Ed Bryant Speaks at Cowan

Vorticity ^ | Feb 27, 2005 | miner89

[miner89]

Ed Bryant spoke to a crowd of about 70 Saturday afternoon in Cowan, TN. Cowan is in southern middle Tennessee in Franklin County. The meeting was a gathering of southern middle Tennessee Republicans who have recently formed a new men's Republican club in the area.

Before the meeting I was priviliged to help interview former congressman Bryant for our local polical talk show, Roundtable Review. Roundtable Review can be seen on public access channel 40 on Franklin County cable each weekday evening at 5:30. A good portion of our discussion was the problem of controlling the judiciary. Bryant stated that his experience in the congress was that it was extremely difficult to remove a judge except in a case of blatant misconduct. He expressed the opinion that it was very important to approve good judges now, since it would be so difficult to remove them later. He agreed with panel members that the time to break the democratic threat of fillibustering judicial appointments was right now, while there was a Republican president, house & senate. In his words, "If not now, when?"

I asked Bryant what his thoughts were on the moderate/conservative split that has hampered the Tennessee Republican effort in the past. He indicated that he was concerned about big money backing candidates that the grass roots does not support (Corker) and that he hoped that the White House would stay out of backing a candidate until after the primary. He expressed his confidence that the majority of Tennesseans were truly conservative and that being the case, he is the best nominee. Also discussed was the war on Iraq and his desire to return to Washington and work on behalf of veteran's benefits.

After the interview, we all proceeded to the downstairs ballroom of the Franklin-Pearson house where a good crowd from five or six counties had already gathered. After a few formalities, Ed Bryant receieved an impassioned introduction from Janice Bowling, our Republican nominee for the US house over the last two campaigns. Janice was defeated by Lincoln Davis, but pointed out that we are gaining Rebublican votes each election, despite the district being redrawn in 2000 to make it more Democratic. Janice reviewed Ed's impressive legal and military background and argued that a man with these sort of credentials was needed in Washington during the current battles over judicial nominees and the war on Terror.

Ed covered a lot of the same ground as we covered in the interview. He indicated that were he to win the seat, he intends to ask for an appointment on the judiciary committee based on his credentials. I did learn one interesting fact. Ed Bryant was involved in prosecuting Harold Ford Sr. in the house banking scandal. When the Clinton administration came to power the justice department ordered the case against Ford dropped. Congressman Bryant resigned from the justice dept. in protest.

There was an interesting question from a member of the audience. Bryant was asked if it was appropriate to campaign for him by pointing out his role as one of the house members who presented the case against Bill Clinton to the Senate during the impeachment scandal. Bryant replied that he didn't have any problem with it, as he was still convinced today that they had done the right thing to try and uphold the rule of law.

Overall, I got the impression that everyone in the room was supportive of Bryant. It was a good event for our rural county. For more information on Ed Bryant's campaign, see his website.

[miner89]

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