A Career Public Servant
Following his talk with the Will Hays College Republicans, seventh district congressional candidate and Wabash graduate Carlos May agreed to sit down for a wide-ranging interview with the Wabash Conservative Union. Below is the full transcript of the conversation, in which he discusses conservatism, Indianapolis politics, the war in Afghanistan, and his time at Wabash College.
WCU: Let’s start out with the campaign. Republicans tend to nominate old guys. We saw that with Bob Dole, John McCain…names that are familiar. I haven’t heard your name until just recently, and no offense, but you look like you could be a student at Wabash right now.
May: That’s right.
WCU: Do you consider yourself an underdog in this race?
May: I think everybody else considers me an underdog. I don’t. I just think differently. I’m realistic—I understand this is an uphill battle, but I don’t think I’m the underdog.
You know, Carson is strong because he is a name. He’s all style and no substance. Now, how do we get around that? Well, A.) Yes, I am young. I’m only thirty. But that means that I’m not set in my ways. That means that I can adapt more quickly, more easily, more readily to any given situation.
Now, to specifically state—you know, you say the Republicans tend to nominate older guys—Yes, that’s true. But I’ve been working with the party, within the party, and for the party for over two years. I work for the Republican mayor. I have made inroads with all of those folks. I’ve already scored endorsements from the majority of the regional chairmen for the party. The only one yet probably is the official seventh district chair has not yet officially said anything—not because he doesn’t like me, but because he says, “Well, I want to see what you’re going to do first before I just give you my endorsement.” So I’ve done a good job of working with the party.
And I think another thing that really sets me apart from the other standard candidate—really any of the other ones that are running against me for the Republican nomination—is the fact that I can bring new voters into the mix. I will be able to get Spanish-speaking voters like no one else has to this date—because I know their language, their culture; because I’ve been to their countries, because I’ve worked with them for many years, because my parents have worked with them for even longer. I know the community leaders in that community. I’ve had Democrats within that community come up to me that have said, “Carlos, I am a registered Democrat. I am a member of the Democratic Hispanic Caucus. I’ve only ever voted for Democrats, but I like you. I want to see someone like you in office. I will endorse you, I will help you, and I will back you.”
They don’t do that because they think, “Well, he’s young.” They don’t do that because they think, “Well, he’s not going to be able to do it.” They do that because they see someone who has been helping them in the past, who has boots on the ground, who knows the community. But most importantly, someone who can actually represent them—not someone who is just going to pay them lip service. And they know this because I’ve been doing it for years now. Not just, “Hey, nice to meet you, please vote for me,” but, “What’s going on? How can I help you?” And granted, that’s a factor of my position with the mayor’s office, but I would do that for anybody—regardless of color, creed, or political party.
And even other Democrat blogs that have jumped on board, that are now blogging about me—they said, “You know what, I call ‘em like I see ‘em. Carlos is one of those all-around good guys who has actually helped us, regardless of the fact that he’s a Republican. So I think I bring that new mix to the table that my opponents don’t have, and won’t have, and can’t have—just by virtue of them being part of this old guard.
And then the other thing is the youth vote. I mean, one of the reasons why Barack Obama won was because he got them to vote for him. And they didn’t vote for McCain. Why? They saw Barack as being young, dynamic, outgoing, talking about change and new ideas, and they saw McCain as being, quite frankly, another Bush. They saw him as, “He’s old. He doesn’t know what we’re about. He doesn’t know what we’re going through. You know, he’s already got millions of dollars. He’s got dozens of properties. I’m coming out of college with debt. I don’t even have a job, or even, more importantly, job prospects. So he’s out of touch with me, I’m not going to vote for him.” And that’s what my opponents offer—that same thing. So I think I can appeal to a group of voters that other folks can’t get. Those voters are what’s going to push me over the edge.
WCU: You describe yourself as a “New Generation” Republican, but, as was pointed out earlier, you remind me of an older generation—sort of a Barry Goldwater, more libertarian type. Do you see the Republican Party moving in that direction?
May: Unfortunately, I don’t see them moving anywhere right now. I see them as being stuck, and I see them as fighting to figure out what is going to be the Republican Party for the next twenty years. I am a Republican because I believe in a few core principles of the Republican Party, and because I believe those core principles better represent our country as a whole. Now that being said, if you make up your mind on any issue before you have even heard the issue or all facets of the issue, that’s not making any sense to me. A lot of people in all the parties—not just Republicans, not just Democrats—in every party, constantly saying, “If you are not one hundred percent with us, you are not us.” That’s the wrong way to go. The moment you start to exclude everybody but the “true believers,” is when your party starts to disintegrate. You need to be the party of the future, the party of inclusion, and the party that actually gets things done, and not just talks about what they want to do.
WCU: Where do you draw the line with the inclusiveness? You mentioned the New York race—New York 23—in your talk. What made Dede Scozzafava a Republican?
May: Well…You know, honestly, I don’t know what made her a Republican, and maybe that was part of the problem—that she wasn’t a Republican, and she just kind of said, “Well, the only chance for me to win is to run as a Republican because a Republican has held this seat for over a hundred years. “ Frankly, I hadn’t even heard her name up until the national media started descending on that race, precisely because it was a battle between the “established” Republican Party and the new guard—the ones that want to see a return to core principles as opposed to just a “one way or the highway” type deal. So what made her a Republican? I don’t know. All I know is what makes me a Republican, and that I believe I am a Republican, and just because someone else says, “Carlos doesn’t agree with me one hundred percent of the time, and therefore he’s not a Republican,” I could easily turn around and say the same thing. Well, you know you’re not a true Republican because you bring up all this other irrelevant stuff. But I don’t. I don’t go around telling people that because, again, I’m not the party of exclusion, I’m the party of inclusion. Just because someone doesn’t agree with me one hundred percent of the time doesn’t mean that they are not on my side. And in fact, common sense would tell you that you cannot get one hundred percent of the people to agree with you one hundred percent of the time. If you think you can, you’re not thinking straight.
WCU: Do you consider yourself a conservative?
May: Yes. But first we need to define conservatism. I mean, how do you define conservative?
WCU: That would have been the follow-up.
May: Yeah…Is conservative being just, you know, you don’t want to spend a bunch of money? Or is conservative saying, “I want to hold onto morality or social or cultural norms that are from a bygone era?” The first step is we need to define conservatism.
How do I define it? How do I see conservatism? I see it in terms of limited government, low taxes, strong national security and individual freedoms. I think being a conservative socially is not the true mark of a Republican. I think that being conservative in terms of principles and ideals is the mark of a Republican. And that’s why I say I’m a Republican—because I believe in low taxes, I believe in a strong national security, I believe in individual freedoms, but most importantly, I believe in limited government. Our country has grown to the wealth and the power and the status that we have because our government, up until the past few years, was very hands-off. Past generations, even as recently as forty years ago, they looked at government not as the first line of defense, but as the last line of defense. They didn’t immediately say, “There’s an issue, federal government, please come and take care of it for me.” They said, “There’s an issue. Can we handle this locally? Can we handle this at the community level? If not, can we handle this as a state?” Normally, it stopped there. They could do that at the state level. So my conservatism, I suppose, is a new brand of conservatism. It’s one grounded in reality, it’s one grounded in principle, but it’s not one grounded in what the media portrays as being conservative.
WCU: What’s the seventh district politically, and how do you think its history is going to affect your race?
May: That’s a good question. To give you a little bit of background, the seventh district is basically entirely within the boundaries of Marion County. Marion County itself, well, a Republican mayor won election there, a Republican governor carried Marion County. So, can I say it’s Republican? Yes. Can I say it’s only Republican? No.
Now specifically, the seventh district, it has been gerrymandered. So what one would consider to be the more “Republican” areas of Marion County have been pushed off in the fifth district and the fourth district. And so, it might trend a little bit more Democratic—a little bit more towards the Democrat—but I don’t think it’s just that. We have a huge voting bloc that does not go vote. I mean, the last turnout—and you really can’t even look at the presidential because that was just such a game-changer in terms of turnout—if you look at the last seventh district standard election, not the special election that just happened, or the one that was tied to the presidential election. If you look at the 2006 election, you had basically a really small percentage difference between the winner, Julia Carson, and the loser, Eric Dickerson. That was a factor, not that it was just that the Democrat’s always going to win, the Carsons had a huge political machine. They got out the vote a little bit better. But I think it’s easily winnable by a Republican.
How do we win it? How do I win it? A.) I can’t be fighting against two parties. I can’t be fighting the Democrats and the Republicans. We need to unify behind one candidate, sooner rather than later. We need to do that as a party, and we need to do that as a county—because the more time we spend bickering and moaning and fighting amongst ourselves, the more time is wasted, the more money is wasted, the less time we’re focusing on the true issues and the true opponent, which is Andre Carson. So I think we can win it. I mean, we can get the Hispanic vote, and we can get the youth vote—two demographics that generally do not vote, yet those are two demographics I think I have the best ability to get out and vote. We can win it. We can win it easily.
WCU: What drew you to politics? You mentioned briefly a conversation with Dr. Blix…
May: Yeah. Really, public service. It was public service, to give you one specific answer. I mean, Dr. Blix was the first person who kind of put that in my head. Before hand, I was thinking about medical school. I wanted to be a doctor. I had wanted to be a doctor since I could, well, I could remember. In high school, I managed to get myself into operating rooms to, you know, watch operations, and to really do a lot of that stuff. I think I saw fifty or sixty different types of operations when I was in high school. And I liked it. I still like it. I find it very interesting, but my aptitude was not one for medicine. That was due to Bio 1 and 2 right here at this school. Which was a good thing, you know. I thought, well, I could be a mediocre doctor, or I could excel at something else. So I chose to excel in something else. Dr. Blix was the first man who put governmental service in my head. I consider public service to encompass many different facets—medicine, doctors being one of them; teachers being another form of public service; but government, obviously, is kind of the most direct one. It’s the one that immediately pops into people’s heads as public service. Why do I want to be in public service? Because I believe in our country. I believe in our history. I believe in our destiny. In our future. In our people. In our system of government. And I want to maintain that. I want to carry on policies and items and systems that have made our country great for the past 250 years; I want to make sure we’ve got that in the next 250 years.
And so I want to get in there, not to enrich myself, because I could be making ten times as much money in private practice in a law firm, or opening up my own law firm. I want to maintain our world standing, and I want to better our world standing. I want to make sure that this country excels, as it has, well into the future, and so I want to get in there to do these things. I want to do what’s right, not what’s easy. I want to bring new innovative solutions to the table. What I don’t want to see is another politician going in ther with a sense of entitlement, saying, “this seat is mine. I inherited it, and I will keep it.” And what I definitely don’t want to happen is I wake up twenty years, and lo and behold, now we’ve got another Carson son or another Carson grandkid, and this guy’s been in office that whole time, it’s been a lifetime appointment for him, and he ushers in the next generation. You know, changing someone’s first name is not change. It’s just modification, and most modification is not always good. So we really just need to change the way we look at politics and what we do with politics. We need to start getting people into office that don’t see it as a birthright, that don’t see it as it’s due to them or it’s owed to them, that see it as a public service—that go in there to get the job done, and then leave. And then take some time off, and then maybe they get back into public service. Maybe they run for Congress again, maybe they run for a different office. But someone who’s not just going to be in there for fifty years and decide, “Well, this is all I’ve ever done, this is all I’m ever going to do.”
WCU: So you don’t see yourself as a career politician?
May: I see myself as a career public servant. And, I mean, if I had my druthers what would I do? I would run for Congress like I’m doing, I would win, and I would stick around there until I lose the fire in my belly—until I’m there and I say, “You know what, I’ve lost my edge, I’ve lost my drive, my determination. It’s time for me to step back for a few years.” At that point in time, I would leave elected public office, but I would continue public service. My plan would be to join the U.S. foreign service and become a diplomat. I’d still represent the country, I’d still help the country, obviously in a different form, but it’s still public service. So I see myself as a career public servant, just in different aspects.
WCU: Why do you think Wabash men are so active in politics?
May: Because Wabash teaches us how to think, first and foremost. It tells us, you don’t walk up to something and immediately make up your mind on it, until you’ve heard all sides of that thing, whatever the issue is, or topic is, or concern is. The mark of a true learned man is someone who can be swayed by a strong argument, a correct argument, and allow his mind to be changed. I think that’s something that Wabash instills into all of us. You know, we might come to this school for one reason, but we stay here because we like what we get out of it. Why do we seem to put out so many people, specifically into government or public service? It’s because we get that instilled into us—that you need to do something that is larger than yourself, you need to do not just for yourself, but for others. And obviously, you’re going to help yourself out at the same time. So why can’t we do both? I mean, we’ve got multiple different guys running for U.S. Congress, which is a good thing. Our current Secretary of State is a Wabash man. We’ve got a City-County Councilor who is a Wabash man. Many people in the mayor’s office—which I was kind of surprised at—are Wabash men. Corporation Councel Chris Cotterill —he graduated a year before I did. We knew each other here. We work together in the mayor’s office right now. He just got a promotion, and he switched jobs over to Chief of Staff to the Mayor. So Wabash—we put out gentlemen. We put out people that do what’s right, do what’s necessary, and do it because it’s right and necessary. And I think that’s a testament not only to the school, but to the teachers, and even to the students.
I mean, we have one rule at this college. One rule. Every other college that I’ve known or gone to has got a book of rules. Often times thick with small print. We consistently put out top-notch individuals. I mean, that last statistic I heard when I graduated here in ’01 was that something to the tune of like 90% of students go on to a graduate school. IS that because we’re inherently the most intelligent people on the planet? No. It’s because Wabash puts a work ethic into us that is unequaled at any other school, really. And we get in there, and oftentimes graduate school is easier than Wabash. That’s a real testament to our system, and to our College, and to our teachers.
WCU: What was your favorite class at Wabash?
May: Oh man…Cultures and Traditions was good, all my PoliSci courses. Honestly, I guess I don’t have a specific favorite course. I have two favorite teachers. “Fast Eddie” McLean—Doc McLean—
WCU: He’s a contributor to The Phoenix.
May: Excellent. McLean really helped formulate my reasons for being a Republican, and my ideals in terms of that—but he also taught me to think, not just follow.
And then Dr. Blix. You know, I pretty much minored in Blix. I started off doing Bio and PoliSci, and then I took a class from Dr. Blix only because he was at a party at the FIJI house one night, and he says, “You know, you look really familiar to me.”
And I said, “Oh…OK…”
“Where’d you go to high school?”
And I said, “Zionsville.”
And he says, “Ah, yes, I remember your speech.” His niece actually went to high school with me and graduated in the same class. And so I started chit-chatting with him. I said, “this guy seems kind of cool. I’ll check out one of his courses.” And I liked him. I liked the way he taught. I didn’t like his five color-coded pen method of grading your papers, until I stopped making the same mistakes over and over, and then I thought it was good. But yeah, those two professors and their classes were my favorite classes I’d say.
WCU: Mentioning Dr. McLean, and knowing your more libertarian stances on some things: What is your position on the Iraq War?
May: Again, hindsight is 20/20. So to say that I would have made the same choices that I’m about to tell you eight years ago, seven years ago when we first go into this, I can’t do that. Here’s what I will say: People need to stop being so judgmental in terms of “we need results immediately.” We are a generation, a nation, of instant gratification. I’m guilty of this. When I load up a webpage, if it doesn’t load in, you know, immediately, I’m like, “man, what’s going on? Why’s this taking three seconds?”
Let’s look at the Iraq War historically. People are saying, “Why are we still in there?” It’s only been seven years. Look at Japan. Look at Germany. Look at South Korea. We’ve been in those countries for half a century. Nobody now can deny that Japan and Germany are first-world nations—world leaders. Is that because we immediately cut out and took off when we were done, or because it became unpalatable to us? No. We went in there—granted, it was a different time, people had a longer world view; they tended to think not in terms of what’s happening next week, but what’s happening next year, so they had a little bit of a longer train of thought, and I think that helped. It helped the country allow a longer base of operations. And so I think that’s part of the problem is that we just want this problem to be solved immediately, and then we’re done.
Now should we have gone to war in the first place? You know, no. We should have stuck in Afghanistan first. You know, I’m not going to speak ill of our prior president, but I think he went into Iraq for different reasons than what were originally given, especially in light of evidence that we find no WMD’s and stuff like that—but even on that topic, people say, “Oh, well, we didn’t find any WMD’s.” OK…That’s because he probably buried them all or got rid of them. But we know a few things: We know that he knew how to produce them. How do we know that? Because he used them, on his own people. If he used them on his own people, we know A.) He can produce them, and we know B.) he’s capable of using them. So just because we didn’t find anything at this exact moment, means nothing. He could have hid them, burned them, buried them, or he could have just said “we don’t have any” until after they leave, and then we’ll start making them again. So the knowledge and the ability was already there.
Now I would have stuck in Afghanistan to begin with because that’s where the problems started. We shifted our focus before we should have. Saddam was a horrible guy, I’m glad we got rid of him, and I think in the long run, Iraq is going to be a regional leader in that area, and I think that will be due totally because we took Saddam out. But at the time, it was not the right thing to do. We shouldn’t have done it at that time. We should have stuck in Afghanistan first.
WCU: Did you watch the President’s speech last night?
May: No, I was actually working last night. Public service is a twenty-four hour a day job. I was at meetings. I think I didn’t get home until about ten PM last night.
WCU: Do you agree with his general position of sending more troops there, and then withdrawing by July of 2011?
May: I think we should have sent more troops there years ago. I don’t agree with setting a specific timetable. If you’re going to do that, don’t tell people about it. If you say 2011—fine. 2011. It sounds good. But don’t tell people about it. Because it’s very easy for insurgents or Taliban or whoever else wants to come in there and insert themselves into the vacuum of power once we leave to just say, “Well, heck. Let’s gather more resources, gather more people, and just wait for two year, and then they leave. And then we take over.” And that’s happened in the past. They did the same thing with the Soviets. Yes, they battled them—insurgent style—the exact same thing they’re doing with us now. They just waited until the Soviets lost the will to be in there. And then, lo and behold, who came into the vacuum? People who probably weren’t too good for us. And unfortunately, we helped create them! So you’ve always got to look at things in a longer view. You can’t just say, “What’s going to benefit me in the next year, or the next quarter?” You’ve got to look longer term in my opinion.
Asians—not to stereotype—but Asian culture generally, Chinese and Japanese cultures, they don’t think in terms of what’s going to happen in the next fiscal quarter. They look and say, “What’s going to happen in the next quarter century?” What is our goal in the next 25 years? Let’s shoot for that goal, and start working for it now. Maybe you’ll get there sooner. But at least they have a long term goal. And I think that’s a good way of looking at things. If we plan out and say, “We need to start looking at the next twenty to fifty years, where do we want our nation then?” I think things would go a lot better. As opposed to now, we say, “Well, what’s the next sound bite for the media,” and then people forget about it, and then another election rolls around, and we’ll have to come up with another sound bite, instead of saying, “You know what, this is a problem, it’s going to take a while to fix, but let’s start fixing it now,” as opposed to saying, “Next generation will fix it, next politician will fix it,” like we’re doing now: we’re throwing a bunch of money into it because we’re not going to be paying for it. Our kids and grandkids are going to be paying for it. We’re writing checks on their money. They’re going to cash them; they’re going to pay for them. It’s because we’re not looking at it long term. We’re saying, “Who cares about the future; we’re here now!” And I think you need to have a more balanced approach to these things.
WCU: What sort of things did you do when you were at Wabash?
May: Everything! I was in a fraternity—FIJI—so I did pledgeship—did all the social stuff in terms of that. Did public service stuff, going out and volunteering, especially as a freshman, you know, you’re forced to do that. Cleaned a lot as a freshman—which I’m glad to say, I don’t have to clean as much now. So that’s good. Then in terms of collegiate activities: Student Senate, I did the academic policy, I did wrestling, I did soccer, I did intramural wrestling here—so you know, a little bit of everything. Everything you do in college is what I did. I didn’t limit myself to one. I had friends from all fraternities, so I went to different ones. I had friends who were independents, international folks, so I hung out with them. I got into some trouble—low-key trouble—everyone gets in trouble, you know. You’re a college kid, you’re eighteen, you’re on top of the world, you think you know it all, and really you don’t know much of anything, but you like to delude yourself into thinking the opposite—which I was very good at. And you know, I just enjoyed myself, is what I did. I loved coming to Wabash. The internships I got sometimes over the summer were great. The teachers were great. And I still talk with some of the teachers, I still talk with some of the professors, I still come back, and every time I see a Wabash guy or a Wabash license plate or a Wabash sweatshirt, I stop and say, “Hey, what’s going on man? What year did you graduate? What’d you do when you were there?” So…everything…Chapel Sing. I really enjoyed that…
WCU: Did you get a “W?”
May: No…
WCU: That’s good.
May: Yeah, that was very good…So yeah, I did a little bit of everything. It was probably the best four years that I’ve had as an adult. I got to experience being an adult, but yet, having no responsibilities and being a young adult at the same time. So it was the best of both worlds.
WCU: Do you still know the second verse of the fight song?
May: Man…Good question…(Laughter)…Dear Old Wabash…I know bits and phrases of it. I couldn’t recite the whole thing to you. That’s a fault on my part. The last time I sang the fight song was probably the year I got back into Indiana after law school, and I was at the Monon Bell game, watching one of the telecasts, and that was when it was still fresh in my mind, and that was five years ago now, so it’s been a while. You’ve shamed me into rereading it now, rememorizing.
WCU: I won’t give you a “W.”
May: (Laughs)
WCU: I still wake up in the middle of the night sometimes, reciting the second verse, scared to death I’m going to mess it up in the Chapel…
May: Oh man…
WCU: …that freshman year, they…
May: They drilled it into you. Heck, I remembered it all throughout college and a few years afterward. But now my mind is focused on other things, I suppose. The tasks at hand.
WCU: That’s probably a good thing. Well, thanks for talking with us.
May: Well, thanks for having me. I appreciate it.
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