42.9957°N 107.5512°W. Thatâs the coordinates for the geographic center of Wyoming. Its somewhere northeast of Lander, and Iâve never been there but I think Iâve been close.
I imagine its a rough, uncomfortable piece of country. Its probably tough to reach on marginal roads, if there are roads at all.
But there it sits, where it always was. It hasnât moved an inch.
Now, ask anyone where the political center of Wyoming is located and, these days, all youâll get is confused glances. Damn few Wyomingites remember those coordinates.
The political center of Wyoming does not seem to be where it used to be.Â
Listen to the rhetoric of the Wyoming Freedom Caucus and one might conclude that the center has shifted way out to the starboard edge, almost to Utah.
Theyâll tell you that you can find it out on some rocky, bare hilltop just across the border from a theocracy.
But thatâs not true. The center hasnât moved. Only peopleâs ideas of the center have moved.
I consider myself a proud resident of the political center of Wyoming, and I get a lot of heat from both extremes for that. Proselytes from the political margins tell me Iâm out of touch. That I need to take a stand.
Its a little lonelier these days, in the middle, since most of my neighbors have wandered off toward the edges.
I touched on this theme about a year ago and not much has changed.
The political center is difficult terrain to defend, since the attacks come from all sides, and you have to be on your toes. The extreme margins, however, are easier to defend since attacks come only from one direction.
It doesnât take much brainpower to crawl into a corner and think in only one direction. Thatâs the lazy manâs way to deal with the world, and I think weâve become politically lazy.
Iâve been challenged more than once to define the political center. I answer with the tried-and-true pendulum analogy, that the arm of a pendulum touches the center twice each time it touches one of the extremes.
But, the center is hard to pinpoint since its less of a place than a state of mind. Pendulums donât always work. Sometimes it takes people to get it done.
Hereâs an example from Dick Cheneyâs book âKings of the Hillâ which profiles several congressional Speakers of the House.
Before World War II, Nick Longworth was Speaker, and a Republican. He was Teddy Rooseveltâs son-in-law, with impeccable GOP credentials. His opposite number, the House Minority Leader, was Cactus Jack Garner, a Texas Democrat.
Cactus Jack later became FDRâs vice-president and famously described the office as âabout as exciting as a pitcher of warm spit.â
Every morning, Longworth would pick up Garner and theyâd carpool to work. They took the long way around DC to give them time to talk about the business of the House.
During the drive, the two political rivals would hammer out what needed to be done, which bills introduced, which killed, what rules to invoke and, by the time they pulled up to the capital, the dayâs work would be laid out and effectively done.
That, my friends, is political leadership par excellence and about as good a definition of âthe centerâ as I can come up with.
That dedication to the peopleâs business is impossible in the Washington of today. In the Cheyenne of today as well, for that matter.
How do we in Wyoming return to that place where the publicâs business is more than a childish bloodsport? How do we reclaim the political center of the Cowboy State?
We do it the same way that we got to this dysfunctional place in our history. We go back to the center the same way we left it.
One step at a time. One election at a time. One vote at a time.
Shall we begin?
Rod Miller can be reached at: rodsmillerwyo@yahoo.com