Girls Gone Wilder: Kurita Impedes The Senate From Being The Senate

By Kleinheider Posted on June 27, 2008 at 8:57 am

In what has to be a relatively unprecedented move, former Lt. Governor John Wilder travels all the way from Fayette County to Clarkville to campaign for Democratic state Senate candidate Tim Barnes and holler at his opponent, Democrat incumbent State Senator Rosalind Kurita:

It was Kurita who cast the deciding vote to end Wilder’s run as Senate speaker in January 2007, enabling Republican Ron Ramsey to claim a key post that had been controlled by Democrats for 140 years.

At the time, Kurita said the change would end the “stagnant environment” that had blocked progress in the Senate and the state.

Kurita also stepped up to the role of Senate Speaker Pro Tempore after casting the vote against Wilder.

Both Wilder and Barnes stopped short Thursday of pointing to that pivotal vote as the single reason why they’re working together to replace her in the Senate’s 22nd district.

“I’m not going to criticize Senator Kurita for voting for a Republican,” Wilder told an audience of about 100 people at the Barnes barbecue event.

Instead, he said the Tennessee Senate needs “statesmen,” implying that Barnes brings more integrity to the job, and is more in touch with the voting public’s wishes, than Kurita.

“His (Barnes’) family came out of the cotton fields of (Crittenden County) Arkansas, and I came out of the cotton patch. Anybody that grew up on a farm knows that being involved in agriculture teaches you values,” Wilder said.

“We need this gentleman up there, because we need the Senate to be the Senate.

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Tags: John Wilder, Roslind Kurita, the senate is the senate, Tim Barnes