FRENCH HILL isn't really that much like his television commercials. At least that's never been our impression. This banker running for Congress in the state's Second District came up with an ad that focused on his family and old car, also known as Ol' Blue. It's what the pros in the campaign biz call Humanizing, but Mr. Hill has always struck us as a more formal type--a buttoned-down straightarrow. Some might even say he's a bit of a stick. But don't get us wrong. That's more than fine with us. This state--this country--can use all the sticklers for the old values and virtues that our political life can attract. There's never enough of them. Or of bright, young but already experienced leaders interested in public service. Such as French Hill.
Besides, this candidate doesn't really need humanizing. Unlike some of the pols who show up during campaign season, French Hill is already personable enough even if he's not one of these pols who'll tell you, at exhausting length, how much they love talking to people. Which in their case seems to mean only talking at people. French Hill is different. He's polite but never familiar, thank goodness. We find it a relief in an era that now seems to have made hugging at the slightest excuse compulsory.
For as long as we've known him, which must be years and years now, we've found Mr. Hill to be thoughtful, reasonable, fair . . . and knowledgeable about both public and private business. Indeed, you can't walk away from a conversation with him without thinking: This man is ready for the U.S. Congress--more than ready.
Maybe that's because he has a lot of experience in both government and business, specifically banking. Just look at his résumé: Majored in economics, minored in history. (It's about time somebody put those two together.) Senior policy adviser for Bush 41 . . . deputy assistant secretary of the U.S. Treasury . . . senior adviser to a governor of Arkansas named Mike Huckabee . . . .
And that's just his government experience. He's also founder and chief executive of Delta Trust & Bank in Little Rock, which he and his partners started from scratch and made into a force for jobs, investment and economic growth in general for Central Arkansas. And quite a personal success, too. Let's just say the man has his bonafides.
Mr. Hill's political positions are conventional enough for a Republican: Secure the borders. The minimum wage "has never been proven as a poverty eradication tool." But, glory be, he understands that Congress had better not default on the national debt--something you'd think, and wish, that all Republicans in Congress understood, but you'd be surprised. Some think of threatening to default on the full faith and credit of the United States of America as just a political tactic, or even a campaign talking point. But this candidate seems to have read his Alexander Hamilton, and knows that the public debt is to be respected, paid off diligently, and even used--prudently--when necessary. ("A national debt, if it is not excessive, will be to us a national blessing."--Alexander Hamilton.)
French Hill already sounds like a conscientious, sensible congressman. Or is that an oxymoron these days? His attitude would make him an exception among all those headline-grabbing Republicans who at one strange point thought it'd be a dandy idea to repudiate the national debt. If he's an exception, French Hill is an exception that needs to become the rule. For it's not enough to oppose the spendthrift ways of this Democratic administration or its general incompetence. An opposition needs to do more than just oppose. Opposition needs to be the thoughtful, principled, rational kind. The kind that offers an alternative.
Mr. Hill's opponent in the Second District started out in this campaign as impressive, too, or at least well-seasoned. For he had been mayor of North Little Rock for many a year, and completely devoted to its growth from small town to small city. And that's just what happened during his long and successful tenure.
Then the pressure of this campaign must have gotten to him. And his idea of campaigning for Congress boiled down to one simple tactic, which was on full, embarrassing display in one, all too simple, television commercial--for which he was obliged to accept full, public responsibility. What was that one tactic? Throw as much mud as he could at his opponent. How sad. And how revealing. Do we really want the next congressman from the Second Congressional District of Arkansas to prove so graceless under pressure?
What a pity. As a long-time mayor, the Democratic nominee might have brought a measure of perspective to this administration's domestic programs--good, bad and indifferent but uniformly, indiscriminately lavish--and their actual effect on the ground.
As for foreign policy, that might be far beyond this candidate's competence, just as it clearly is beyond this administration's. For its foreign policy, if any, is now the usual shambles that is the result of studied neglect interrupted only by bouts of complete rout. Not just in eastern Europe but at Benghazi and throughout the Arab world. This latest awfulness with ISIS is only the latest crisis it's invited. But all such distinctions and considerations have been lost in the general distaste that this formerly nice gentleman from North Little Rock invited when he turned his campaign into just another election-year smear machine.
Which is one more reason why the better choice in this election, much the better choice, is French Hill. He's the candidate who would continue the Second District's line of serious congressmen--the kind whose views have had gravity and substance. Congressmen like Tim Griffin and Vic Snyder. And, let's hope, French Hill.
Editorial on 10/10/2014