Thursday, February 23, 2006

Talk about lobbing a grenade!

The unexpected withdrawal of County Commissioner Bruce Thompson from the District 5 race has thrown a monkeywrench into the works.

As the Flyer article notes, Thompson's retreat leaves the Republicans (temporarily) without a candidate for that seat, which would shift the balance of power to the Democrats. However, it should also trigger the state's anti-skulduggery law, causing the filing deadline to be reopened for another week.

(Note - as always, Jackson Baker and the Flyer beat the CA like a red-headed stepchild to this story. This would not happen if we had a fully functioning daily newspaper that cared about hard NEWS.)

The reopening of the filing deadline also should render moot any of Joe Cooper's arguments regarding Steve Mulroy's residence (NOTE: It's at 755 SOUTH GRAHAM in the heart of precinct 46-2, in the northwestern corner of District 5, shown in yellow in the link!) which will be grandfathered in and he will probably allowed to run.

Who will run on the Gooper side? The flyer article indicates it might well be Thompson's 2002 opponent in the Gooper primary, John Ryder, a former Republican National Committeeman and one of Terry Roland's attorneys. Think he might try to make this an Ophelia Ford referendum?
Given that Ryder has been one of the ultimate Republican insiders for more years than I can remember, he will fight the Democratic nominee like a rabid badger, and will use ANYTHING to win.

This is THE BATTLE in Shelby County this fall, especially if Mulroy beats Cooper.

6 comments:

Brassmask said...

Welp! I'm sufficiently hyped.

Steve Steffens said...

I was at work until 10, sorry I missed the shindig, hope it was well-attended!

Brassmask said...

It was my pleasure, Brad. Thanks for setting it all up.

Anonymous said...

Wow, I had forgotten about that anti-skulduggery act. I think I helped Cohen write it.

Ryder is Ryder, smart enough to respect but hard to love.

autoegocrat said...

I used to go to church with John Ryder and his family waaaaaaaaaay back when I was a little kid. I always liked him, and although my dealings with him at the time had nothing whatsoever to do with politics, his reputation in politics preceeded him.

The first time in my life I ever heard the word Repubican, it was applied to John Ryder. It's very difficult for me to reconcile what the word means to me today with what I remember of him from my childhood.

polar donkey said...

Joe Cooper said in the CA that he thought up to four people will enter the Democratic primary. That's what he wants. He has money, but needs to split the vote as much as possible. People can enter the race until the 6th! Cooper may pay people to enter the race as well as the republicans. This saved Mulroy but it is turning into a clusterf--k. Suddenly this ain't going to be an easy race. I hope Mulroy toughens up and gets on the offensive. He has to show something n the next couple days or people will jump in the race.