Live from Music Row Monday 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 the original all-star panelist Crom Carmichael to the studio.
At the end of the second hour, Carmichael discussed the growing decay of democratically controlled cities and cited the need for tighter election laws that held strict penalties for fraud. He later compared the Chines Communist Party politics to the United States billionaire class which acts as a protective run government that takes care of its own.
(President Trump clip plays)
We’re going to continue to go forward. We have numerous local cases where you know in some of the states that got rigged and robbed from us. We won every one of them. We won, Pennsylvania. We won Michigan. We won Georgia by a lot. We have a Republican Governor that’s worse than a Democrat. He’s horrible and he’s hurting Kelly and David very badly who are Senators and are terrific people.
Leahy: That’s a very good point by the President that Brian Kemp’s disappearing act and you know unwillingness to confront the cheating that went on in Georgia is hurting both Kelly Loeffler and David Perdue. Because the consequence is, you know our John Frederick’s is down there with his radio program our partner with The George Star News says people are angry at the Republican party for not fighting stronger and that that may influence their turnout on January fifth.
Carmichael: Well it could and this is exactly what I’m talking about. You know I’ve said that the Democrat Party is the party of government. And you know, we really probably should take it a little bit further. It was a couple of weeks ago I was talking about how I’ve been watching this kind this old series that may be on the History Channel about mobsters and their effect on our society and Al Capone in particular in Chicago and he just took over. He owned the judges.
Leahy: He owned it.
Carmichael: He owned the politicians and he owned the police. And in Chicago is still, I mean we’re talking about that was 90 years ago. And Al Capone and Chicago is still controlled very much by organized crime or just government crime.
Leahy: They’ve become much more sophisticated at cheating and much more well-financed.
Carmichael: Yeah, but it’s through the government. And the people and the people of that area elected them. And so, you know you I don’t know what you do about it in a free society where people are free to elect crooks if they choose to. And they’ve been electing Democrats for 100 years. Maybe there are no Republicans who will run or even can run. It’s now similar to New York. And so when you look at New York, you look at Chicago, you look at Los Angeles and you look at San Francisco, those are examples of cities that are most likely in long-term decay now.
Leahy: Oh, yeah. No question about it.
Carmichael: And I don’t know what Illinois is going to do because the people of Illinois voted against it even though the side was pushing for taking the cap off of the income tax. Under the constitution of Illinois, the state income tax must be a flat tax. And Pritzker.
Leahy: Democrat.
Carmichael: Democrat. He is the governor that spent tens of millions of dollars trying to get a constitutional amendment passed that would allow for a graduated income tax. The voters voted that down. And so the voters understand at least in the state of Illinois they understand the logic of keeping the tax the same on everybody because it makes it more difficult to raise taxes if you have to tax everybody at the same time. In Tennessee, we don’t have a state income tax. We have a sales tax.
Leahy: And the best way to do it in my view.
Carmichael: Yes, and that is the form of tax that that is most likely to constrain government. In Tennessee, we are a very very well-governed state at the state level. Nashville is not so well-governed.
Leahy: Poorly governed in my view.
Carmichael: We could argue that and I would not take the other side. Unfortunately, Nashville has been a one-party city and I’ve been here since 1967 and it’s been run by Democrats for that entire time. When Phil Bredesen was mayor he made some changes that were beneficial, but they were beneficial for the short term.
They didn’t last very long. When Marvin Runyon was TVA he closed down a whole bunch of little teeny weeny businesses that TVA was engaged in and losing money all over the place.
Leahy: That was just kind of a payoff.
Carmichael: Yeah, and I asked him I said Marvin you’ve done just an incredible job of reforming TVA should we privatize it now? And he said no. And I said why? And he said well because it operates better this way. And I said, well it wasn’t operating well when you took over. And I said what will keep it from going back to the way it was after you’re gone? And he didn’t have a good answer for that.
Leahy: And what’s happened?
Carmichael: I don’t know. I can tell you I do not know if it’s morphed back into a bureaucratic kind of nightmare. But Nashville has some things that need to be done that aren’t being done. And so when you look across the country now what you see is the Democrat Party being the party of government. When you look at the Communist Party of China the Communist Party of China allows its friends to be successful in China.
Leahy: Parallels here.
Carmichael: If you’re not connected to the Communist Chinese Party in China, then you can get by but you’re not going to live freely and you’re not going to have whatever opportunities you might be able to find. And if you look at the billionaire class in the U.S. today it really is pushing a government that is protective.
Leahy: Of their friends.
Carmichael: Of their interests.
Leahy: Counter to free markets and enterprise and what made America great. It’s moving more towards the Chinese model. And it will accelerate under Biden.
Carmichael: Yes. And then the question is whether or not the people in the elections will change that and it’ll be up to the Republicans who control the legislators in the very states that we’re talking about to change their election laws. To tighten them up and put enormous penalties on those who commit fraud at the smallest level. I mean even at the smallest level those who commit fraud.
Leahy: It is a daunting task.
Carmichael: It is a task.
Leahy: It is a daunting task.
Carmichael: And it’ll be up to the legislators in those states.
Leahy: And it’s one that our listeners can help with I think going forward.
Carmichael: I think so. In Tennessee, we are in good shape in terms of our election laws.
Leahy: We absolutely are.
Listen to the full second 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.Â
