Waiting For Junior: Will Harold Ford Condemn The Tinker Toy Tactics In His Former Stomping Grounds?

By Kleinheider Posted on August 6, 2008 at 11:00 pm

Aunt B. asks and answers her own questions on where Nikki Tinker’s money to create of those racially and religiously inflammatory ads comes from — but only partially. Yes, Tinker gets her money from Armenians. Republicans? I’m not so sure.

Regardless, one place we know Nikki Tinker did get her money from was Emily Threlkeld Ford, wife of Harold Ford, Jr. the former Congressman from the very district in question here.

In 2006, the year Cohen originally won his seat, Ford the U.S. Senate candidate was noticeably cold towards the candidate Cohen — and for good reason. His brother Jake, supported by Harold, Sr., was an independent candidate for the seat.

However, when his brother again filed to run against Cohen this year, again as an independent, declaring that the Ninth District should have a black Congressman, Harold Ford, Jr. condemned him in the harshest possible terms.

“It’s beyond concern. I want to make clear my brothers’ comments are not mine. I reject them. … I don’t believe any candidate’s fitness for office should be measured or determined by race or gender.”

Where is Harold Ford, Jr. now? This is not just one negative ad, it is a pattern. Nikki Tinker is attempting to divide Harold Ford’s former district along racial and religious lines. Where is the reprimand, the censure?

The blowback on Tinker has been significant. The rebukes are starting to roll in.

Post Politics has made its requests for comment formally to the office of Harold Ford and those requests have gone unanswered. I hate to get all Scenester on the issue but, in this case, I have to say, “Harold, call me.”

permalink | 9 Comments

Tags: Emily Threlkeld Ford, FUBU, Harold Ford, Jake Ford, Junior, KKK, Klan, Nathan Bedford Forrest, negative ads, Nikki Tinker, Steve Cohen, That's racist  

For Real: Junior Takes It To The Grammcracker

By Kleinheider Posted on July 10, 2008 at 7:49 pm

From R. Neal, Harold Ford, Jr. responds to Phil Gramm’s assertion that we are in “a mental recession” and that America is “a nation of whiners”:

“We have a competitiveness problem in America whether we want to admit it or not….This is not mental, this is real.

The fact that we don’t graduate enough engineers and scientists in this country, that’s real. The fact that we don’t have a real immigration policy in this country, that’s real. The fact that small businesses are paying too much for health care crippling their ability to innovate and hire more people, those are real issues.

And as much as this may be a little mental, this is a real issue for government leaders, for business leaders and certainly for people all across this country.”

~ Harold Ford, Jr.

permalink | 2 Comments

Tags: Harold Ford, Junior, mental recession, MSNBC, nation of whiners, Phil Gramm, that's real  

Davis’ Big Payback Probably Not What He Was Expecting

By Kleinheider Posted on June 18, 2008 at 11:16 am

Jeff Woods points out the one important point we have learned from the whole Democratic State Executive Committeeman’s “I heard on Fox News that Barack Obama may have terrorist connections” flap — Rep. Lincoln Davis and Harold Ford, Jr. aren’t as big a fans of each other as they used to be:

If we needed proof, this whole episode confirms that Davis and Harold Ford Jr. are really pissed at each other. The rub is that Junior is refusing to help anoint Davis as the 2010 gubernatorial nominee. As Davis said this week, “God bless Harold Ford Jr. Bless his little heart.”

Indeed. From a political perspective, one can almost say Junior is in the wrong here. Lincoln Davis, of the extremely rural conservative Fourth District, did a fair bit of vouching for Harold Ford, Jr. during the 2006 Senate race.

To be sure, Ford played the populist to a tee and went the places he needed to go to secure his good ole boy chops and assuage the fears of white Democrats and independents that he wasn’t like those “other Fords out of Memphis.”

But having a silver haired good ole Southern yellow dog Democrat standing next to him while he visited Confederate flag emblazoned diners and talked the Southern Populist palaver probably didn’t hurt ‘em any.

While in the days of old, the “I’ll scratch your back, if you scratch mine” quid pro quo was more explicit, to say that Lincoln Davis didn’t think he was banking a bit of love with Ford for giving him credibility with yellow dog dems would be naive.

Davis expect a return on investment. What did Davis get for his troubles? Not much it seems. While Lincoln vouched for Ford with rural whites going so far as loaning out his Chief of Staff to serve as campaign manager, when the wormed turned and Davis and his staff found themselves in a racial beef, not only did Ford not help Davis out, he threw his man to the wolves.

Now, one can say that this was just business. Ford was implicitly, but not explicitly behind Hillary Clinton in the most recent primaries, and this episode probably seemed like a good way to get in good with the new king of the Democratic Party.

But Ford’s statement does strike one as a bit of overkill. After all, despite the chronology implications in some articles Lincoln Davis’s Chief of Staff’s disavowal of the views attributed to him in the City Paper occurred before the Ford statement throwing him under the bus.

So considering what Lincoln Davis did for the almost successful Senate campaign of Harold Ford, Jr. it is understandable that Davis is a bit perturbed that Ford has not taken steps to return the favor, instead taking action that one could reasonably interpret as outright sabotage.

SEE ALSO: Braisted points out that this subterranean Ford/Davis feud is not new and recounts the acrimony between the two camps when various Ford operatives were talking up a Ford Gubernatorial run last Fall.

permalink | 2 Comments

Tags: Beecher Frasier, Confederate flag, Fox News, Fred Hobbs, Harold Ford, Junior, Lincoln Davis, terrorist connections, yellow dog