left to right: Peter Voysey and Bob Schwartz chat with Scot Golden, Chair of the Tennessee Republican Party |
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Me (Rod Williams) with Jennifer Hensley Webb, Council Member district 10 and candidate for TN House District 50 |
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Marsha Blackburn |
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A right-leaning disgruntled Republican comments on the news of the day and any other thing he damn-well pleases.
left to right: Peter Voysey and Bob Schwartz chat with Scot Golden, Chair of the Tennessee Republican Party |
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Me (Rod Williams) with Jennifer Hensley Webb, Council Member district 10 and candidate for TN House District 50 |
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Marsha Blackburn |
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However, when it comes to national defense and the international order, both parties have changed and my position is closer to that of the Dems than the Repubs, and that is an important issue to me.
For all of my life, the Republican Party was for standing up to tyrants, promoting strong alliances, and defending democracy around the world. Now, not so much. While foreign policy was mostly bipartisan, those for appeasement at any price and all-we-are-saying-is-give-peace-a-chance were Democrats. Now, it the Democrat Party that is for supporting democracy and for American leadership in the world while the Republican Party that has turned isolationist.
Not all Republicans of course, but the isolationist and appeasers are now the Republicans. I am really as surprised that Democrats could become the party of a robust foreign policy as I am that Republican could become the party of isolationism and appeasement. Times change and people switch sides. Anyway, that is probably the number one thing pushing me away from the Republican camp. When Congressman Mark Green voted against aid to Ukraine, that pushed me further toward leaving the Party. He was a person I admired; not so much anymore.
If on other issues, Republicans were much stronger than Dems, then my identity as a Republican would not be so weakened. Even on defense, neither party is addressing our dwindling weak navy. On this crucial issue, neither party is advocating what needs to be done.
On other issues, neither party is showing leadership. Republicans are no better than Dems on addressing entitlements, or the national debt. Republicans are much worse than Dems when it comes to free trade and tariffs. Trump has advocated an across-the-board policy of increased tariffs. These would be paid for by Americans. A tariff is a sales tax paid for by the consumer. Not only would this be inflationary and a regressive tax on American consumers, but we could expect retaliatory tariffs. This is a recipe for a worldwide depression. Dems are the party of sanity on this issue.
I am not so sure I even trust Republicans more than Democrats when it comes to immigration. Congress was on the verge of passing a bi-partisan bill to address illegal immigration until Trump told them not to do so. He wanted the issue more than he wanted a solution to the issue.
I am in closer agreement with Republicans than Democrats on the social issues. I am pro-life. I oppose DEI indoctrination and ESG investing and cancel culture and wokeness and the silliness of the use of language to promote transgenderism and all things woke. However, even here, I find that often Repubs are using these issues to gin up anger than really address an issue. After all, how big of a problem is drag queen public library story hour? How often has it really happened? And, when it comes to telling a bar that they must make sure there is a restroom for men-only and one for women-only, I tend to think that is none of the government's business.
I see no circumstance under which I could vote for Donald Trump. I think Trump is an idiot, uninformed, and a liar, and a dictator wannabe. His policies of weaking our alliances, betraying Ukraine, appeasement, opposition to free trade, and proposing massive tariffs would be an absolute disaster. Also, he is not a very nice person.
So, after all I have said, why am I going to the Nashville GOP picnic? Despite my view that the Party has lost its way, did an about face on long held positions, fails to address crucial issues, and has basically become a Trump cult, I know a lot of Republicans and while I sometimes get confronted and challenged for my anti-Trump views, most Republicans are still cordial and friendly. Even some of the leaders of the Trump movement are friendly to me and are nice people. We were friends before Trump and worked on the same causes and campaigns. I don't feel personally ostracized. And despite thinking they are wrong; I still like these people.
Also, I would like to see Courtney Johnston defeat Andy Ogles and I want to see them each speak, and I want to see the interaction of those two candidates and camps. Also, despite no longer caring for Marsha Blackburn, I want to see what she has to say.
While I am almost out the door, I am hanging around hoping Trumpism does not extend beyond Trump. I still think the Party will return to its conservative roots, sanity and normalcy and will abandon Trump populism after Trump leaves the stage. While I won't vote for Tump, at this point I am still a Republican. In November, I will vote for a Republican for President, but it won't be Trump. I may vote for Liz Cheney, or maybe Chris Christie, or maybe Rod Williams.
So, while just barely still a Republican, I still am one. So, I am going to go to the picnic. For $15 you can get good barbeque and the fixings and good ice cream. There is that. What a bargain!
If you go, say hi. I will be the one not wearing a red MAGA cap.
Though there was a little pushback after Porterfield originally unveiled the council’s budget, it seems she avoided any courthouse scruples by making a few notable changes at the eleventh hour. For one, Councilmember Sandra Sepulveda got the $300,000 she needed to fund her “Build It Right” legislation’s construction safety oversight board.
Speaking of Build It Right: the bill got significant support during last night’s meeting, and Sepulveda was able to pass a substitute version of her bill on second reading. After being deferred to address a few community and administrative concerns, the District 30 council member didn’t just manage to appease her colleagues by adding a contractor position to the board, but she also cut a few of the DEI requirements: specifically, the requirement to adhere to Metro’s Equal Business Opportunity Program.
While “Build It Right” got a boost, Metro Arts got a buzzcut: Porterfield ended up shaving a bit off the top of the $400,000 set aside for Metro Arts to conduct an equity study. Now, there will only be “up to $250,000” available in this year’s budget for the study.
At the end of the day, Porterfield was able to find the extra money needed for her additional spending without raising taxes or firing anyone; instead, she turned to administrative savings and Metro reserve funds. “...I do have to be very clear that because of a mid-year supplemental, we were able to reduce those admin accounts,” she told her colleagues. “However, in our next budget, we do have to refill those accounts [and] we will not be able to tap them so low...”
Ginny Welsch Still trying to defund the police. |
Welsch proposed six of the seven amendments filed to make more changes to the budget on third reading: all defunding the police and allocating their budget dollars elsewhere. Five of those proposals never made it through committee because the “no pass for fascism” council member couldn’t find anyone to second her amendments. As Vice Mayor Angie Henderson opened up the machines to take the final vote on the budget proposal, Welsch was flustered and confused having not presented the one amendment that made it through committee. Unfortunately, she missed her window during the proceedings and resigned to the fate of her failed amendments.
Nashville TN, June 17, 2024- Tennessee Attorney General Jonathan Skrmetti today released a statement regarding a federal fudge blocking the Biden administration’s attempt to replace Title IX language with a social change agenda.
This is a big win for the Constitution and the people of Tennessee. We fought hard to protect our constitutional separation of powers, which ensures that the people through their elected representatives are the only authority that can make new laws. If the rule we stopped had been allowed to go into effect on August 1 as scheduled, Tennessee schools and universities would have to let boys into girls’ locker rooms and other private spaces. If the rule went into effect, our schools would have to punish teachers and students who declined to use someone’s preferred pronouns. These are profound changes to the law that the American people never agreed to. This rule was a huge overreach by federal bureaucrats, and the Court was right to stop it.
To read a copy of the opinion, click here.
Go deeper: Read the full audit
Read the Nashville Banner's timeline of issues at Metro Arts
NASHVILLE, Tenn. (WTVF) — Courtney Johnston is the only Republican other than Andy Ogles campaigning in the primary for Tennessee's 5th District Seat in the U.S. Congress. Find out what she's advocating for on this edition of Inside Politics.
Actor Morgan Freeman derides Black History Month: 'My history is American history' The Academy-Award winner said, 'this whole idea makes my teeth itch. It’s not right'
Taxpayer dollars continue to go to an unreliable source of energy that often has negative environmental
By ANDREW FOLLETT, National Review, June 12, 2024 - The 2,300-acre Aratina Solar Project west of Barstow is intended to generate 530 megawatts of electricity. But it has infuriated residents with construction dust and a likely threat to centuries-old trees and endangered desert tortoises that are the official state reptile of California and Nevada, the usual environmental safeguards so prevalent in California notwithstanding. ... “Let’s destroy the environment to save the environment. That seems to be the mentality,” local teacher Deric English told the Los Angeles Times. “It’s hard to comprehend.”
... According to the National Park Service, Joshua trees are a key part of the desert ecosystem, “providing habitat for numerous birds, mammals, insects, and lizards,” and are on average 150 years old, although many are much older than that.
... Many older solar panels take up to a decade to accomplish a net reduction in emissions, while even more modern ones placed in the — increasingly limited — climatically ideal environments for solar power typically take many years. So any net benefit from this project will take, at best, years to manifest.
... The majority of America’s recent CO2 emissions reductions come from the “decreased use of coal and the increased use of natural gas for electricity generation,” not the growth of solar power, according to the EIA. ... Solar power also creates about 300 times more toxic waste per unit of electricity generated than nuclear-power plants do, ... (link)
Rod's Comment: I accept the reality of global warming and consider myself an environmentalist. Unfortunately, the liberal activist environmentalist community hinder addressing the problem of climate change. Promotions of solar energy joins the promotion of ethanol as solutions that are not really solutions and actually are bad for the environment. Activist liberal environmentalist opposition to refining cleaner oil in favor of continuing to refine dirty oil, opposition to fracking which results in an increased natural gas supply which replaces much dirtier coal, support for the ineffective Paris Accords, and, most egregious, the opposition to nuclear energy are all environmentalist positions that perpetuate climate change and environmental degradation. Unfortunately, there are too few rational environmentalists at the table.