Thursday, November 30, 2006

Shocked, Shocked I am to find corruption in this establishment!

City Councilmen Rickey Peete and Edmund H. Ford (yes, of THOSE Fords, for those of you from out of town) have been arrested and charged with criminal corruption regarding legislation before the Memphis City Council.

On top of that, former County Court Squire and perennial County Commission candidate Joe Cooper was indicted on money laundering charges stemming from an investigation into narcotics dealing in the Mid-South area.

According to the CA article, Peete is alleged to have taken a total of $12,000 from an FBI informant who is facing criminal charges on his own. Ford is alleged to have accepted a total of $6,000 paid over three installments at his mortuary, E.H. Ford Mortuary.

Well, since we're going in to City elections next year, this should open things up a bit, eh? Will Peete and Ford do as Kathryn Bowers did and run for re-election anyway?

Grab some popcorn and pull up a chair, it's getting interesting around here!

Wednesday, November 29, 2006

For a VERY good cause..

You're Invited to
MCIL's Annual Open House &
Silent Auction

Date: December 1, 2006
Time: 4pm – 8pm
Location: 1633 Madison Avenue

The Gift Shoppe will be open for inexpensive
last minute holiday shopping.

Silent Auction will be open from 4:30-7:30pm

There will be music by the Specimens
and light snacks.

Call to R.S.V.P. at (901) 726-6404
**Credit cards accepted for
Gift Shoppe and Silent Auction
Free Our People!

The DSCC responds..

Yes, I know, R. Neal beat me to it, but Mike Liddell of the DSCC sent me a nice email challenging The Prince of Darkness' claim in the post below that they had sandbagged Harold Ford Jr in the closing days of the race.


Here is Mike's email, reprinted with permission:

Hey Steve, I saw your post on the DSCC and support of Harold Ford Jr. and wanted to pass along some info.

Just to let you know, the idea that the DSCC abandoned Harold Ford Jr. is simply not true. Novak got it wrong in his latest column. We were up on the air running ads right up to Election Day. In the last two weeks of the campaign we easily spent over a $1 million – about a fifth of the $5 million we spent throughout the race. I’ve included the money we spent through our Independent Expenditure for those last two weeks below.

Perhaps most telling though is what Ford himself said – in an interview on the Situation Room on Nov. 16th Ford said “Chuck Schumer did an extraordinary job for me.” [link: http://transcripts.cnn.com/TRANSCRIPTS/0611/16/sitroom.02.html - I’ve also got a wmv video clip of this if you want it.] Those aren’t the words of a candidate that feels abandoned.

At any rate, I can pull more data if you need it but there’s simply no evidence to back up Novak’s BS claim that Schumer abandoned Ford. Let me know if you have any questions on this – I’m happy to help.

TN

$747,554.00

Media Buy

10/25/2006

TN

$25,629.00

Media Production

10/25/2006

TN

$53,828.63

Direct Mail

10/26/2006

TN

$3,588.00

Media Production

10/30/2006

TN

$80,877.31

Media Buy

10/30/2006

TN

$53,828.63

Direct Mail

10/30/2006

TN

$130,000.00

Media Buy

10/31/2006

TN

$53,828.63

Generic Voter Drive

10/31/2006

TN

$53,828.63

Direct Mail

11/1/2006

TN

$10,860.00

Media Production

11/2/2006

TN

$165,000.00

Media Buy TV

11/3/2006

TN

$28,000.00

Media Buy TV

11/3/2006

TN

$747,554.00

Media Buy

10/25/2006

TN

$25,629.00

Media Production

10/25/2006

TN

$53,828.63

Direct Mail

10/26/2006

TN

$3,588.00

Media Production

10/30/2006

TN

$80,877.31

Media Buy

10/30/2006

TN

$53,828.63

Direct Mail

10/30/2006

TN

$130,000.00

Media Buy

10/31/2006

TN

$53,828.63

Generic Voter Drive

10/31/2006

Monday, November 27, 2006

The DSCC Giveth, and the DSCC Taketh Away..

Chuck Schumer doesn't play, does he? In a puff piece written about the New York Democrat in this morning's Chicago Sun-Times, written by the Prince of Darkness himself, Robert Novak, out came this little bombshell:

While Schumer takes credit for helping make the Tennessee Senate race competitive, the DSCC at the end pulled the plug on Democrat Harold Ford Jr. on grounds money could be used more effectively elsewhere. The endgame strategy of concentrating on Montana, Missouri and Virginia produced a Democratic majority.

Wow. After undercutting Rosalind Kurita's outside fundraising efforts to prevent her candidacy and ensuring a Ford primary walk-through, they throw him under the bus at the end.

I don't know whether to laugh or cry at that one.


Friday, November 24, 2006

I had a great Thanksgiving, thank you

And it was obviously better than the one enjoyed by the almost legendary Rex L. Camino of Murfreesboro.

Go ahead, read this, it's hilarious!

Wednesday, November 22, 2006

To all of my beloved readers..

And you are, I hope you know.

I hope that you have a joyous Thanksgiving with your loved ones, whomever they may be. Eat as much as you can, laugh as much as you want, watch as much football as you dare, and love more than you knew that you could.

Because they've already got the damned Holiday sales fliers out and they have forgotten about Thanksgiving!

Peace, and we'll see you Monday if nothing dramatic happens in the interim!

Tuesday, November 21, 2006

The story of Braxton Moore

As you know, I was initially skeptical of the need for a second Juvenile Court judicial position when Commissioner Deidre Malone first brought it up earlier this month.

However, after learning of the story of Braxton Moore, I am far less skeptical than I was at first. Braxton is 13 years old; however, he functions on the level of a 7-year-old, and he is being bounced around the Juvenile Court System because he was caught with older youths in a series of robberies.

Chaplain Novella Smith Arnold, along with attorney William T. Winchester, has taken up the plight of Braxton Moore, and started a blog to keep everyone aware of the situation, at Braxton & Friends, which you will also see near the top of THE ENDLESS BLOGROLL over on the right side of this blog.

Please go there and read about this situation, and learn how you can aid in this fight; you'll be glad that you did.

Friday, November 17, 2006

Bo Schembechler 1929-2006

A giant has fallen.

Glenn Edward "Bo" Schembechler, the man who restored pride and glory to the Michigan Wolverine football program upon arrival in 1969, has passed away at the age of 77, on the eve of the biggest Michigan-Ohio State football game in the history of these two storied programs.

As you may have gathered, I am a Big 10 guy from way back, and I rooted for Michigan for all those years against Ohio State, just as I will tomorrow. Bo was a terrific coach and was beloved throughout college football.

To me, he was the equal of Woody Hayes, Joe Paterno, Ara Parseghian, and maybe even Bear Bryant (their bowl records were very similar), and he brought respectability back to the Michigan program.

More at EDSBS (read the comments), to whom I owe thanks for the picture.

Thursday, November 16, 2006

Bob Tuke stepping down as TDP Chair

Sean Braisted has the story on Tuke's departure and an interesting possible replacement: Gray Sasser, son of former Senator Jim Sasser.

Hat tip to Kleinheider!

From Liz Rincon of the Cohen Campaign....

To All of Those Who Helped and Voted:

I would like to extend my greatest thanks to all of those in the 9th Congressional District that helped out and VOTED on E-Day. The Cohen Campaign was about a positive change for Memphis. That campaigns can be won on the grassroots level, though community involvement and volunteer recruitment.

Building “Leaders” in our campaign out of volunteers was one of my main priorities. I always believed that if you had a strong and positive message and made it about the voter and not about your “name” that people would want to be a part of your campaign, because they are motivated. The Cohen Campaign was the first of its kind in Memphis and I feel so lucky to have had a role in that.

People of the 9th District were ready for change. Things in our Country have been on the wrong path for so long, that the voters are ready for real leadership in their government. We saw this across the Country on November 7!!! Now is the time to govern and to govern well. I believe that it will take time, yet, if the voters keep their Elected Officials accountable, then this Democracy will be better for it.

So, once again, I say thank you to those who helped out on the campaign and to those who showed up at the polls. To those who were unable to vote, either because they were not of age, did not live in the district or were not yet a citizen, you turned out people to be your voice. Thank you. To those who came in the heat, the rain, and the cold to knock on doors, so that we could make it about the voter, I say thank you.

To those who held people accountable when they were not speaking the truth about Congressman-Elect Cohen, I say thank you. And to every person who exercised his or her voice on Election Day, no matter who you voted for, I say THANK YOU!

Sincerely,

Liz Rincon
Field Director
Congressman-Elect Cohen (TN-9)

Wednesday, November 15, 2006

Kleinheider notices Junior's snub of Cohen.

In reading this CA article more closely than I did, Kleinheider observed that Junior was not there to help with the transition for the 9th District office and then posted these comments:

What about now? Now that the smoke has cleared and everyone's blood is down, where are the kind words from Junior for the new Congressman? Where is the gesture of goodwill?

Most importantly, where is the respect? Where is the tacit admission that his brother Jake's run for Congress was some unadulterated BS?

Does the Ford family still hope to take that seat back? Is Jake gonna run again this time in the Democratic primary?

Indeed. Go read the rest of it....

Mike Kernell says...

he's giving a "FedEx NO" (absolutely positively NO) to the report in the Flyer that he is considering a run for the Senate District 30 seat, and has asked me to inform all of you folks that he is happy in the House, where he has served District 93 since 1974.

UPDATE: The author responds:

No, no, no, Cracker! Mike's name was included in a series of those being "floated." The article never said he was considering the race. Have others mentioned his name? Yes. That's all that was being said.

Corrected!

Monday, November 13, 2006

OK, let's talk about this for a minute....

What, you may ask? Well, it's the idea that we need a SECOND Juvenile Court Judge in Shelby County.

Now, Commissioner Deidre Malone is absolutely correct when she notes that the Legislature authorized the second position way back in 1967. However, I suspect this was because they had an idea that the person likely to be elected as Judge, Kenneth Turner, was NOT a practicing attorney. This would have been to create a new position in case anyone challenged the idea of a Judge who was not an attorney.

Again, I'm tickled beyond words that we have a majority on the County Commission, but I am concerned that we are spending our political capital unwisely. I voted for Veronica Coleman, too, but this does not necessarily mean we need to fill that extra position now, especially since we now HAVE a practicing attorney, Curtis Person, holding that office.

This space stands open for Commissioner Malone, or any of the other Democrats, to put up a post explaining WHY this is necessary.

We finally got control of the Commission, folks, let's be careful out there.

UPDATE, hat tip to SgtLarry: Apparently Smart City Memphis had been having a similar discussion, and newly elected Commissioners Mike Carpenter and Steve Mulroy explain the reasoning for a new judicial position, go read it HERE.



Friday, November 10, 2006

THEY DAMN WELL BETTER NOT DO THIS!!!!!!!!!

Ryan Lizza at TNR's The Plank says that there may be a move afloat to dump Howard Dean as DNC Chair and replace him with......

wait for it...

Harold Ford.


If that happens, I will cancel my Democracy Bonds and renounce any ties to the National, State or Local Democratic Party, they can kiss my ass.

IT WAS THE 50-STATE STRATEGY THAT JUST WON THIS ELECTION.

HOW DARE THEY REMOVE ITS ARCHITECT!

And, to replace him with someone who LOST because HE RAN AWAY FROM DEMOCRATIC PRINCIPLES! CALL YOUR DNC REPS TODAY!!!!!!

UPDATE: Howard responds; hat tip to THE PLANK again.

DNC RESPONSE TO CARVILLE:

Howard Dean spokeswoman Karen Finney emails the following in response to James Carville's
comments below:

After the Republicans have admitted to a thumping, why is it that the only one complaining on the Democratic side is James Carville, who today in addition to trashing Howard Dean, praised the RNC, the outfit that brought us the racist ad that defeated Harold Ford, James' supposed candidate for Chair?

Perhaps he's not aware that under Dean in this midterm election the DNC has raised record cash --- all hard dollars -- including three times as much from major donors, eight times as much online and made a $30 million investment in the '06 cycle, three times as much as the DNC put into the last midterm. Not to mention we made an $8m overhaul of our voter file which was successfully used in 47 states and through the 50 state strategy invested in states like Pennsylvania, Kansas, Indiana and Montana where we had critical victories on Tuesday.

--Ryan Lizza
posted 3:37 p.m.

Colbert on the 2006 Elections

I saw this at Sharon Cobb's site, and had to steal it for you...


Wednesday, November 08, 2006

More about last night....

First, go read this terrific piece by Chris Davis at the Flyer. And yes, I was at the debauch at the Bayou. A note about that; while Junior's speech was on one of the TVs, it had the closed-caption from Conan O'Brien's show, and the juxtaposition was hilarious.

It apparently was a great speech, so much so that Chris Matthews noted that Junior sounded like he was going to come back and run against LAMAR! Alexander in 2008. In addition, two of my dearest friends were on the phone with each other watching the speech last night and came to the same conclusion. These are two people who are extremely knowledgeable and are godfathers to my political life.

However, to paraphrase the great Winston Wolf, let's not start shaking each other's hands just yet.

Ok, let me remind all of you of one thing. Ford was LEADING this race when two things happened that changed the course of the race.

First, he made his ill-fated crashing of Corky's presser at Wilson Air. That looked and smelled for all the world like a suggestion Senior made, and it turned out to backfire horribly; it reminded everyone in the hinterlands that his last name really WAS Ford.

That, he can fix for another run; just have his father and brothers shipped to a South American prison for the duration (with Senior in Miami, that shouldn't be THAT difficult!).

However, the other major factor was that Corky fired his staff and brought in Tom Ingram, LAMAR!'s right-hand man. He righted the ship, changed the focus to Ford's single lifestyle and his family, and the rest is history.

Now, if Tom Ingram can do that for a weak-ass candidate like Corky, what the hell do you think he will do for a 35-year veteran of Tennessee Politics who has been a two-term Governor, Secretary of Education, Presidential candidate and sitting Senator?

Exactly.

This, of course, is based on the idea that Junior would run another campaign like the last one, running to the right of Alexander, depressing his base even further. He COULD wake up and run a populist campaign based on economics, but that's not him.

Look, he needs to go home to Washington and be a talking head, letting Matthews and Hannity fight for the right to fellate him on air. We KNOW you don't want to live here, Junior, and frankly, after this, the feeling is mutual. Go to your REAL home, Washington, DC.

Believe me, we understand.

A tale of moral instruction...

At the glorious Steve Cohen victory party last night, I was told of this situation by a friend who put together canvassing for the Coordinated Campaign. Apparently, they had hired canvassers at $10/hour to go into Whitehaven yesterday to rustle up every possible vote for the Democratic Ticket.

Jake Ford's people finds them, offers them $15/hour and steals them.

From the Coordinated Campaign.

On Election Day.

Nice.

Want to tell me again how Jake helped Junior's Senate bid?

Did you hear? We have a new Congressman!

Steve Cohen was elected in a FREAKING LANDSLIDE on Tuesday to end 32 years of Fords representing the 9th District.

Steve had a great campaign, with stellar work from Kevin Gallagher as his campaign manager, and especially Liz Rincon as his field director. She had her crew of interns and volunteers canvassing almost non-stop since JUNE, through a TOUGH primary and general election.

This was after she had headed up the field crew for Steve Mulroy's successful election that flipped the County Commission to the Democrats.

Keep your eyes on both Gallagher and Rincon, they are going places because they are sharp and well-organized.

As for my new Congressman, whom I have had the privilege of calling a friend for over 25 years, this is the best feeling imaginable, especially now that he will be in the MAJORITY in the House of Representatives with a larger majority than the Republicans EVER had.

Oh, who won the Senate race? OOPS.

Tuesday, November 07, 2006

I'm a gutless old hack, I guess....

After all of that, I wrote in Rosalind Kurita and COULD NOT push the CAST BALLOT button. I thought about it, thought of the Senate, got madder and madder, and then cancelled it.

Howard Dean will be happy with me, and most of my friends did the same thing, but I'm not real happy with me.

I caved.

Yes, I voted for Junior, so if you see me tonight and I have to go excuse myself to go projectile-vomit on the Garibaldi's parking lot, just turn your heads and excuse me for a moment. Then buy me a beer, I'll need it.

This settles it, I'm writing in Kurita.

THIS is what Senior is putting out today, thanks to Daily Docket for putting this out!

Please remember to vote today.

For US Senate - NEVER MIND, I CAVED

For Governor - WILLIAM J. LEPETOMAINE

For US House - 7th District - BILL MORRISON

For US House - 9th District - STEVE COHEN

For State House - District 89 - BEVERLY MARRERO

For State House - District 93 - MIKE KERNELL

All Other Contested Races - VOTE DEMOCRATIC

VOTE NO ON ONE, YES ON TWO, and I will vote for Ed Vaughn for At-Large School Board, because I trust Ann Sandberg.

See you at either Kernell's party (Garibaldi's on Walker) or Cohen's (Palm Court)

Sunday, November 05, 2006

It's over.

Barring accident, the Democrats will regain control of the US House on Tuesday, and possibly the Senate as well. However, they'll do it without Harold Ford Jr, who COULD have run a campaign showing how the Goopers crushed anything he may have tried to accomplish in the House.

He didn't do that.

He COULD have run a campaign with the other blockbuster Democrats on the ticket like Bredesen (I can't stand him, but he is going to win) and Steve Cohen.

He didn't do that.

For several months, he ran a campaign that assumed that his base would fall in line out of desperation and get behind him, even as he trashed Democratic values along the way, up to and including voting for TORTURE. When the best Democrat won the 9th District primary to succeed him, Junior shunned Steve Cohen and even began to work AGAINST him on behalf of his dropout, ill-tempered brother Jake.

In addition, he NEVER talked about how Democratic values were superior to Republican values (and they ARE). He talked about ending partisanship while failing to mention who created that partisanship, the Republicans. He railed against gay marriage while failing to mention that he supported civil unions and equal rights.

It took him until the general election to mention that the President was WRONG on Iraq, and when he finally figured it out, he made the gaffe that reminded the people of Tennessee that was really WAS a Ford, crashing Corker's Wilson Air press conference.

Then, he and his father and brothers made asses of themselves trying to prevent the greatest President of our lifetime from even RECOGNIZING the Democratic nominee for his old seat.

Harold Ford has never figured out that it's NOT about him, it's about our country and which direction that it goes. For him, it was about his OWN ambitions, not ours. About HIM being elected to the Senate, not about winning the Senate for the Democrats. About HIS BROTHER winning his old seat, not the nominee of the Party that has faithfully supported his family since his father's election to the General Assembly in 1970. About NOT being a Democrat who said "Democrat, Democrat, Democrat".

So, if this election is a referendum on Harold Ford, Junior instead of winning the Senate for the Democrats, I vote NO.

As I said earlier, there are two major candidates for the United States Senate. NEITHER of them will represent me OR my Party's issues in Washington if elected, and as such NEITHER of them are worthy of my vote.

Friday, November 03, 2006

Thursday, November 02, 2006

Aunt B votes for Ford, but ain't happy about it!

With a hat tip to Kleinheider, Aunt B talks about her vote for the "Democrat" running for the Senate. Here's a taste:

I was looking forward to voting for Ford, because his family is so corrupt that it moves beyond offensive clear into awe-inspiring.

But recent events have made me less enthusiastic.

First, I hate all the "I love Jesus" shit. Please, Harold, we live in a predominantly Christian country. Though some Christians are just sure that their culture is under assault from all sides, I'd point out that, as of at least yesterday, you could buy Christmas decorations at Target. Two months, one-sixth of the year, the whole culture is devoted to the birth of Jesus. Of course you love Jesus. That's not a reason to vote for someone; that's a reason to go to church with them.

Go read the rest of it HERE, it only gets better!