LIKE MOST PEOPLE I know, I make lists. I know traditional wisdom is that you list the most important item first—the A-list concept. However, I tend to work the order in reverse, dealing with the easy items first. The little items tend to fog my brain, as irritating as mosquitoes at a picnic. If I can eliminate the little things, I have a clearer head to tackle priorities.
So instead of beginning with the donor lists, I went to the file on Lucy Robinson. She’d supported Russell’s love of the Arts Center, but she didn’t serve on any of its boards or committees. She always appeared with him, playing her role perfectly, but that was it. I went to their federal financial-disclosure report. It was fairly detailed, but the dollar-amount range was so broad, all one could really tell was that Russell and Lucy had more than $25 million in assets, mostly in trusts, and no debt. Lucy’s trust included income from her father’s farm and a wide range of stocks and other holdings. They were certainly rich, but there was nothing controversial about their holdings.
None of this surprised me. Since the advent of opposition research as a muckraking tool, those with serious political aspirations make sure their financial households are in good order before they begin testing the waters. Accountants and consultants become specialists in scrubbing an aspiring politician’s financial affairs—amending tax returns, making sure all social security taxes for nannies have been paid, verifying the immigration status of employees, and ensuring that the candidate’s investments will hold up to scrutiny. Woody would have made certain that Russell and Lucy were squeaky clean. I could find nothing that even came close to raising an eyebrow.
I searched the issues that Russell had championed during his campaigns, starting with proposals that Russell made to the legislature as governor. I didn’t see anything that stood out; Russell toed Woody’s philosophical line when it came to politics, except on guns. The duck-hunting Russell was a poster child for the NRA. Even Lucy appeared in PR pictures hunting deer, ducks, and quail in full regalia. I know Russell’s affinity for guns bothered Woody, but it didn’t offend his concept of political correctness. In the South, most folks embrace guns and a citizen’s right to own or carry them. Russell was also conservative on issues of criminal justice. He was at the forefront of endorsing tougher sentences and the imposition of stringent post release terms. He recognized that politicians garner votes by following the old adage: “Prove you’re tough on crime by being tough on the people who are already locked up.” It’s much easier than to actually try to deal with the tough issues underlying crime. Any law restricting prior felons from working, voting, living in certain neighborhoods, or getting any kind of assistance had the Russell Robinson seal of approval.
If the disagreement between Russell and Woody had been political, it must have involved something new. Thanks to Beth’s thoroughness, I now had a very good understanding of Russell’s politics. He’d ridden his former football glory to public office, and once elected, hadn’t taken any risks. Only twice had he taken a controversial or risky position—his pardon of Roger Kent and his progressive stance on the environment. I caught myself. I was letting my personal bias interfere with my analysis. Most people could easily call Russell a “southern progressive.” He supported programs for the elderly, tried to improve public education, and fought for better funding for Head Start programs and higher education. He worked hard to get additional funding for the Arts Center, and always tried to attract industry and commerce for the state, spending a lot of effort on green industries.
His fight for pro-environmental policies was impressive. To advocate for something requires some measure of understanding and effort. To be against something doesn’t require much of anything. I felt better about Russell after reading his environmental record. If I hadn’t known the guy and his wife personally, I probably would have supported him, even without Woody’s recommendation.
Woody knew how to keep Russell right down the center. I told him once that this was what galled me about politics. Woody always said that, to do any good, “You have to get elected, and to get elected, you avoid making waves.” I knew he was right, but I didn’t have to like it. I asked him once, “When do you stop trying to get there or stay there and start actually doing something good for a change?”
I glanced at the clock by the bed, the same one in every hotel room in America. The bright red time display is enough to keep you awake all night. And try setting the alarm—huge mistake. You end up turning on rap music you can’t turn off, and the red display starts flashing mercilessly. It was already past midnight. It would be six thirty before I knew it, and I hadn’t even started combing through Robinson’s donors. For now, I decided to focus only on the Senate race, hoping that if the bone of contention were a new one, it might show up in the Senate donor list. The list was long. I tried to pay attention, but it meant nothing to me, just name after name swimming before my tired eyes. Draining the last of my wine, I closed the computer and was about to turn in when I remembered something Woody had said when we talked several weeks ago. Russell wants to prove to his financial backers, especially those from out of state, that he can be a force in the Senate.
I opened the Excel spreadsheet of donors again and went directly to Texas—the most likely of the adjoining states to provide a number of wealthy donors. I immediately saw a name that I recognized—one that puzzled me. I knew the donor well, and I didn’t think he had any interest in progressive politics, much less in Russell. Quickly scrolling down the names of Texas contributors, I found I recognized most of them. Then I remembered Beth’s list of major contributors who had also donated big bucks to the Arts Center. I fished it out of my briefcase and ran through the names. Not a long list, but an impressive one, and I knew almost every one of them personally.
Of the thirty names on Beth’s list, at least twenty-five had given the maximum contribution to Russell’s last campaign for governor as well as to his Senate race. I had no idea why they’d supported Russell. His environmental record should have turned them off. I was confident Woody wouldn’t have known them from Adam. The only person who would see this list and be disturbed by it was me. I now had another huge problem to deal with in the morning.
When I finished making my own list, I closed the computer again, but remained in the chair. There was no way Woody could have understood the significance of what I had just discovered. Yet Woody had learned something that bothered him, and he had started researching donor lists. I still didn’t understand the clues he’d left me, much less this new puzzle, and I was running out of time.