stage Uh, oh. Gov. Asa Hutchinson appeared on a national television weekend news show again. The woman on ABC's "This Week" who alternates being host with George Stephanopoulos--Martha Raddatz--is apt to a... February 3, 2021

OPINION | JOHN BRUMMETT: On partisan imperfection Ten Republican senators have come forward to tell President Biden they have his unity right here. He should tell them their covid relief proposal is imperfect, too small, and that he'd harm himself w... February 2, 2021

OPINION | JOHN BRUMMETT: The independent path Sarah Huckabee Sanders' video announcement of her candidacy regurgitated four years' worth of angry Trumpian resentment. It presented, for the first time in an Arkansas gubernatorial candidacy, a who... January 31, 2021

OPINION | JOHN BRUMMETT: Much ado about ... The Tom Cotton thing is not a thing. We don't have things in American politics anymore. We have only embedded biases embracing our versions of the truth and harboring disdain for other versions. Thi... January 28, 2021

OPINION | JOHN BRUMMETT: Straw in the boxing ring Do you believe the state Legislature needs to step in to keep your local city council from defunding your local police department? Are they boarding up police stations all over Arkansas and I've not ... January 27, 2021

OPINION | JOHN BRUMMETT: Sarah steps in The video is sheer and shameless demagogic claptrap. It makes a cynical woman out to be our brave protector against Jim Acosta and Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez. As perhaps you hadn't heard, Acosta and A... January 26, 2021

OPINION | JOHN BRUMMETT: Paying to be insulted Attorney General Leslie Rutledge, who so wants to win a Republican gubernatorial primary in 2022, is spending your money to serve her personal and partisan interest while insulting your intelligence. ... January 24, 2021

OPINION | JOHN BRUMMETT: Cops at the Capitol It's not against the law to be stupid. Feel free now to enter your own second sentence. Let's get your snark out of the way, freeing space for mine. Perhaps you're thinking the decriminalization of s... January 21, 2021