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Courtesy photo. Lou Holtz, football amnalyst for ESPN and former coach at Notre Dame and South Carolina, was a candidate for Congress and then he wasn't.
Most Republicans in this area were excited at the prospect that college football analyst and former coach Lou Holtz might run for the house seat now held by Suzanne Kosmas of New Smyrna Beach. Shortly thereafter Holtz decided he wasn’t going to run so the whole exercise became academic. However, it is interesting to review just what excited conservatives about Lou Holtz.
First of all, as a former very successful coach at Notre Dame and South Carolina, and presently as an analyst with ESPN, he comes with extreme name recognition.
He is an outstanding, charismatic speaker who mesmerizes his audiences.
I had the pleasure of hearing him speak to a group of First Union Bank Executives several years ago and he turned me from a Notre Dame hater to a Notre Dame fan.
Holtz delivered his talk while doing sophisticated magic tricks using such things as newspapers for props. The talk went on for over an hour but he could have talked for many more hours as we all hung on every word and story he told about his life and career. I came away from his talk with the opinion that this is the type of person I would like to have my kids exposed to as they grow up.
It should be noted that Lou Holtz narrated a video clip that we used as a training film in the success at work program that Kiwanis put on every year for high school students. The purpose of the program was to teach students the things they needed to know about how to obtain and hold a job.
In the video clip, Holtz made many of the points that we were trying to teach. We figured it might make a bigger impression coming from Lou Holtz than from one of us.
Lou Holtz is seen as representing all that is good about America . Honesty, hard work, tenacity and all of the traits that you would like to see in your children are associated with Lou Holtz.
Many were disappointed that he decided not to run. Maybe he figured that his age precluded him from having much of a career in politics. Then again, maybe he was afraid that he might become a politician