BY KAREN SAMPLES
The Cincinnati Enquirer
WARSAW -- Around Gallatin County, the would-be sheriff is known mostly for his crazy motorcycle. Its handles were so tall he had to stand on the seat to reach them. "Ape hangers," he called them.
Then there was that horned helmet he used to wear. And his experiment with the asymmetrical beard.
For an entire year, Ronnie Lee Smith walked around with one side of his face clean-shaven and the other hairy. He'd seen this in a Clint Eastwood movie once: Guy sits down with his barber, gets called into a gunfight and dies with half a beard.
Nice.
Well, at least Mr. Smith's foray into county politics has prodded him to get a proper shave. Friends suggested his facial hair might look a little weird on the campaign trail.
And Mr. Smith -- computer whiz, constitution scholar, father of a 2-year-old named Thor -- is nothing if not a serious candidate. He has to be. This is a trail he's blazing here.
"For the first time in Kentucky history, a Libertarian is running for Gallatin County sheriff," says the press release put out by party spokesman Steve Larson of Florence.
To his credit, Mr. Larson sees the humor.
Libertarians believe government should have simple functions: To protect citizens against aggression, theft and fraud. They're not so paranoid as to believe black helicopters are taking over the world, but they do think all those alphabet agencies -- the IRS, the EPA -- are way out of line.
So: A Libertarian for sheriff. Is this even possible?
Sheriffs, after all, tend to stop people for any kind of law-breaking, like smoking marijuana or driving with broken taillights.
In Kentucky, they're also responsible for collecting millions in property taxes. Libertarians don't appreciate taxes much, because of the unconstitutional ways in which they're wasted. Mr. Smith is wrestling a bit with the tax question. If he can somehow beat popular incumbent Clifford Higgins, of course he would carry out the duties of the office. But, "I don't think I could take anybody's property for not paying taxes. That's why we came to America, to get away from England and taxes. We had a tea party for that."
Mr. Smith is that rare 32-year-old who has read the U.S. and Kentucky constitutions several times.
His campaign signs are emblazoned with the Statue of Liberty, and Tommy Chong recently helped out with his advertising. Mr. Chong is one half of the marijuana-addled, 1970s duo known as Cheech and Chong. At an appearance in Dayton, Ohio, the hippie icon took time out to say, "If lived in Gallatin County, I'd vote for Ronnie Lee Smith."
Of course Mr. Smith got this on tape.
No comment
We're discussing his strategy at campaign central: His brother's convenience store, Valley Service Center, along U.S. 42 near Warsaw. In the center of the store is a fireplace and a picnic table. At the table sits a friend of Mr. Smith's; he is tapping his cigarette into an ashtray shaped like -- I'm not kidding -- an old man who has gotten drunk on moonshine.
Above the fireplace hangs a deer head. On the mantel are a bottle of Budweiser, a shotgun and a bale of tobacco.
Mr. Smith pulls out his campaign brochure, which he printed himself. He's good with computers -- even has an associate's degree from an electronics institute. For a living, he builds systems for friends and works at his brother's store.
The brochure promises he will "maintain your sovereignty by demanding that the IRS, EPA and DEA agents obey the same laws that you do."
He also wants to establish neighborhood watch programs, support citizen arrests, train deputies to respect civil rights and decline to carry out unconstitutional searches of property.
Sheriff Higgins, the incumbent, won't comment on any of this. Having struck out with the competition, I head for a bar down the street from Valley Service Center, where the assembled regulars tell me Mr. Smith has no chance to win.
They like him, though.
"His ideas are similar to everybody's," says the bartender, Mom Hammond. "But he needs to get out and push it."
"The boy's smarter than a tack," says Bob Riley, who knew Mr. Smith in school.
They're a little hazy on the meaning of Libertarianism, though. "Kind of like someone who stands alone, has their own agenda," says Todd Edmondson, 33. "My dad was trying to explain that to me last night . . . (But) the game was on and I wasn't paying much attention." Mr. Edmondson and his friends like anybody who's against Kentucky State Police roadblocks. For some time now, troopers have been setting up checkpoints along U.S. 42 near the bars.
Mr. Smith likens this to Nazi Germany.
"Vere are your papers?" he says, feigning a German accent. "Vut are you doing out this time of night?"
As sheriff, he would put a stop to it, he says.
"I don't know exactly how it all works, but I figure after I'm in there a month, I'll have it all down to where I can set policy. I may have to issue a memo or something."
Sheriffs can't do that
Actually, sheriffs can't do that, says Trooper John Bradley, spokesman for the La Grange post. They have no authority over the Kentucky State Police, he says.
Besides, there's nothing wrong with this method of checking for safety violations or other crimes, the officer says.
"In road checks, by definition and by policy, we stop every car that comes through," Mr. Bradley says. "What would be illegal and unfair would be random checks, and we don't do that."
Oh. OK.
Now I know why we have Libertarians.
Karen Samples is The Enquirer's Kentucky columnist. Her column appears on Sundays and Thursdays in The Kentucky Enquirer. She can be reached at 578-5584 or email
her at ksamples@enquirer.com
SAMPLES ARCHIVE