The Courage of His Convictions

Since County Commissioner Keith Honeycutt was elected in 2002, he's made a great public show of his supposed support for public education. He just can't quite bring himself to actually ACT in the public interest.

He attended an organizational meeting of the R.I.D. group, which is still flogging the dead horse of "renovation," while simultaneously dodging the question of what several hundred high school students would be expected to learn in the midst of such a renovation.

So when the vote was held last Tuesday on the new county budget, Honeycutt was a no-show. That is to say, HONEYCUTT COULD NOT FACE CASTING A PUBLIC VOTE on a budget that (1) lowers the tax-rate more than 8 cents and (2) contains specific support for a new high school. DID NOT SHOW UP.

Commissioner David Blust (bless his heart) did show up and cast the single dissenting vote against the budget, based primarily, he said, on the line item for the Cooperative Extension Service and (oh yeah) because it put aside money for a new high school (why anyone would think the promoter of private Christian schools would ever vote to support PUBLIC education is beyond us). But apparently Mr. Blust (bless his heart) thinks such "principles" will help him get elected to the State Senate, where he can impersonate a potted plant even more fulsomely.

But we digress.

Honeycutt's cowardice is the more striking spectacle. He could have won points among moderate Republicans by voting for the new high school. Now he just looks pusillanimous.