And on the top of my reading list...

Officially out Sept. 1...

I truly admire Markos for the size of his balls.

Ultra-Partisan Blackburn on GOP TV: We are the Part of Nothing.

Keep tax cuts for the wealthy, give no healthcare to anyone, make sure the middle class stays screwable.

Telling, to say the least

Blackburn refuses to debate Rabidoux
Clarksville candidate request ignored
BY JAKE LOWARY • THE LEAF-CHRONICLE • August 20, 2010

Greg Rabidoux's request for a debate with his opponent for the 7th District seat in the U.S. House, Republican incumbent Marsha Blackburn, has been rejected.

Rabidoux, an assistant professor of American politics and constitutional law at Austin Peay State University, said he issued the call for a debate following the Aug. 5 primary, in which both candidates ran unopposed.

Rabidoux said the call for a debate came after a "concerned citizen" posted a message on Blackburn's Facebook page.

"Our elected officials are responsible to the people who elected them. A debate is their chance to tell us what they have done for us, and we can decide if we want more of the same," the post said, according to Rabidoux's campaign.

Blackburn's campaign spokeswoman, Darcy Anderson, said the post was from a staunch Rabidoux supporter.

As of Thursday evening, Rabidoux still had gotten no response to the request, which he said was sent in a certified letter that was repeatedly rejected. Anderson said she signed for the letter.

The letter, dated Aug. 6, says it is "both responsible and responsive action" to give voters in the district "an opportunity to evaluate both of us as prospective applicants to the job of representing them."

Rabidoux gave Blackburn an Aug. 16 deadline for a response.

In a prepared statement responding to the request for comments about the debate, Blackburn's campaign said she wouldn't have anything to do with Rabidoux because he might vote for Nancy Pelosi as House speaker.

"Tennesseans know that to stop out of control spending and the exploding debt, we have to fire Nancy Pelosi," the statement reads. "They aren't interested in any candidate who would give her one more vote for the speaker's chair, and neither is Marsha. Instead, Marsha is working as a conservative leader across the state and across the nation to make sure Americans reclaim their government for the next generation."

Rabidoux issued a lengthy counterattack Thursday to Blackburn's response, highlighted by what Rabidoux says is a disregard for voters.

"It seems that again, Blackburn is more concerned with Washington/Beltway politics than with the working people of the 7th District," Rabidoux said in a release from his campaign. "While she is concerned about Nancy Pelosi, I am concerned with creating jobs and connecting educational opportunities with economic growth."

In a later response, Rabidoux added, "Marsha Blackburn is now claiming to know what all Tennesseans want or don't want, there are a whole lot of Tennesseans tonight asking a simple but profound question, 'What is Marsha Blackburn so afraid of?'"

WARNING: Enough to make ya sick

From the Memphis Commercial Appeal & Daily News...

Blackburn Hears Conservative Concerns at Town Hall

U.S. Rep. Marsha Blackburn heard a lot this week in Bartlett about conservative hopes for a Republican majority in both houses of Congress with the Nov. 2 congressional midterm elections.

Some in the lunch-hour crowd of more than 100 at the Bartlett Performing Arts & Conference Center expressed concern that if Republicans become the majority in one or both chambers, they will become more moderate.

“Are you going to act like you belong there?” asked Tim Nichols of Bartlett. “If we do take the house back, I don’t want to see civility.”

Another attendee said he feared the coming election is a choice between “socialist party A and socialist party B.”

Blackburn said the key to Republican conduct, should the GOP win a majority in the U.S. House of Representatives, is in the Republican conference of House leaders where priorities of a GOP majority would be determined. She said the priority of the conference will be to repeal national health care reform.

Blackburn faces opposition from Democrat Greg Rabidoux of Clarksville in the Nov. 2 general election.

Rabidoux has said Blackburn has “gone out of her way to align herself with the tea party.”

“I think there’s a gap between what the average person wants and needs to hear and the sexy story, so to speak, in the media about the tea party,” Rabidoux told The Daily News before the August primaries.

Blackburn said a constituent recently described her as “being tea party before tea party was cool.”

The Bartlett audience reflected concerns of the tea party movement and other conservative concerns.

Another man at the meeting veered from concerns about illegal immigration.

“I’m not convinced that we don’t have an illegal immigrant in the Oval Office,” he said in a remark that drew applause from most in the room.

Don Waters of Cordova said he didn’t want to see a mosque built near ground zero in Manhattan, or anywhere else for that matter.

“I don’t think we should have one built anywhere because they are all Muslims,” he said.

“Muslims all stand together when they come down to who they are going to fight for. … I don’t think that needs to be built where it’s proposed to be built or built anywhere. We’ve got enough of them already.”

Blackburn didn’t touch the remark about where President Barack Obama was born.

She talked of her proposal to allow local law enforcement officers to “apprehend and hold” and require deportation of illegal aliens arrested for other crimes.

“My legislation is targeted specifically at the criminal alien population that is in this country,” she said.

And Blackburn said Obama’s recent remarks supporting the right to build the mosque, but not necessarily near ground zero, showed the administration is “out of touch” with the American public.

“Placing that mosque at ground zero is basically stepping on the pain of a lot of the 9/11 families,” she said.

Blackburn acknowledged that some of the comments at the meeting reflected a fear and uncertainty that is about a sudden shift in government policies at a time of economic peril.

“It is a very good thing that people are showing up and they are talking. … That uncertainty causes people to be fearful,” she said after the session. “It is about having a path that is going to be a path to productivity for this country that people know is going to be generating economic growth. They know that what is being done now is not generating job growth. It has made the issues worse.”

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What is wrong with these people?

Where's our Congressman?

Crazy from Iowa

Primaries over, it's game time

Rabidoux challenges Blackburn to debate
By Kevin Walters • The TENNESSEAN • August 6, 2010

FRANKLIN — Democratic congressional candidate Greg Rabidoux says he wants to face Republican Rep. Marsha Blackburn in a public debate.

On Friday morning, Rabidoux issued a letter challenging Blackburn to at least one debate, if not more. He’s given Blackburn until Aug. 16 to respond.

“Ultimately, the 7th District voters and the democratic process are all best served by this happening,” Rabidoux said.

Rabidoux initially took the letter to Blackburn’s office at the Cadence Bank Building on Main Street in Franklin though he later took the letter to Blackburn’s campaign headquarters in Brentwood.

Blackburn’s staff could not immediately be reached for comment.

Rabidoux is an assistant professor of American politics and constitutional law at Austin Peay State University in Clarksville.

Rabidoux will oppose incumbent Blackburn for the 7th Congressional District in the general election in November.