Here’s something I should have mentioned but didn’t in Tuesday’s column about the new-generation reform for an initiated act to ban lobbyists’ gifts to legislators and corporate contributions to state campaigns, which is the brainchild of Catholic High government teacher Paul Spencer and is backed now with financial and celebrity muscle by the likes of Brent Bumpers and Bruce McMath and Dale Bumpers and Jim Keet and Baker Kurrus and Nate Coulter and John Paul Hammerschmdit and now Ed Bethune and on and on:

The proposal also would ban union contributoins to campaigns.

This is the first, and usually only, question I get on the proposal from Republican or conservative persons.

The Arkansas AFL-CIO is all right with that, figuring corporations have more to lose by a ban on both.

The inclusion of unions, which is only fair, helps explain the Republican participation.

And the hits just keep on coming…

The Talk Business poll of South Arkansas on Thursday night also inquired, it turned out, of Democratic primary voters as to their preference for president — Barack Obama or the crank from Tennessee named John Wolfe, who has a pending penalty in Tennessee for not obliging all campaign finance disclosure requirements and who makes populist pronouncements actually to Obama’s left.

Obama led it 45-38.

There are people who actually think Wolfe will carry the 4th District.

He already has polled 22 percent in the 1st District, and that was before Obama sided with the homosexuals.

The felon imprisoned in Texas got 42.8 percent against Obama last week in West Virginia. Wolfe might beat that, but at least he’s not in prison.

We take our politics much more seriously than that in Arkansas.

Attorney General Dustin McDaniel probably won the 2014 Democratic gubernatorial nomination on Monday.

U.S. Rep.  Mike Ross of Prescott, who would have cleaned up in southern Arkansas as a primary foe of McDaniel, put out a statement in Washington announcing he would not run for governor after all.

He said that, upon completion of his congressional term at the end of this year, he will become corporate vice president for governmental relations — lobbyist, kind of  – for the Little Rock-based Southwest Power Pool. That is a regional electric transmission consortium that helps manage the nationwide power grid. It’s technically a nonprofit, but it springs form assorted corporate special interests in the utility sector.

This will enable Ross to settle his family in Arkansas and make a nice sum of money availing himself of his knowledge and connections in the political class.

McDaniel now needs to turn his attention to rich businessman John Burkhalter, a Highway Commission member who is talking about self-funding a Democratic gubernatorial run.

I may as well try to link this video before the Republicans do. On Talk Business last night on Fox 16, I say some gays must be against themselves in South Arkansas, considering new polls numbers on gay marriage down in the lower regions, and that the Democrats are just in a pitiful way in the state.

Well, this is just about the best news I’ve heard in a while.

Retired cookie mogul Brent Bumpers, businessman and Little Rock School board veteran Baker Kurrus and noted Republican businessman Jim Keet have announced the formation of “Better Ethics Now” to raise money and otherwise support this Regnat Populus citizens’ initiative to get a Wal-Mart Rule, a ban on lobbyist gifts to legislators, on the general election ballot

Last I checked, Paul Spencer, the Catholic High government teacher heading up Regnat Populus, was candid about the challenges facing an unfunded group of do-gooders in actually having the money and wherewithal to employ canvassers to get the necessary 62,000 signatures by July.

Now these three guys have come forward to lend money, business credibility, political credibility, additional fund-raising potential and broad-based mainstream political muscle.

Look out, lobbyists and legislators. The good guys have some oomph.

UPDATE: Apparently Bumpers, Kurrus and Keet are the leaders and front guys, but up to a dozen other prominent names will be added, perhaps by the time of a news conference Monday, and they will include Bumpers’ dad, former U.S. Sen. Dale, and former U.S. Rep. John Paul Hammerschmidt. The goal is a quarter-million dollars in money raised. They need hired-gun canvassers at the polls May 22 to get this done.

UDATED: Actually, Brent Bumpers says all committee members are listed on official filing with state. They are, in addition to Bumpers and Hammerschmidt: John Adams, Jim Argue, Hank Bates, Paul Byrd, David Couch, Beth Coulson, Nate Coulter, Bob Edwards, Stephen Engstrom, Sam Ledbetter, Richard Mason, Walter May, Bruce McMath, John Riggs, Bobby Roberts and Stephanie Spencer, the wife of Paul.

Oh, and Brent Bumpers says he isn’t retired. Or retiring. I meant retired as a cookie mogul. He sold  the cookie company for more money than I care to mention. I would say that he now is a dabbler, but I’d probably have to take that back, too. Public-spirited investor? How’s that?

The Talk Business-Hendrix College automated poll went into South Arkansas last night with more than 400 calls each to likely Republican and likely Democratic voters to assess the congressional primaries. Those numbers will roll out later.

But, for today, you might be interested to know that the poll threw in a question about same-sex marriage. And this is what came back: Among Republicans in this 4th District, only 6 percent favored it and 92 percent opposed, and, among Democrats, only 26 percent favored and 69 percent opposed.

I will hold forth disapprovingly and lamentingly on all of this in a Sunday column.

Meantime, I’ll sit down with Roby Brock of Talk Business this morning to tape an interview about these findings that will air at 10 p.m. Sunday on KLRT-Fox 16 in Little Rock. You won’t want to miss that.

They are saying that one of the most respected members of the U.S. Senate — 36-year veteran and octogenarian Richard Lugar, ranking Republican on foreign relations — will get beat today in Indiana’s Republican primary by a Tea Party-favored state treasurer.

It likely will happen because:

–The Republicans have gone extremist nuts. Moderate statesmen of sensible accomplishment and cooperation such as Lugar simply will not be tolerated any longer.

–Lugar actually is on record as being friends years ago with a young Democratic senator. The name was Obama. Unforgivable.

–Lugar is out of touch. He sold his place in Indiana and couldn’t even prove he lived in the state.

I’m no rock music critic or expert

I knew Levon Helm only to the extent that one can know someone by virtue of spending a celebratory Fourth of July years ago with a gathering of 20 or so that included him.

I remember that Shalah shot a bottle rocket that nearly hit him in the behind. He darted clear with a high-stepping quickness and agility perhaps suggestive of his drumming skills.

In this Aug. 14, 2009 file photo, Levon Helm performs with the Levon Helm band during the Heroes of Woodstock concert at Bethel Woods Center for the Arts in Bethel, N.Y. (AP Photo)

I remember his leaned-back rapture that afternoon over the song being sung by a bird above.

I do know well people who knew him intimately.

So that is how it comes to be that a political columnist is doing a blog post on how Levon and Robbie Robertson did not, as a few published reports have suggested, reconcile their differences at the end of Levon’s life.

This is more properly a subject for a takeout by Rolling Stone, but, in the meantime, we can try to address these few mild flaws in the public record.

First, the necessary background: Levon, the purist of Americana music who came from Phillips County, was the drummer and dominantly distinctive vocalist for the seminal and influential late-60s, early-70s group calling itself simply The Band. The five talented members wanted to be all about the music, a rockish blend of country and gospel and bluegrass and blues and anything else they wanted to put in the stew, and about the collaboration that can produce genius.

Robertson was the band’s lead guitarist and most conscious and able in public relations (which is to say self-promotion) and business matters. He also was the most talented originator of songs. He would come up with tunes, generally, and Levon and the others — the late Richard Manuel, the late Rick Danko and the “music teacher” guru, Garth Hudson — would work them over and change them and touch them up, both in regard to melody and lyrics.

I’ve been told, for example, that Robertson concocted “Up on Cripple Creek,” but that it wasn’t working, and was about to be abandoned, until Hudson came up with some revitalizing touches. I don’t know that. I wasn’t there. My sources are Levon intimates. But I suspect that’s how the process worked generally. It is usually how the creative process works.

Long story short: Robbie ran off with sole songwriting credits, then parlayed his friendship with Martin Scorsese to get more camera time and content control than the other band members from that acclaimed documentary, “The Last Waltz.” He also got all or nearly all the money, through an exclusive producing credit.

You can read Levon’s candid and scathing account of his resentment toward Robertson in his book, “This Wheel’s on Fire.”

This wasn’t merely a rift. This was deep. Levon refused to attend The Band’s induction into the Rock ‘n’ Roll Hall of Fame. I’m told he would put his autograph on just about anything except any paraphernalia related to “The Last Waltz,” to which he would firmly say no.

So, anyway, word leaked out a couple of weekends ago that Levon was at death’s door with madly spreading cancer. And Robertson got in touch with a couple of family members to ask if he could come see Levon. After a period of considerable thought, family members permitted it on the thinking that there was a chance that Robertson might be seeking sincerely to put his own mind at ease over these differences with Levon, and that they would regret denying him that opportunity.

Robertson came by. But — how do I put this? — Levon was in a kind of hospice state, not conscious, not cognitive, not communicating.

Robertson went on to say publicly that he had “visited” with Levon and to express his undying admiration for, and alliance with, his beloved bandmate.

He didn’t actually say they’d reconciled, but a few press accounts have over-read Robertson’s public comments and asserted that.

But they didn’t reconcile. They couldn’t have — a reconciliation requires two active participants.

I’m not trying to feed any pointless feuds and bitterness. I’m just trying to say what happened, as it has been related to me.

The fact of the matter is that I kind of side with Robertson’s on songwriting — kind of, not entirely, because he could have revered the collaboration and shared — but not at all on the stunts he pulled with the documentary.

A presidential race as tight as the one of 2000, reflecting deep differences between men and women and decided by the whims and enthusiasm levels of a few voters in eight to 12 states, perhaps split between the popular vote and the electoral vote that matters — all of that is suggested by Gallup’s latest polling.

A new nationwide Gallup survey out today shows Republican Mitt Romney leading President Obama by a point.

But in a sub-survey released the day before of nearly a thousand respondents in the 12 swing states — they are New Hampshire, Ohio, Pennsylvania, Virginia, North Carolina, Florida, Wisconsin, Michigan, Iowa, Colorado, New Mexico and Nevada — Obama leads Romney by 47-45.

The other 38 states seem decided and Obama has an electoral advantage in those. He leads in fewer states, but they are bigger ones.

And Obama’s 12-state lead in the swing states is down from nine points, 51-42, a month ago.

And both findings — the national and swing states ones — fall snugly within the margin for error.

Gender gaps persist. Obama leads by 12 points among women and Romney leads by eight points among men.

Equally significant, Gallup suggests for its swing state survey, is what we might call an enthusiasm gap. Obama’s voters are more certain of their preference and more enthusiastic about expressing it, even more certain actually to go to the polls.

Of Obama’s supporters in those 12 states, 55 percent call themselves either extremely enthusiastic or very so. For Romney, that figure is 47 percent.

Obama’s enthusiasm numbers are up from a month ago, and Romney’s are unchanged, even as Romney gain grounds overall. That reflects that back-and-forth voters in the 12 decisive states have moved only tentatively to Romney in the last month.

It’s going to be one for the ages. The economy is not good enough to re-elect Obama, but it’s not bad enough to elect Romney. The respective bases are less than fiery, though Obama’s base is stronger. The decisive arena has narrowed — I think it’s probably eight states, not 12 — and, within those eight, just a few thousand people so fickle as to move significantly in a month. Attack advertising, super-PACS, the debates — huge.

Romney’s running mate? Gotta come from Florida or Ohio, seems to me.

I went out yesterday afternoon to chat with one of Dr. Art English’s small upper-level political science classes at UALR, and the conversation produced a couple of moments I found worthy.

On the subject of education, an African-American woman, mother of teenagers and Democratic sympathizer, said she was running for the school board of her kids’ charter school in Maumelle. It’s not because that particular charter school, or any charter school, is necessarily great, much less flawless, or because her kids consistently do better than they would do in regular public schools. The results are mixed and uneven child to child and year to year, she said.

It’s because the charter school permits her a more intimate and active and influential engagement in her kids’ education than would a regular public school.

It’s a micro choice made in behalf of her own kids, she said. But there’s a macro application, she said, and it’s that Democrats and left-leaning defenders of teachers’ unions and public schools need to become less reactive on the issue, show more respect for parental choices and embrace the occasional charter school concept.

That gave me a natural opening for one of my themes. It’s that politics is all about “reform,”  about defining something that is wrong or bad or failed, and embracing and championing changes that you want the voters to rally around in a morally compelling way. Republicans are cornering the market on “reform” in Arkansas right now. Democrats who jerk their knees against charter school and school choice — who dismiss it as an attack on teachers’ unions or public education altogether or on integration — are, quite simply, engaged in yesterday’s reform and on the losing end of the political equation. President Obama seems to know that at the federal level.

So the class of mostly Democratic sympathizers began to discuss how Democrats could win politically through a commitment to government and government services in the face of the poisoning of government and government services by Republicans.

My best idea was the looming shortfall in Arkansas Medicaid. As I will discuss in Sunday’s column, Medicaid is not welfare, or a handout, when it pays for residential care for an asset-depleted frail elderly person with dementia. Nor is it welfare to extend ARKids First medical insurance to kids in families falling within 200 percent of poverty, which is two-thirds of Arkansas children.

At that point a young woman spoke up to say that her kids — three, I think she said — are on ARKids Part B, which requires co-pays and deductibles and premiums of her. She said  that one of these children had expensive surgery at Arkansas Children’s Hospital and that, absent ARKids, she would not be able to pursue higher education, for which she plainly had an aptitude, because she’d have to be working a job or two.

The class otherwise lamented the lethargy, or actual illness, of the state Democratic Party. With Obama not even trying in Arkansas, and no governor’s race or U.S. Senate race this fall, there will be no money for a “coordinated campaign,” nor any energy, and Democrats quite possibly are going to get their hats handed to them all across the Arkansas landscape.

We wondered: Is there a message Arkansas Democrats could seek to develop, embrace and articulate to reverse this death spiral? One young man, another bright light in the class, said we seemed to have hit upon it in our charter-school and ARKids First discussions. It’s about kids coming first, or taking care of our kids.

It’s simply expressed, universally embraced and morally compelling, which is to say it has the advantage of being, while tactical, right.

I was struck by the fact that the most powerful political communication is personal, possessed of a human face and a human challenge, and anecdotal. Public education? Well, our policy discusspon is interesting, but let me tell you about why I’m running for my charter school board. Medicaid? Well, our policy discussion is interesting, but let me tell you about the surgery my baby had at Children’s Hospital.

It was a worthy hour of higher education. May there by many more, in classrooms and out.