Op-ed: The Arkansas shtick

  • By Bob Franken
  • Tuesday, October 24, 2017 10:47pm
  • Opinion

Sarah Huckabee Sanders is from Arkansas, and she frequently likes to spout regional sayings as she deflects tough questions about her boss. President Donald Trump is about as un-Arkansas as any person can be, but that doesn’t stop Sarah from employing the faux folksiness that she heard in her childhood to evade the truth about his latest outrage. She learned it from a distance, from the governor’s mansion, but she still has the affectation down pat.

So it was when she was defending factual inaccuracies in White House chief of staff John Kelly’s takedown of Rep. Frederica Wilson. The Democrat Wilson has become a “rock star,” to use her own words, ever since she harshly criticized President Trump’s consolation call to the wife of Army Sgt. La David Johnson. Sgt. Johnson was killed during an ambush in Niger. Rep. Wilson, who was listening in, along with Johnson’s family members, described Trump as insensitive during the brief conversation. When Kelly decided to respond and defend his boss, he went after Rep. Wilson. In the process of slamming her, he accused Wilson of falsely claiming credit for arranging the federal funding needed to build a new Miami FBI field office during the building’s dedication in 2015. However, a videotape of her speech showed that she did no such thing. Faced with that evidence, Huckabee-Sanders tried to gloss over Kelly’s inaccuracy in Trumpian fashion: She went on the attack against Rep. Wilson and her history of wearing distinctive — no, make that outlandish — hats.

We don’t know whether Sarah needed to consult her book of quaint farmer put-downs, but she was ready with one, declaring that Wilson was “all hat and no cattle.” For those city folks who have no earthly idea what she was saying, it means Wilson is all show and no substance.

I, too, am from Arkansas, so I know from Southern speak. I can say “y’all” with the best of them and put on a drawl whenever it suits my purposes. There are a lot of these banalities. One of my favorites is, “Why bless your heart.” What that really means is, “What you just said is truly stupid.” Reporters had asked if former Marine Gen. Kelly could face them again and explain the obvious discrepancies in his takedown of the congresswoman, and this is Sanders’ exchange with a persistent CBS correspondent Chip Reid (full disclosure: Chip and I are longtime friends):

“If you want to go after General Kelly, that’s up to you,” Sanders said. “I think that if you want to get into a debate with a four-star Marine general —”

Reid interrupting: “That would be great if he would come out here and do it.”

Sanders finishing her sentence: “— that’s inappropriate.”

Why bless your heart, Sarah. It’s not inappropriate at all. Members of the media are not supposed to salute smartly when a general speaks. We need to ask them the same impertinent questions we ask all our leaders. How else are we going to gather the “fake news” your boss is always talking about. Why bless your heart, Donald, by the way.

The fact is, members of the White House press acted beyond appropriately when Kelly was defending his boss’s call, even to the point of accepting his limitation that questions come only from those who knew a Gold Star parent. That was in deference to the fact that Kelly is one; he lost a son, who was killed in Afghanistan combat seven years ago.

But now it was time for him to explain or defend his charges about Rep. Wilson, which apparently included false information. Did he get what the military calls “faulty intelligence”? It would seem he’d be anxious to maintain his reputation as a straight shooter and as a man who has spent his life defending American values, including the open government one, which is enforced mainly by skeptical journalism.

Sarah Huckabee Sanders and the president don’t share that reputation. Returning to her “all hat and no cattle” description, it’s fair to say that her reporter briefings are not meant to enlighten, that they are usually a way of spreading a load of male cattle excrement.

Bob Franken is a longtime broadcast journalist, including 20 years at CNN.

More in Opinion

Logo courtesy of League of Women Voters.
Point of View: Tell your representatives SAVE Act is not needed

The SAVE Act will disenfranchise Alaska voters and make the process of voting much more restrictive.

Sen. Jesse Bjorkman, R-Nikiski, speaks at a town hall meeting in the Moose Pass Sportsman’s Club in Moose Pass, Alaska, on Friday, Feb. 28, 2025. (Jake Dye/Peninsula Clarion)
Rep. Justin Ruffridge speaks during a town hall meeting hosted by three Kenai Peninsula legislators in the Kenai Peninsula Borough Assembly Chambers in Soldotna, Alaska, on Saturday, March 29, 2025. (Jake Dye/Peninsula Clarion)
Capitol Corner: HB 161 — Supporting small businesses

Rep. Justin Ruffridge reports back from Juneau.

The Swan Lake Fire can be seen from above on Monday, Aug. 26, 2019, on the Kenai Peninsula, Alaska. (Photo courtesy Alaska Wildland Fire Information)
Point of View: Fire season starts before Iditarod ends

It is critical that Alaskans exercise caution with anything that could ignite a fire.

The U.S. Capitol in Washington, March 25, 2025. (Eric Lee/The New York Times)
Point of View: Wake up America

The number one problem in America is our national debt resulting from the inability to control federal spending.

Snow collects near the entrance to the Kenai Community Library on Thursday, March 10, 2022, in Kenai, Alaska. (Ashlyn O’Hara/Peninsula Clarion)
Libraries defend every American’s freedom to read

Authors Against Book Bans invites you to celebrate National Library Week.

Rep. Justin Ruffridge, R-Soldotna, speaks during a town hall meeting hosted by three Kenai Peninsula legislators in the Kenai Peninsula Borough Assembly Chambers in Soldotna, Alaska, on Saturday, March 29, 2025. (Jake Dye/Peninsula Clarion)
Capitol Corner: Preparing for wildfire season

Rep. Justin Ruffridge reports back from Juneau.

Alaska State House District 7 Rep. Justin Ruffridge participates in the Peninsula Clarion and KDLL 91.9 FM candidate forum at the Soldotna Public Library on Monday, Oct. 14, 2024, in Soldotna, Alaska. (Photo by Erin Thompson/Peninsula Clarion)
Capitol Corner: Putting patients first

Rep. Justin Ruffridge reports back from Juneau.

Sen. Jesse Bjorkman, R-Nikiski, speaks at a town hall meeting in the Kenai Peninsula Borough Assembly Chambers in Soldotna, Alaska, on Saturday, March 1, 2025. (Jake Dye/Peninsula Clarion)
Capitol Corner: Building better lives for Alaskans

Sen. Jesse Bjorkman reports back from Juneau.

Gov. Mike Dunleavy compares Alaska to Mississippi data on poverty, per-pupil education spending, and the 2024 National Assessment of Education Progress fourth grade reading scores during a press conference on Jan. 31, 2025. Alaska is highlighted in yellow, while Mississippi is in red. (Jasz Garrett / Juneau Empire)
Opinion: Freeing states from the ‘stranglehold’ of the U.S. Department of Education

The USDOE has also been captured by a political ideology that has been harmful to education in America.

Alaska State House District 7 candidate Rep. Justin Ruffridge participates in the Peninsula Clarion and KDLL 91.9 FM candidate forum at the Soldotna Public Library on Monday, Oct. 14, 2024, in Soldotna, Alaska. (Photo by Erin Thompson/Peninsula Clarion)
Capitol Corner: Building a culture of reading

Rep. Justin Ruffridge reports back from Juneau.