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Gary Anderson: The Choice of Liberals Everywhere 2007-08-31 14:21:45 National liberal Democrats don’t usually have many candidates to root for when it comes to Mississippi. The top of the Dems ticket- Eaves and Franks- includes two candidates who are certainly economically liberal but socially conservative, a no-no when it comes to DailyKos types. But there is one statewide candidate who has been taken up by the “progressive” cause. That candidate is Gary Anderson. As I have mentioned before, he has won the endorsements of liberal stalwarts like the AFL-CIO and Democracy for America, a left-wing organization founded by Howard Dean. Of course we know about the quarter-million from Dickie Scruggs. And now the Insurance Commissioner hopeful is being touted on a liberal blog from New York City, the Mole Progressive. This has led to a grassroots effort, led by Democracy for America, to elect a grassroots progressive, Gary Anderson, as Inusrance Commissioner of Mississippi…And so far Gary Anderson has won the Democratic Primary! Next is the general el ...

Give ‘em Zell! 2007-08-30 19:57:05 After about a month and nearly 2500 views of Haley’s Neshoba speech I have decided to change the featured video on my vod:pod (located about half way down the sidebar). I have decided to go the archives with Zell Miller’s 2004 RNC speech as well as his appearance on Hardball later that night where he challenges Chris Matthews to a duel. Both a classic, enjoy! ...

AG Hood: My Donors Are Above The Law 2007-08-30 12:43:53 Y’all Politics was the first to report this story. For $30,000 Jim Hood will defend you. One of his biggest campaign donors- Dickie Scruggs- has been indicted and now Hood has written a letter to the judge involved in the case requesting that the charge against Scruggs be dropped because he is a “confidential informant.â€� When is Tim Ham-Burger going to do a story on this? Below is a portion of the text from Insurance Coverage Blog: Mississippi AG Hood calls Dickie Scruggs a ‘confidential informant,’ says he shouldn’t be prosecuted According to Mississippi AG Jim Hood, allegations that attorney Dickie Scruggs engaged in criminal contempt by willfully violating a federal judge’s injunction are all wet. Scruggs, Hood said in a July letter to U.S. Attorney Alice Martin, should be left alone because he is a crime buster and a “confidential informant.” I am not making this up. New slogan for the Scruggs defense team in the criminal contempt case ...

Weekly SEC picks 2007-08-30 08:20:58 Every Thursday I will try to post my SEC picks for the upcoming weekend. This weekend it’s a little bit easier than it will be in the upcoming months as many of the teams are either playing 1-AA schools or 1-A bottom feeders as a warm up for the season. We’ll start with tonight’s game… LSU at Mississippi State- I really don’t care to see either team win, but I’ll make the easy pick and take LSU. For Saturday… Western Carolina at Alabama- Nick Saban start’s his Alabama tenure off with an easy win. Troy at Arkansas- The Hogs Kansas State at Auburn- A couple years ago this might have been a good game; but I’ll go with Auburn Western Kentucky at Florida- This is the JP game? I’ll take the defending national champs. Oklahoma State at Georgia- Another Big 12/ SEC matchup and I’ll take the SEC and the Bulldogs again. Eastern Kentucky at Kentucky- I’ll go with regular Kentucky. Louisiana-Lafayette at South Carolina- The Ol’ Ball Coach better win, SC should have no tr ...

Dickie Scruggs Indicted 2007-08-29 18:01:05 Right of Mississippi did an excellent job of finding this story. Infamous trial lawyer Dickie Scruggs has been indicted in a case relating to Hurricane Katrina insurance claims. Here’s the text of the story from the Wall Street Journal Law Blog: Dickie Scruggs, the high-profile Mississippi trial lawyer, was charged Tuesday with criminal contempt in a case relating to Hurricane Katrina insurance claims. In an unusual scenario, the criminal charges were brought by the federal judge overseeing the case and endorsed by three private attorneys appointed by the judge as special prosecutors to prosecute the case. Here is the story from the Birmingham News. Neither news outlet was able to reach Scruggs and his son, Zack, a partner in the firm; nor were we. In June, federal judge William Acker recommended that the Justice Department prosecute Scruggs and his law firm for civil contempt after allegedly violating a court order about handling of documents in a case relating to Hurricane Katrina ...

Katrina and Politics 2007-08-29 14:59:43 Today is the two-year anniversary of Katrina making landfall. Other than saying that I continue to pray for Katrina victims two years after the storm, I wanted to add these three points about the political effect of Katrina- and how it so greatly affected three separate politicians. Before Katrina, Republicans controlled the House and Senate in Washington and had a president less than a year after re-election hoping to shape his legacy. Things certainly weren’t cozy for Bush at the time- his Social Security reform had stalled, Iraq was (is) causing him trouble, and his approval was somewhere in the mid-40s (while that ain’t really high, it’s substantially higher than where he sits now). Then the storm hit, and whether it was deserved or not- the president’s slow reaction signaled a lack of leadership in this crisis, and to some people a lack of concern even. Republicans went on to struggle through the few 2005 elections and then got killed in the 2006 mid-terms. Was it all beca ...

Primaries and Negative Ads 2007-08-29 14:28:29 Parties hate primaries. They pit Republican v. Republican or Democrat v. Democrat, and often times the winner comes out bruised. In close races they split the party, and in many cases they lead to attacks on one another. This was the case in at least two statewide primaries this year. In the Republican lt. gov. primary, Charlie Ross kicked off the negative ads by trying to tie Phil Bryant with Mike Moore. Ross then went on to label Bryant “Flip-Flop Phil” running ads accusing the State Auditor of flip-flopping on many key issues. Bryant did respond a little bit- running an ad accusing Ross of suing Haley Barbour but nothing significant in my opinion. I think its fair to say that Ross launched more negative ads against Bryant then vice-versa, and in the end Bryant won. In the Democratic Auditor’s race, a couple of weird negative ads surfaced. Two white men accused the other of playing the race card. A flier surfaced in Jackson stating that Sumrall was trying to portray himself as ...

Now The General Election Begins… 2007-08-29 08:28:36 Here’s Your 2007 Statewide Match-ups Governor: Haley Barbour (i)(R) John Arthur Eaves (D) Lieutenant Governor: Phil Bryant (R) Jamie Franks (D) Attorney General: Jim Hood (i)(D) Al Hopkins (R) Secretary of State: Delbert Hosemann (R) Rob Smith (D) Auditor: Stacey Pickering (R) Mike Sumrall (D) Treasurer: Shawn O’Hara (D) Tate Reeves (i)(R) Insurance Commissioner: Gary Anderson (D) Mike Chaney (R) Agriculture Commissioner: Rickey Cole (D) Les Riley (Constitution Party) Lester Spell (i)(R) ...

Local Election Results 2007-08-29 07:43:32 Hinds County District Attorney: Robert Smith- 52 Faye Peterson (i)- 48 Tax Assessor: Charles Stokes- 79 Dorothy Bedford- 21 Rankin County State Senate: Lee Yancey- 50.7 Charles Porter- 49.3 Chancery Clerk: Larry Swales- 51 Mitch Childre- 48 Supervisor (District 1): Jared Morrison- 55 Dale Bridges (i)- 45 Supervisor (District 2): Wood Brown- 56 Scott Berry- 44 Supervisor (District 3): Greg Wilcox- 56 Ken Martin (i)- 44 ...

Updated Runoff Numbers 2007-08-28 20:44:50 The Clarion-Leger is updating the runoffs throughout the night as the precints are reporting. ...

Ike Brown Banned From Assisting with Elections 2007-08-28 19:07:19 Good news for folks interested in free and fair elections: a judge has banned Ike Brown and his associates from participating in Noxubee county elections. Judge Tom Lee has appointed former state Supreme Court Justice Reuben Anderson superintendent of election until November 20, 2011. Anderson’s duties will include certifying candidates, appointing and assigning poll workers and officials, distribute regular ballots and ballot boxes containing absentee ballots, supervise polling locations and officials and certify election results. Brown, on the other hand, will not be allowed to be present at the circuit clerk’s office two weeks prior to an election nor is he to be present at polling places. You can read the Clarion-Ledger story here. ...

Liberal-Speak on Abortion 2007-08-28 13:14:19 I read a letter to the editor from the Clarion-Ledger on Monday where one reader goes over the usual mantra of pro-abortion talking points. I have decided to break it down and take out her “code words” for what they really mean. The deleted words are hers, the italics are mine. Rep. Taylor should support Planned Parenthood goals unfettered abortion on demand As a board member of Planned Parenthood of Alabama the nation’s leading abortion provider, which provides reproductive health services and advocacy to a 38-county area in Mississippi ships women to Alabama to have abortions, I was outraged by the latest attempt in Congress to restrict reproductive health care to lower the number of abortions and take away our business. Earlier this month, anti-choice pro-life hardliner Rep. Mike Pence of Indiana proposed an amendment to a key federal spending bill that would have restricted Title X federal funds for birth control from going to Planned Parenthood health centers t ...

Dems Double Standard 2007-08-27 12:52:37 Sid Salter had a good column in the Sunday paper where he calls the Democrats out on their double-standards when it comes to race. He talks about the Democrats trying to make hay out of Jim Herring statements about the Black Caucus, yet accept a man like Ike Brown who has made a living of discriminating against whites. He also has a good piece on his blog about Jim Hood and Jamie Franks silence on Brown. Those two same men went after Franks 2003 opponent for a minor and common campaign violation when it was in their political interest; but now that they are apparently relying on Brown for delivering them votes they will remain silent. ...

Vicksburg 2007-08-27 05:59:47 It’s amazing how a place where so many men lost their lives can feel so peaceful… I have some 200 pictures from the national park in Vicksburg and can not fit them all here for obvious reasons so if you would like a CD, send me an e-mail. ...

Closed On Sundays 2007-08-26 08:44:17 Gone to church. See you on Monday. ...