Tennessee
Posted at 10:17am on Jun. 27, 2008 Hypocrisy, FISA, Guns, and Government: Jim Cooper Abuses His Congressional Throne
By Erick
The government, some would have us believe, is beyond the kind of criminal conduct that necessitated the second amendment. The Bush Administration, some Democrats would have us believe, is reprehensible in its handling of FISA matters and fascist in its nature.
If only the Democrats had more control, all would be well. Except it would not.
Today comes word that the FBI is investigating Congressman Jim Cooper (D-TN) for an abuse of his power. Congressman Cooper sought information from the National Rural Electric Cooperative Association ("NRECA"), my former employer, that the NRECA refused to give him.
Cooper, undeterred, obtained a user name and password to the NRECA's intranet site from someone, and proceeded to probe internal documents and get what he wanted for his hearing without a warrant or permission. Having navigated through this same site, I assure you someone else was complicit in Cooper's actions. It's a difficult site to navigate to get to the information Cooper was after.
I worked at the NRECA. I know the organization. It is one of the most upstanding organizations in the Washington. It's programs around the world are impressive and commendable. I realize people have varying views on electric cooperatives, but without them, much of the nation would have been without power for a lot longer than they were.
Some cooperatives do dumb things, like any business. In this particular case, however, whether you care for electric co-ops or not, it is beside the point.
The point is the congressman, having been denied permission by a private entity to search its records, and without a court order or vote of the Congress granting him permission, went into the entity's private computer system and got what he wanted. Then he set about having a congressional hearing to probe the conduct of electric cooperatives nationwide using the documents he obtained through surreptitious means.
If an individual member of Congress can and does do that to one private group, a member of Congress can also do that to you.
There must be no tolerance for this behavior.
Posted in Congress | Corrupt Democrat Watch | Jim Cooper | NRECA | Tennessee | TN-4 — Comments (8)/ Email this page » / Read More »
Posted at 11:53am on Jun. 14, 2008 Why Do Prominent Tennessee Democrats Think Obama Has Terrorist Ties?
By Erick
You know, if Tennessee Democrats think Obama has terrorist ties, what are independent voters going to think?
Fred Hobbs, a state Democratic Party Executive Committee member representing part of Davis’ district, said he understands why Davis is not endorsing Obama and is “skeptical” of the Illinois senator himself.
“Maybe [it’s] the same reason I don’t want to — I don’t exactly approve of a lot of the things he stands for and I’m not sure we know enough about him,” Hobbs said when asked why he thought Davis wasn’t endorsing Obama. “He’s got some bad connections, and he may be terrorist connected for all I can tell. It sounds kind of like he may be.”
Even Representative Lincoln Davis's Chief of Staff is hesitant.
His chief of staff, Beecher Frasier, said he doesn’t know for sure if Obama is “terrorist connected” but he assumes he’s not.
Holy cow this year is going to be so much fun.
Harold Ford, Jr., by the way, has repudiated Beecher Frasier's statement (Frasier was Ford's campaign manager in 2006) and the Tennessee Democratic Party has smacked Hobbs.
But the damage is done.
Oh, and Obama does have ties to terrorist Bill Ayers and has ties to a number of people with very questionable backgrounds and affiliations.
Let's see how the anti-smear site handles this. I can't wait for them to classify Bill Ayers as anything but a terrorist.
Posted in 2008 | Barack Obama | Obamafiles | Tennessee | terrorists — Comments (17)/ Email this page » / Read More »
Posted at 11:30am on Jun. 9, 2008 Oh, sure, *now* the Netroots care about anti-Semitism in Tennessee.
It only took them, what, four months?
By Moe Lane
Paul Rosenberg (Obama supporter) is mad, mad, MAD! about the way that EMILY's List (Clinton supporters) candidate and Harold Ford (Clinton supporter) protege Nikki Tinker is using a virulently anti-Semitic flyer against incumbent Congressman Steve Cohen (Obama super-delegate).
As the parentheses might tell you, I'm not really buying his ostensible motivations for writing this piece. Then again, I had already given the "typical Republican" response to this sort of thing - appalled disgust - back in February (see also Ed Morrissey). This is in sharp contrast to Open Left, a site that pretty much ignored the problem at the time (search terms were "steve cohen" and "steven cohen," and only got involved in recently (note hit piece against EMILY's List here). But hey, at least they care now, right?
Even if it's only because of their highly entertaining internal grudge match.
Moe Lane
Posted in 2008 | Barack Obama | EMILY's List | Fairly Typical Behavior | Netroots | Steve Cohen | Tennessee — Comments (1)/ Email this page » / Read More »
Posted at 8:52pm on Apr. 8, 2008 Tennessee Edukasion: Lynn Lang Gets Reinstated
By Erick
I mentioned this in my new column at Human Events, but it is worth sharing here.
Blue Collar Muse has the tale of Lynn Lang, a high school basketball coach and teacher turned felon.
Posted in felons | Lynn Lang | State Politics | Tennessee — Comments (1) / Email this page » / Read More »
Posted at 12:30pm on Jan. 14, 2008 Tennessee Democrats Think You Like It
By Erick
So, the Governor of Tennessee just handed out $1 million of Tennessee's taxpayer dollars to restore the Hermitage, Andrew Jackson's home. His off the cuff comment speaks volumes.
Posted in State Politics | Tennessee — Comments (22)/ Email this page » / Read More »
Posted at 12:55am on Mar. 6, 2007 Everybody wants to rule the world
By MrsNachos
If your name is Hillary Clinton, then the theme song for your campaign may be "Everybody Wants to Rule the World." Now, I love some Tears for Fears, but in the middle of the excitement of Hillary running for Presidential nominee, I feel one area is incredibly lacking. You see, for the last several years, while the rest of the country focused on "Will she or won't she?" in regards to her running, Tennessee has been slowly trying to make use of the program that Hillary decided would benefit our fine state. I'm still not sure why she chose Tennessee. I truly wish she would have taken her social economic experiment elsewhere because, for all the people TennCare may help, its bureaucracy and red tape have meant sudden medical coverage death for a great majority of the people on TennCare.
Posted in Economy | Health care | Hillary | Tennessee — Comments (9) / Email this page » / Read More »
