Live from Music Row Tuesday morning on The Tennessee Star Report with Michael Patrick Leahy – broadcast on Nashville’s Talk Radio 98.3 and 1510 WLAC weekdays from 5:00 a.m. to 8:00 a.m. –  host Leahy welcomed several listeners to call into the show to weigh in on whether or not Mayor Cooper should be recalled as the mayor of Nashville.
Leahy: We’re going to turn the page here a little bit to something a little bit more local. And we’re going to open up the phone lines will see if anybody calls. You know, we try this every now and then. We just say open phone lines for calls! I have a topic Scooter and the topic is do you agree with me that Nashville Mayor John Cooper is a tinpot dictator who is over asserting his authority by shutting down and ruining the Nashville restaurant and bar industry based on something other than science? Or do you want to defend Mayor John Cooper? (Gives call-in number)
Producer Scooter: Should I start a tally sheet?
Leahy: Well, we’ve got to see if somebody calls it’s interesting about that Scooter because you know something when we do this, we do the open line thing in the five o’clock hour, which I do like once a week or so, the phone’s just light up. But I’m not sure if we’ll do it here get that kind of response here at the 7:30 hour it typically. It’s like you started the beginning of the hour.
Scooter: Everything I see on Facebook there’s definitely a feeling about Cooper and about the way this is all been handled. So it’ll be interesting as people have a chance to voice their opinion right now literally with their voice.
Leahy: With their voice, yeah, six one five seven three seven nine five two two. Mayor John Cooper, should he stay or should he go now? Back to the shitty go aspect of it. There is a new website I want to talk about here. The story is by our own Chris Butler. Voters Must Recall Nashville Mayor John Cooper. This according to this new group with a website that is asking Davidson County voters to recall Nashville Mayor John Cooper.
Members of this group Nashville Citizens for the Fair and Transparent Government said on the website. Here it is folks. RestoreNashville.org and hey advised Mayor Cooper to ‘cut Metro costs before taxing Nashville citizens.’ And he did not. As the Tennessee Star reported Nashville citizens for fair and transparent government fought Mayor Cooper’s 34 percent property tax increase in May. They passed it anyway. But citizens are pushing back in a couple of ways. And you can call in now.
Should Mayor Cooper stay or should he go? So the recall thing has a little higher standard than the charter referendum. And the way it works is this. I think you need to get like 70,000 signatures in a very narrow period of time to put a recall of the mayor on the ballot. I suspect it is going to be put on the ballot. And so that’s going to be happening shortly. And we also have a petition and we have to repeal the 34 percent property tax increase at the mayor’s team is fighting. We go now to Karen who wants to weigh in on whether Mayor John Cooper should stay or go, Karen. Welcome to The Tennessee Star Report.
Caller Karen: Thank you. Of course, he should go. I’ve been in Davidson County for 31 years. I don’t want to get out.
Leahy: You do?
Karen: Any time restrictions are put on you when you leave your front door of what you can and can’t do, then that’s a dictatorship.
Leahy: Yeah, I cannot disagree with you on that. What is the legal authority by which these restrictions on restaurants and bars are being placed by the little tinpot dictator, I call him Mayor John Cooper. What’s the legal authority?
Karen: Well, I don’t know what the legal authority is because I’m not a lawyer and I’m not up a lot on the practice of law. But you know, he’s supposed to represent the people and that’s not what the people want. He’s destroying all these businesses. Douglas Corner is closed. We can never go back to Douglas Corner even when the county opens.
Leahy: Yeah, very good point. Well, Karen so Cooper should go according to you. Thanks so much. We’ll go now to Don here in Nashville who wants to weigh in on should Mayor Cooper stay, or should Mayor Cooper go. Don, you are on the Tennessee Star Report with Michael Patrick Leahy.
Caller Don: Michael, I think he should go can they impeach him with a special election or anything? How do they actually get him out of office?
Leahy: I’m glad you asked. Under the charter here the citizens have the right to recall any elected countywide official under the Nashville Metro Davidson County Charter. And you’ve got to get like 70,000 signatures to get the recall on the ballot. So you have to have a petition. It has to be done in like I don’t know like 21 days some or period of time like that. We’ll get to the exact amount. And this group at RestoreNashville.org is going to announce at some point apparently that they’re going to be starting to circulate these petitions. So you could go there to RestroreNashville.org and be ready to sign the petition. Does that make sense to you Don?
Don: Yes sir.
Leahy: Why?
Don: Obviously he’s bringing this economy down. I mean he is killing Nashville.
Leahy: Yeah a very good point Don. Let me go quickly. We got about a minute here. We have a contrarian on the line. Dave in Nashville says he wants Mayor Cooper to stay. Tell us why Dave you’re on the Tennessee Star Report.
Caller Dave: Yeah. This is great what he’s doing for these outlining counties. He’s bringing people out to eat and to bars and stuff because we’re not shut down. And God bless him. We need this economy and a dictator and the fewer fruits of his labor while we expand and grow out here.
Leahy: You got me! You got me on that one Dave! That was very clever. That’s very clever. But you know, there’s also an argument Dave, that that as Andy Ogle’s the mayor Maury County says. He says it hurts all of Middle Tennessee as well. We go now to John who wants to weigh in and whether Mayor Cooper should stay or go. John welcome, you are on the Tennessee Star Report.
Caller John: Hi. Yeah. He should go. He’s killing the economy. Here are my fears though. I’ve seen this from experience. I believe down here from Chicago four years ago. I moved out of there because I’m the only conservative left there and if they vote him out what I’m seeing here is the same thing I’ve seen in Chicago. The population is just going to vote in another progressive liberal, you know? I mean I voted for Carol Swain and so I think the only real support she had was from the conservative block in Nashville, which is shrinking.
Leahy: Well shrinking and you know, we talked to Metro councilmember at-large Steve Glover about that. He actually thinks it’s growing and has some polling data to support that but we’ll talk about that more after the break John. Thanks so much for your call.
Listen to the full third hour here:
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Tune in weekdays from 5:00 – 8:00 a.m. to the Tennessee Star Report with Michael Patrick Leahy on Talk Radio 98.3 FM WLAC 1510. Listen online at iHeart Radio.
Photo “Mayor Cooper” by Nashville Mayor’s Office.
