Newscoma

My cell phone died yesterday twice. Not for any other reason than I was on the damned thing all day. It was that kind of day. I talked to more folks yesterday with all of the ongoings in Hoots and with what happened in Nashville that went long into the night.

You see, there is a lot going on. I’ve talked in the past about back room deals guiding what happens in the legislature during the light of day. And we are seeing it again in the Tennessee Democratic Party.

Plans are already made more times than you can shake a stick at. Michael Silence and I are huge advocates of putting this stuff out in the sun, but the reality is that most stuff is dealt with over a bourbon and good cigar in smoky rooms in Nashvegas, at Mule Day or Name-The-Venue-Here. It just is.

The TNDP is not controlling their story. They just aren’t and that is why that Bill Hobbs and Co. are winning in this state in a time of technology and instant communication. Something happens, they have a statement out.

They are in front of the story.

When yesterday’s story broke regarding the reorganization of the TNDP, there should have been a press release immediately. Chip Forrester doesn’t have a Bill Hobbs, and he spoke via conference call roughly five hours after the rumors hit Post Politics. Several bloggers and a few journalists where on that conference call from what I was told by one who participated.By then, it was too late for some folks who wanted immediate answers.

The news cycle of 10 years ago is not the news cycle of 2009. This is something that has to be understood. Hobbs is doing it. I may not like what he says pretty much ever but he is, I repeat, in front of the story.

The TNDP isn’t and that’s a shame. Yes, they have made great strides, but five hours on a Thursday with nary a word isn’t going to work after information this huge hits the streets. This needed immediate counter information. And it didn’t happen.

I don’t know why there has been so much vigorous nastiness being reported from coming from Bredesen’s office towards Forrester but many of the bloggers have talked about this for weeks. We talk off line more than we talk online which may or may not surprise you. And the thing is, this story was being spun last week at Jimmy Naifeh’s Coon Supper just like the buzz surrounding that Sen. Jim Kyle might run for governor. The spin wasn’t, however, about reorganization but it was more about a truce as Jackson Baker reported.

The biggest problem is that the TNDP has not only NOT managed three months of stories that have hit the blogosphere but they have not tapped into the passion that the bloggers and supporters feel. Passion is a mighty gift when it comes to politics.

Have they been accommodating? Of course they have. Have they handled their PR? Well, not really. Passion is important. And it wasn’t funneled into anything very positive that would have moved into the next election cycle, which is now just beginning.

Most of us could have given two craps who got TNDP chair. I didn’t. But we decided that we would support whomever won. That’s what we did. Nothing more, nothing less.

And it became a constant attack from people that allegedly were also in the party. Forrester is a big boy, he can take care of himself. We just wanted democrats that represented our core beliefs, although they are different for each individual. What we got was old school bullying from people apparently in our own party? WTH?

Next weekend, their will a TNDP Summitt in Monteagle. I will not be there. I will be in Dresden at the Tennessee Iris Festival which has been a Ned McWherter based festival for many years.

For all the players that have been bickering for the past quarter of this year, here is where you screwed it up. You blew three months as we are headed into redistricting which will happen. You will never get that time back again and it was needed.

Same as it ever was and worse, because collectively some folks in Nashville have told the little guys, the ground troops if you will, to go away.

All righty then.