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Thursday, November 19, 2009
Boomer with Attitude / News Jesse Helms portrait & his 'caring heart'
Posted By John Grooms on Thu, Nov 19, 2009 at 2:52 PM
Wingate University in next-door Union County is home to the Jesse Helms Center. The JHC’s newest project is a portrait of Helms by artist Rene Dickerson, which was unveiled last night in D.C.’s ultra-conservative Capitol Hill Club. A crowd of Jesse fans oohed and aahhed when the portrait was revealed, and Union County D.A. John Snyder III, who once worked for Helms, said the portrait (or “picture,” as he called it) “captures his (Helms’) caring heart and his humility."
We assume Snyder is talking about the caring heart that fought like crazy against any and all attempts to achieve equal rights for women and African-Americans; the caring heart that rose to fame as a race baiter and opponent of all civil rights bills; the caring heart that fought against the Clean Air Act and supported clear-cutting in North Carolina's national forests; or the caring heart that repeatedly voted against Head Start, funding for day care, aid to colleges and college students, vocational education programs, and funding for handicapped education. Or maybe Snyder meant the caring heart that strongly supported a constitutional amendment that would force all women to carry a pregnancy to term, regardless of the woman's desires or the circumstances of her impregnation, including rape and incest; or the caring heart that railed viciously against gays and lesbians, and opposed combating AIDS in this country (although he eventually supported the fight against AIDS in Africa, where most of the victims at least have the decency to be straight). Yeah, maybe that’s the caring heart Snyder’s talking about. As for portraits of ol’ Jesse, I prefer the one Creative Loafing ran on the cover three or four years ago, shown here.
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Helms was one of the best things to come out of NC. He was a bit of a big spender and race baited at times, but that's forgivable. He was much more good than bad. We need more like him.
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It's much more likely that the DA was referring to the 4 million African children who Bono says are alive today because of Senator Helms' pushing our government into the first serious funding for aids prevention in 2000. Or, it might have been that he knows that Jesse Helms hired women and minorities in management positions long before any laws required it and advocated business-based training programs to help all people improve their opportunities. Or, it might be because he knew when the flooding from Hurricane Floyd destroyed so many people's homes it was Senator Helms who rallied the state's businesses and non-profits to step in and help before the government could get mobilized. Or, it could be that he knew that in Senator Helms' office every citizen request for assistance was treated without any hint of preference and handled so well that people from other states contacted Jesse Helms when their own Senators couldn't or wouldn't help. Or, it could be that like everyone else who ever got to know Jesse Helms, the DA recognized a man of true character when he met one.
The spending on AIDS programs in Africa was not a good move by Helms. The government is not in the charity business regardless of the cause. Of course Helms could have started a private charity to fund those programs, but he instead looted the public trough to do it. It was not his money to give. Like I stated earlier, he was a bit of a big spender at times. Considering his entire record, he was more good than bad.
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