Super Tuesday was anything but for Gary Long as his tumultuous political career came to an inglorious end with his bombastic reelection bid resulting in a lackluster third place finish in a three way race for Lee County Commissioner of District Three. Garnering a paltry 462 votes out of the 2,919 cast in the heated contest, Long not only lost to first place winner Jeff Drury who received 1,582 votes but also finished behind second place challenger Brian Davis who received 875 votes. Without a concession speech nor any sort of public statement on his failure to secure reelection, Long's swan song may very well have been one of his last appearances before the 2024 Republican Primary when he took part in a candidate forum along with his two opponents at J.R.'s Steakhouse in Smiths Station on February 29th.
Mr. Snarly, a moniker many have come to know Long by, was true to form sporting his trademark sneer and surly, no holds barred demeanor. Gary gave zero damns and made no bones about it, quick to reiterate again and again from the onset of his campaign that if voters found themselves upset by his dubious decisions they could all drink a tall glass of STFU. Doubling down on his unpopular positions with wanton disregard for the concerns of his constituents, Long has unrepentantly awarded himself a badge of honor for alienating voters and dismissing their concerns as nothing more than an overflowing bucket of unsolicited hogwash.
Carrying himself like something that the cat had dragged in, Gary clutched onto his microphone for dear life as he sought to find balance on a barstool atop the small stage beside his two opponents. Long's litany of hot takes came off as a bizarre mixture somewhere between a hapless standup comedian bombing before an audience and a bad santa scaring away families at the mall. But don't take our word for it, read and behold the unapologetic utterings of soon to be ex-commissioner Gary Long in his own careless words.
Introducing himself to the crowd, Long remarked;
"I feel like we have done a lot, there have been some things that weren't popular decisions. The trash pickup may be one of them. But we were getting raped by counties around us and cities around us."
Use of the word "rape" seemed more than a bit uncouth here, even by Gary standards, when one considers that he was speaking before a mixed crowd that included quite a few young children and their attendant mothers. Then again, Gary was just getting fired up as he commented;
"Alabama only had one county that continued to use open top containers, and that was Lee County. We changed that, there was a lot of people that got upset by that. I stand behind my decision to support that. That was something that we needed to do."
"I plan on serving another four years, but you have the vote."
Again, Gary knows that his decisions rankled voters but in the same breath he also wants you to know that he does not give a hot damn. Nevertheless, there did seem to be some reluctant recognition of his precarious predicament as Gary begrudgingly acknowledged that he is obligated to actually win a majority of votes to stay in office when he reminded the audience that the electoral power is in their hands. Thanks for that public service announcement, Gary!
Responding to a question about his position regarding the exorbitant fees collected for the Smiths Station Fire Protection District, Gary noted;
"When the fire department first came to us about the fire district, I am going to be honest with you, I supported it. That may not be a popular decision."
"Because they are now a fire district, what they are doing is they are getting that fifty dollars off of your ad valorem tax and then you are paying the remainder of that. I don't know that the county really has the authority to change that. But again, if it is up to me, I don't see me changing that. I am going to be honest with you."
Yet again, Gary knows that his decisions are unpopular. He also wants you to know that he does not care and would do everything the same way all over again if he theoretically had to. This seemed to be a major theme of his doomed reelection campaign as he addressed another 800 lb. gorilla in the room, Lee County's botched rollout of curbside trash pickup by stating;
"I know there is a lot of people that say that they are getting some big garbage on their property as a result of the containers being gone. But I cannot support open top containers, because we had absolutely no way to keep people from dumping in them in the middle of the night. It was costing us way too much money."
Moving on to his vitriolic contempt for the First and Second Amendments, Gary regurgitated a defamatory diatribe as justification while slandering the conduct of a well known Lee County resident after being asked about his decision to remove citizen comments at commission meetings from the official minutes and live stream;
"I have been asked this question before and I am going to answer it the same way as I did before. We used to live stream all of the citizen comments but because those comments go out over the airwaves and we don't have any opportunity to edit any of that or bleep out things."
"It was at that point that we decided that we could no longer air citizen comments. As long as those individuals continue to come to our meetings and abuse citizen comments, I will never be a part of changing that."
"Unfortunately, we have got some that have abused it and caused that change. This is not the commission's issue, this is theirs."
Here the major takeaway is that due to the Lee County Commission lacking the technical capability to arbitrarily censor citizen comments being broadcast in real time via live stream, they opted to block them out altogether. Gary then foists responsibility for his decision upon citizens who possess the unmitigated gall to speak truth to power, washing his hands of the matter. Seeking to put lipstick on the pig that ultimately became his political obituary, Gary opined in his closing remarks;
"It has been my stance every time that I have run that I not collect thousands of dollars in contributions because I end up owing somebody. I do not want to be in that position. Developers will just run you over to try and get you in their pocket."
"There are some folks that say that term limits, that we shouldn't serve more than two terms. I will tell you that it is very difficult to get anything done in your first four years. You are learning to be a commissioner."
"If you are not willing to serve as many terms as you can get elected, you are not helping the county at all. I am of the opinion that the experience that I have got makes me the better candidate. Again, it is your vote as to who goes in. I just feel that my experience is my biggest asset."
Gary may have given away the game on corruption in Lee County with his misgivings about being bought off, yet methinks the lady doth protest too much. Term limits are another virtue that Gary despises, in his estimation he should be crowned commissioner for life and to hell with what the voters think. According to Gary, aspiring commissioners need at least four years of indoctrination courtesy of the Association of County Commissions of Alabama before they can properly do their job. Still, Gary returns hesitantly to the daunting reality of adhering to the rigors of serving in a constitutional republic and sheepishly attempts to sell the crowd on the purported benefits of his lengthy time spent in office.
Well, the voters were not buying what Gary was selling. Long's ignoble track record as a Lee County Commissioner is exactly what tanked his bid for yet another term in office, after having desperately pinned his hopes all along on that being the saving grace. Jeff Drury's victory has been chalked up by some as the result of winning with the votes of his relatives and friends as well as having lived in Smiths Station his whole life. Truth be told, Drury is a charismatic speaker with a pleasant confidence and an even temperament.
For many in district three and beyond, the true hero of this story is Brian Davis. Having thrown his hat in the ring early on, Davis set the bar high through his clarion call to defend the First and Second amendment rights of Lee County citizens that had been threatened and trampled upon by the morally bankrupt commission that seeks to rule over them like serfs. Davis is owed an immense debt of gratitude for setting the tone and the agenda of this political contest from the outset by championing the concerns of voters before all else. Bravo, Mr. Davis, we shall forever remain in your debt.
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