Bonafide Disaster For Tennessee’s Open Primary System
Posted on September 16, 2008 at 9:55 amJoe Lance reflects on “the Kurita situation“:
This idea of “challenging bona fides” doesn’t sit well with me. And it doesn’t even make much sense, if you think about it: after all, what does party registration mean, when each major party strives to put up the biggest tent, and therefore each attracts ideological opposites to stand warily alongside each other?
SEE ALSO: Silence
permalink | Comment on this post
A Dissenting View
Posted on September 15, 2008 at 10:01 amThe oft-ornery, contrarian Jeff Woods takes a different view of the political demise of Senator Rosalind Kurita at the hands of the Tennessee Democratic Party Executive Committee:
It’s not that the senator voted against John Wilder for speaker. Wilder was part of the Democrats’ problem. With his alliance with Republicans, he held power for power’s sake. He never tried to advance Democratic Party policies. He opposed most of them, in fact. So Kurita could have voted to oust Wilder to elevate a real Democrat to the speakership. Senate Democrats should have banded together and done that many years ago.
But Kurita voted against Wilder and gave Senate control to the Republicans. To a Democrat, that has to be unforgivable. The only way for Democrats to push their policies through the legislature is to impose party discipline. In the Senate especially, that’s been a foreign concept. That’s why every year the House passes Democratic initiatives only to see them fail in the Senate. Kurita’s ouster sends the message that Democrats finally might be serious about getting something done in state government.
Where The Boys Aren’t
Posted on at 9:24 amSean Braisted takes issue with the meme that those who executed the political lynching of Rosalind Kurita were “good ol’ boys”:
There are an equal number of men and women on the board of the TNDP. There is a man and woman elected to the committee in each of the state senate districts in Tennessee. The chair is a man, the vice-chair is a woman. And while Sasser didn’t vote either way last Saturday (I don’t think he could as he was not an elected member of the committee), the Vice Chair, Elisa Parker, did vote to throw back the election to the county level, and with a 33-12 vote, more women than not voted to accept Barnes’ side of the story. In Nashville, from what I recall, both Jerry Maynard (19) and Will Cheek (21) voted against the measure.
SEE ALSO: Jerry Maynard explains his vote.
Thief
Posted on at 7:25 amCity Paper editor Clint Brewer calls a spade a spade when it comes to what happened to Rosalind Kurita this Saturday:
Tennessee Democrats will have a day of reckoning when it comes to this vote. Sadly, party elders seem to be squandering the leadership of Chairman Gray Sasser, one of the more informed and strategy-minded chairs in recent memory.
Even worse, Tennessee Democrats now appear to care more about politics and holding power than they do actual democracy.
That Sure Is One Special Census
Posted on May 20, 2008 at 2:56 pmFrom Radio Free Mt. Juliet:
The organizer of Mt. Juliet’s special census has quit his city job and admitted to stealing thousands of dollars in town money.
City employee Mike Chambers said he took between $10,000 and $15,000 over a period of several weeks by falsifying invoices related to the census, which was completed earlier this month.
Recent Comments
Where’s Chris Jackson when you need him?
This is stupid. Perhaps unwritten laws should be...
Ben, how so? I’m curious to know your analysis of...
me*
No, no, no. This isn’t going to fly. I hope the NRA gets involved in this...
Harold Ford 2010=Van Hilleary 2006.
“…another outlet for his race-baiting, divisive, elementary...
Voters, while not extremely astute by and large… I just...
As the article pointed out, Ford had his best chance when he ran for...
This is great news. Wamp needs to get a jump start on...