The Homeys In The GOP, They Never Heard From You, G

By Kleinheider Posted on December 11, 2008 at 7:05 am

Clint Brewer pens a column on the mad dash by lobbyist to get close to the new power in the Tennessee Legislature:

Lobbyists were asking for introductions to GOP legislative staffers, few of which they actually knew. Sources say some lobbyists were shocked to meet a cadre of young GOP turks in their 20s and early 30s as opposed to the rather long-in-the-tooth Democratic staffers the lobbyists had known, loved and squeezed for decades in some instances.

On the flip side, the attendance does show business seems to come first for Nashville’s government relations class above partisanship. GOP operatives say there is a scramble going on for law firms and lobbying shops to land qualified individuals with legitimate GOP ties.

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Tags: business, conservative majority, Jason Mumpower, lobbyists, Republican majority, Ron Ramsey  

More On The RINO Hunt: Steve Gill Explains The Embryonic Group

By Kleinheider Posted on December 10, 2008 at 10:01 pm

Rep. Bill Dunn and Rep. Brian Kelsey have already denied involvement in a group described in a Metropulse article as a confederation of conservative Republicans committed to ideological purity in the state legislature.

Via email, radio talker Steve Gill (also mentioned in the article) describes the as-yet unnamed, unannounced group:

There is a group that is in the formative and discussion stages. Dunn, Kelsey and other legislators are in the category of legislators that we have talked about as the kind of legislators we would want to have involved. I have not talked to either of them at this point. I don’t know if they have had any other contact from those who are involved in the development of the group.

The same is true of some of the other names mentioned. Some have weighed in, others have not been contacted yet. There are others not listed who have expressed interest as well. We are seeking input and developing a more concrete plan with some of the key individuals involved and then hope to be able to take that basic plan to a wider audience to seek additional input and involvement. There is a draft working paper that has some prospects listed that is apparently the basis of the Metropulse article.

It is not a PAC that will be targeted at any particular legislator, including Steve McDaniel. The idea is to support conservative house and senate candidates in both primary and general election campaigns. The Left has poured millions into state races, including into Colorado for example, and there is no counterbalance in Tennessee at this point.

Here is a link that gives some insight into how the extremist Left is turning its attention to state races, including plans to insure that they are in position to put their “allies” into positions that decide those races.

The principles that are included in the draft working paper are intended to provide a discussion point for clarifying the type of conservative issues that have broad support among Tennessee voters. Most, if not all of those issues, poll well over 50-60% among Tennessee voters so they are clearly not “wedge” issues. They are mainstream issues to Tennessee voters.

I would expect that by mid-January we should be in position to make a formal announcement of the intents and purposes of the group.

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Tags: Bill Dunn, Brian Kelsey, conservative majority, Metropulse, RINO, RINO hunters, Steve Gill, Tennessee State Legislature  

Red To Blue: Harold Ford On The Democratic Agenda

By Kleinheider Posted on September 1, 2008 at 9:34 am

Former Congressman and DLC Chair Harold Ford, Jr. discusses what Democrats need to do, and keep doing, to carve out a ruling majority in Congress:

“If you look at the congressmen who won in 2006, the ‘red to blue’ as they call them as a group, not those who may have succeeded Democrats and are holding safe Democratic seats,” Mr. Ford said, “and you consider the special election races this year, in the last couple of months in Mississippi, Louisiana and Illinois, what you will see clearly in the ascendancy in the party is a moderate, mainstream, Democratic approach to taxes, to fiscal policy, to spending as a whole, to national security, foreign policy.

“I would contend that the Democratic majority is due to a moderate, mainstream, conservative philosophy — conservative, a lot of people interpret that the wrong way, but just a moderate mainstream philosophy in the party being on the ascendancy, as opposed to [a philosophy that is] sometimes further to the left, some may call liberal.”

On the numbers, I couldn’t disagree. House Speaker Pelosi owes her gavel today to Rep. Heath Shuler of North Carolina, and about a score of other conservative or moderate Democrats who won by promising voters a certain level of independence from the Democratic Party’s liberal wing. (Mr. Shuler won his seat in 2006 by telling voters he wouldn’t “automatically” vote for Mrs. Pelosi to be speaker if elected.)

But I’m skeptical of a conservative ascendancy in a party that promises tax hikes for the “wealthy,” balks at expanding domestic oil drilling, and opposes nearly every form of school choice that would give poor children a way out of failing public schools. So I press Mr. Ford on the apparent divergence between the DLC’s moderate agenda and that of Mr. Obama and the Democratic Party.

“I don’t think there are as many differences as people may think,” he said pointing to Mr. Obama’s recent proposal, sketched out on these pages, to return the top capital gains tax rate to 20% — a rate almost a third lower than the rate set by Ronald Reagan in the 1986 tax reform. He also cites Mr. Obama’s support for teacher merit pay.

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Tags: conservative majority, Harold Ford, red to blue