Capitol View
By Pat Nolan, NEWSCHANNEL5 Political Analyst
September 16, 2022
FORMER GOVERNOR PHIL BREDESEN ON INSIDE POLITICS TO DISCUSS HIS NEW PODCAST WITH FORMER GOVERNOR BILL HASLAM PROMOTING BI-PARTISAN PROBLEM SOLVING AND CIVIL CONVERSATIONS; INFLATION IS STILL RAGING EVEN AS GAS PRICES CONTINUE TO FALL; THE PRIMARIES ARE OVER WITH THE MIDTERM ELECTIONS NOW LESS THAN TWO MONTHS AWAY; JUDGE NAMES SPECIAL MASTER AND KEEPS BLOCK ON DOJ INVESTIGATION ON CLASSIFIED MAR-A-LAGO DOCUMENTS; IS THE FIX IN FOR HILLSDALE CHARTER SCHOOLS?; STATE NEWS BRIEFS; AS TALKS CONTINUE ON THE NEW TITANS DOMED STADIUM, MORE DELAY APPEARS LIKELY ON NASHVILLE FAIRGROUNDS SPEEDWAY RENOVATIONS
FORMER GOVERNOR PHIL BREDESEN ON INSIDE POLITICS TO DISCUSS HIS NEW PODCAST WITH FORMER GOVERNOR BILL HASLAM PROMOTING BI-PARTISAN PROBLEM SOLVING AND CIVIL CONVERSATIONS
It may be the biggest challenge facing our democracy.
How do we find a way to address, or even talk about, the hot-button political issues that so divide our country?
Former Tennessee Governor Phil Bredesen is my guest on INSIDE POLITICS this week. He and another former governor, Bill Haslam, are teaming up to address these challenges.
It is a new podcast they are hosting. It is being sponsored by the Howard Baker Center for Public Policy. The programs will also feature special guests to look for ways to find common ground on the problems we all face rather than seek to win a political debate, or score points with their supporters.
It is always an honor and a pleasure for have Governor Bredesen join us on this program.
We thank him for being with us!
Our conversation with former Governor will first air at 6:30 P.M. Friday night on the main channel of NEWSCHANNEL5 following NEWSCHANNEL5 AT 6.
INSIDE POLITICS can also be seen on its regular weekly schedule on NEWSCHANNEL5 PLUS.
Those times include:
7:00 p.m. Friday.
5:00 a.m., 3:00 p.m. and 5:30 p.m. on Saturday.
1:30 a.m. & 5:00 a.m. on Sunday.
THE PLUS is on Comcast Cable channel 250, Charter Cable channel 182 and on NEWSCHANNEL5’s over-the-air digital channel 5.2. We are also on DISH TV with the rest of the NEWSCHANNEL5 NETWORK.
One option for those who cannot see the show locally or who are out of town, you can watch it live with streaming video on NEWSCHANNEL5.com. Just use your TiVo or DVR, if those live times don't work for you.
This week’s show and previous INSIDE POLITICS interviews are also posted on the NEWSCHANNEL5 website for your viewing under the NEWSCHANNEL5 PLUS section. A link to the show is posted as well on the Facebook page of NEWSCHANNEL5 PLUS. Each new show and link are posted early in the week after the program airs.
Finally, I am now posting a link to the show each week on my own Facebook page, usually on the Monday or Tuesday after the show airs.
You can listen to the first episode of new podcast of Governors’ Bredesen and Haslam and sign up for notices of future podcasts here.
INFLATION IS STILL RAGING EVEN AS GAS PRICES CONTINUE TO FALL
Sometimes it seems the administration of President Joe Biden just can’t get its timing right.
On Tuesday of this week, the very day the White House held an event to celebrate the Inflation Reduction Act that Democrats in Congress finally passed to help bring down inflation and help consumers weather the 40-year record rise in prices, the latest monthly Consumer Price Index report was released, showing inflation is hardly even slowing down, at 8.3% annually.
The announcement took the stock market, which had hoped the worst of inflation was over, plunging to its biggest one day loss in over two years. It also made another ¾ of a percent hike in interest rates a certainty when the Federal Reserve Board meets next week. Who knows, even more or higher interest rate increases may lie ahead?
One thing that is known is what day these economic reports come out every month. Note to the Biden media team: Don’t hold your celebrations on fighting inflation on the same day the other news of the day obliterates getting much positive coverage!
The continued near record inflation for September comes as gas prices continue to fall but that decline is offset by big increases in food, travel and rental costs.
The continued reduction in gas prices at the pump are among the most significant here in Tennessee. We are now the cheapest market in the nation to fill up.
One other study to ponder this week is from the Census Bureau. It shows household incomes have remained flat the last two years while poverty especially among children has shown a significant decline.
Some of the poverty decline is likely due to some of the pandemic relief measured approved by Congress but are not being continued.
There is one thing Team Biden did get right this week. Following the last- minute involvement of the President and members of his economic team, a new contract was reached between the nation’s freight line railroad operators and their unions. With up to 30% of the nation’s goods shipped by rail, a strike, which had been set to start as early as today (Friday), would have created a new disaster for the economy, further snarling supply chains, creating shortages, pushing prices and inflation higher.
THE PRIMARIES ARE OVER WITH THE MIDTERM ELECTIONS NOW LESS THAN TWO MONTHS AWAY
The last of the party primaries before the November midterm elections were held this week.
The results show a continued tilt towards the Democrats and away from the red tsunami that had been predicted to sweep Republicans back in control in both houses of Congress. But with inflation continuing at near a 40 year high, will this mid-term really be different from past election cycles where the party in party loses seats?
Most analysts believe the GOP will recapture the House (but with a fairly narrow majority) while the current 50-50 Senate might somehow stay in Democratic hands. That may be largely due to the candidates former President Trump endorsed for the Republican nomination, but who are now struggling at times with the general election voters in recent polls. This comes, even as GOP voters this week keep nominating Trump-endorsed candidates in the final primaries.
And then there is the latest on former President Trump and Q Anon conspiracies.
The latest public opinion poll by the Associated Press shows a sharp rise in President Joe Biden’s approval rating, even his disapproval rating at 53%, shows him still a bit underwater.
But some Democrats remain concerned. What if these latest polls are as inaccurate as the ones for Democrats for President in 2016 and again for President and the party’s House candidates in 2020?
Meanwhile, Democrats in the Senate seem to have lost their momentum to pass the Marriage Equality Act. They obviously don’t have the 10 Republican votes to pass it over a filibuster effort. Now it appears a vote won’t happen until November and after the mid-term elections, if then.
Another new development this week that threatens the Republican’s ability to control the narrative in the midterm elections is the introduction of a bill by South Carolina Senator Lindsey Graham that would create a nationwide ban on abortion after 15 weeks. Setting a national standard in this hot-button issue is something most elected Republicans don’t want, and that probably includes GOP Senate leader Mitch McConnell, who would prefer this issue be left up to the state in post-Roe abortion world.
Here in Tennessee this week, Nashville’s Juvenile Court Judge says she expects to see a large increase of “babies having babies” under the state’s new law banning abortion, which is one of the strictest in the nation.
JUDGE NAMES SPECIAL MASTER AND KEEPS BLOCK ON DOJ INVESTIGATION OF CLASSIFIED MAR-A-LAGO DOCUMENTS
The Mar-a-Lago classified documents case now appears headed to the Appeals Court. The move would come after federal district judge, Aileen Cannon, late Thursday, again rejected an effort by the U.S. Department of Justice to be able to use the classified documents seized during a raid of former President Donald Trump’s home in Mar-a-Lago home in Florida, as a part of an ongoing DOJ criminal investigation.
The judge says she won’t release the documents until a third-party master reviews them. She has selected that master and given him until November 30 to complete the review. That alone will keep the matter alive until after the mid-term elections, and with the appeal to the Appeals Court (or even the Supreme Court?) who knows.
IS THE FIX-IN FOR HILLSDALE CHARTER SCHOOLS?
A huge controversy ensued earlier this year when the President of the conservative Hillsdale (Michigan) College, Dr. Larry Arne, insulted Tennessee’s, and other public teachers across the nation, for being “trained in the dumbest parts of the dumbest colleges in the country.”
Following those comments, three Tennessee county school boards in Rutherford County (Murfreesboro), Montgomery County (Clarksville) and Montgomery County (Jackson), rejected proposals by Hillsdale to operate taxpayers funded charter schools in their districts.
Such a denial can be appealed to the Tennessee Public Charter School Commission, a relatively new state board with its member's hand picked by Governor Lee. It was the Governor who further inflamed the Hillsdale controversy by never uttering a single word of criticism about Dr. Arne’s inflammatory comments, even when the Governor sat next to him when he made those comments during a closed- door meeting with charter school supporters, or ever since.
This week, the Public Charter School Commission held public hearings in all three counties where Hillsdale is trying to overturn their charter school application rejections. The Governor says he will not try to influence his appointees even though Mr. Lee has been a major cheerleader for Hillsdale’s charter schools and the Commission already has a track record across the state for overturning the rejection of charter school efforts by locally elected school boards.
So what happened at the first public hearing in Murfreesboro? When it was time to hear from the public, all the speakers were supporters of Hillsdale and no one in opposition managed to speak. How curious?
Hillsdale opponents were allowed to be in the hearing room and they made up a majority of the audience, trying to get their feelings seen and felt, if not heard by the Commission.
The full Commission will vote in Nashville on Wednesday, October 5 on whether to approve or deny the appeals of the Hillsdale charter school applications.
STATE NEWS BRIEFS
In what should be a surprise to no one, the federal public corruption trial involving former Tennessee House Speaker Glen Casada and his top aide Cade Cothern has been postponed from next month to October 3, 2023.
All the parties agreed to the delay although Casada only asked for six months. With such a strong case, would the feds support a delay? Might it be to see if the defendants have other information they want to share about corruption in state government in return for consideration in lessening the potential punishment in the pending case?
Meanwhile, TennCare is having to deal with a goof that exposed the personal information of close to 2,000 thousand of their enrollees.
Even worse the Tennessee Bureau of Investigation is continuing to have embarrassingly long wait times to process rape kits across the state ranging from weeks to even a year. The problem has been reported before but surfaced again in a related way in the recent Eliza Fletcher murder case in Memphis.
The TBI says it is trying to correct the delay issue by hiring more qualified personnel to process the kits. Already there is a renewed effort on Capitol Hill in Nashville to increase the funding needed for additional TBI personnel. But for now, the support seems to be coming only from Democrats, who are likely to remain in a distinct minority in the next General Assembly.
I am sure, like every other employment need these days, it is difficult to find folks to hire. But given how long this issue has been festering, you wonder if rape investigations were a primary issue for men if we would have seen more and quicker progress in this matter?
One other political development out of Eliza Fletcher tragedy, the two top Republican legislators on the Hill are appointing a committee to explore getting even tougher on crime.
AS TALKS CONTINUE ON THE NEW TITANS DOMED STADIUM, MORE DELAY APPEARS LIKELY ON NASHVILLE FAIRGROUNDS SPEEDWAY RENOVATIONS
With all eyes still centered on plans and negotiations for a new $2.2 billion domed stadium for the Titans, and to host other major sporting events, efforts to renovate the Fairgrounds Speedway to bring NASCAR Racing back to Nashville remain on hold.
It’s been almost 9 months (December 2021) since Mayor John Cooper announced he had an agreement in principle with officials of the Bristol Motor Speedway to move ahead on the project, but no details have ever been released.
Now the Metro Fairgrounds Board of Commissioners, which oversees the Speedway, wants the Cooper administration to at least give them get a fresh assessment of the condition of the track and what the proposed cost for the renovations might be. They say the current information they have on the facility’s condition is from 2016 which is woefully out of date. The Board voted unanimously to request that information as well as a legal opinion on their authority under the Metro Charter.
The future of the Fairgrounds and the Speedway have been in and out of controversy for years. The talk of the Speedway renovations and NASCAR’s possible return has brought forth concerns from the surrounding neighborhood. They want a community benefits agreement from the developers, similar to what the Nashville MLS team had to do, to build the new Geodis Stadium at the Fairgrounds.
The Fair Board efforts are being led by Board Chair Sheri Weiner, a former Metro Vice Mayor and Bellevue district council member. There is no word on when the Cooper Team will provide the information that is being requested. Ultimately, whatever happens to move ahead on the Speedway renovations and bring NASCAR back, Fair Board approval will be required along with the city’s Sports Authority and the full 40-member Metro Council.
That is a lot of financial and political work to get done, even more so if the new Titans stadium is going through a similar process in the next few months.
Oh, and it is an election year in Metro next August too.
Another major Courthouse development this week is Mayor John Cooper announcing that LaTanya Channel will become his Director of Economic Growth and Small Business Development, effective October 3rd. Channel brings nearly 30 years of federal and state public service to her new role and will implement the mayor’s vision for Nashville and Davidson County’s future economic development. That vision will apparently focus more on small business development.
Economic Development Director has been something of a revolving door for the mayor in his nearly three years in office with having now three directors in as many years.
