By Lam Ho
Editor-in-Chief
In a post on his blog, Dr. David Haskell recounted a run-in with Senator Bob Corker. Haskell and three friends were walking along Stringer’s Ridge when they ran into Corker, who was alone on his hike.
“I greeted [Corker], then told him how deeply ashamed I was to be from a state where our senator will not denounce Trump for boasting of sexual assault,” wrote Haskell, who confirmed his account later in a telephone interview. “Corker has been silent on this matter and on the racism and hate that the T-monster has spewed into our country these last months.”
“If you don’t like it, then you should leave the state,” Haskell states Corker replied.
The senator’s office, however, released an opposing statement.
“Professor Haskell began shouting at Senator Corker in a profanity-laced tirade while pointing a finger in his face and told the senator that he was embarrassed to live in a state where the citizens voted to overwhelmingly elect Donald Trump,” Corker spokeswoman Micah Johnson said.
“Senator Corker took an oath of office to uphold the US constitution. The constitution gives citizens the right to express grievances to their elected representatives,” said Haskell. ‘If you don’t like it, leave the state’ is not the stance that I expect from my senator, nor is his refusal to publicly repudiate the odious rhetoric of president-elect Trump.”
Statements taken from the Nashville Scene, which refers to both Haskell’s blog and Johnson’s statement.
Reposting my comment in response to the initial report of this incident:
“Consider the Source
For those unfamiliar with The University of the South who might have come across the news about a Sewanee professor’s encounter with one of Tennessee’s US Senators while hiking over the weekend, here is a FB Note I posted on a previous occasion when the prof was in the news:
https://www.facebook.com/notes/tom-whitaker/a-response-to-a-sewanee-professors-romance-with-zen-in-the-woods/10151309809497631