Next best thing
Perhaps you recall my mentioning from time to time that I lead a class called "Behind the Headlines" each Wednesday morning at Second Presbyterian Church in Little Rock in the active-retiree program called "LifeQuest," formerly Shepherd Center. We have a good time and maybe a couple of hundred attend in the sanctuary. So next week I'll be in Fayetteville overnight Tuesday for what sounds interesting and fun, 10 minutes of commencement remarks to GED graduation. Not wanting to drive back to LR late at night or by 9 a.m. the next day, I had to get a sub for LifeQuest. So I got one. It's the governor, Mike Beebe. I appreciate his tinkering with his schedule to do it — not for me, but for those admirably active and thoroughly delightful retired folks. Fair warning to him: I encouraged these fine folks to ask him why he didn't show more initative and leadership and inject himself ad hoc into the Little Rock school mess for mediation. I told Beebe having him there would be the next best thing to having me. He replied, and I do not know what this had to do with it: "I know Dale Bumpers. Dale Bumpers is a friend of mine. You're no Dale Bumpers."