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 Senior Political Editor for The Epoch Times, Roger Simon to the studio.
During the third hour, Simon predicted a split-decision with a Kelly Loeffler win in the Georgia Senate run-off election January fifth. He also questioned whether or not Republicans in the state would be fooled a second time around.
Leahy: I’m in the studio with Crom Carmichael and Roger Simon who is a political columnist at The Epoch Times. Roger, we were going to handicap the two races runoff races that will determine the outcome of who has a majority in the Senate. You have got one race with David Perdue the former CEO of Dollar General running against the guy I call pajama boy John Ossoff who’s never done anything except talk about how wonderful he is. That guy. And then you have Kelly Loeffler the appointed Senator who owns the WNBA team Atlanta Dream and whose husband owns the NASDAQ.
Simon: He owns a lot of stuff.
Leahy: She’s running against this leftist Black liberation theology guy named Raphael Warnock. The polls show all both of those races very tight plus or minus one either way. What’s your take on it?
Simon: Well, you know as Yogi the Bear said (Chuckles), predictions are dangerous particularly about the future. (Leahy laughs).
Leahy: That’s great.
Simon: But this is a short-term future. So I’ll make my prediction that it will be a split decision and Loeffler will win. And Ossoff who I agree with your characterization completely, he won’t wear pajamas in Congress but he should. (Leahy chuckles) The reason I think Loeffler will win against Warnock is that she’s done a good job of painting Warnock for what he is. I mean, he’s the guy who said Fidel Castro was a complex figure. He wasn’t a despot.
Of course, Fidel Castro is someone who murdered his colleagues in the revolution and put homosexuals in prison. There’s a great movie about that incidentally with Javier Bardem. And then he impoverished his own people for like 50 years. And then ended up a billionaire himself. So he’s not exactly a complex figure unless you’re Michael Moore.
Carmichael: What I’m trying to figure out is why somebody would go into the polls and vote for Loeffler and then vote for Ossoff. I don’t know why somebody would split that ticket. To me it’s a get out the vote contest and whether or not the Republicans have the stones to keep the Democrats from cheating the way they did in the past time.
Simon: My answer to you there is you’re almost entirely correct. But I think very few people will do that. And those few people will be the ones who will of tossed one to Loeffler and one to Ossoff. I was asked about my prediction now. Don’t bring me back here after the answer.
Leahy: (Laughs) Here’s the way we handle predictions here. They live the day you make them and disappear the day after.
Simon: I think so. (Laughter)
Carmichael: I think both Republicans will win so long as the Republican Party keeps the Democrats from cheating the way that they cheated in Georgia this last time.
Simon: But they’re not.
Carmichael: Okay, then my qualification doesn’t mean anything. But the Republicans got up and left the room. Are you telling me that Republicans when the Democrats say you can go home now, are you telling me that Republicans will get up and go home? Are you really telling me that that’s what the Republican Party is going to do?
Simon: The good Republicans are not doing that.
Carmichael: No. No, I’m talking about the ones that got told to go home.
Leahy: In Fulton County.
Carmichael: The last time in Fulton County. Are you telling me that they’ll get up and go home again? I just can’t I can’t believe that to be true. I just can’t believe that that that the people who are there to help count votes got tricked last time and now know they got tricked last time.
Simon: They are not going to go home.
Carmichael: I can’t believe they’re going to get up and go home again. I just can’t believe that.
Simon: Yeah, the real question is, you know them that’s not the only way they were tricked. They were tricked on outer levels.
Carmichael: Well they know how they were tricked.
Simon: Some of it.
Leahy: Let me add this. They do know how they were tricked some of those elements though are not going to be changed.
Carmichael: If somebody’s signature is completely illegible and you can’t match it to anything that that vote if you’re the Republican counter, you should say that votes not going to count and so it goes over in the contested pile. And what I’m saying is that if the Republicans don’t have the stones to do that. That’s all they have to do.
Leahy: Those two elements are a little different in terms of the complexity of actually executing it. And the reason is that staying there, they will stay there. They won’t be told to go home. But the problem is what does exactly that mean when the rules set up by the Zuckerberg-funded election directors in Fulton County for instance are, we’re going to have a consolidated counting center and you can observe from the cheap seats.
Carmichael: No, no, no. What I’m saying is if the Republican Party allows that to happen and says I’m going to be there looking at the ballots and looking at those signatures, if they don’t have the guts to do that then they deserve to lose. And we deserve to lose.
Simon: Oh, absolutely. I’m with you there. The real question is how is this exactly all going to go down. I’m going to try to go down there again. I’m going to go down at election time.
Leahy: Go to a Fulton County consolidated counting center and see what happens. Crom, you make a very good point. This is all part of the Zuckerberg requirement in these grants that they gave them. Consolidated counting centers are huge places with you know, dozens and dozens of tables where people are counting. The way they observe them was that they weren’t looking over each table. They were in the room but couldn’t watch. Now, will the Republicans in Fulton County insist upon having an observer at each table?
Carmichael: And if they don’t Michael then they deserve to lose because they already know how they got cheated. If you are going to get cheated the same way the second time then you deserve it.
Simon: Yes. Fool me twice as you said it.
Carmichael: Then you deserve it. It’s like somebody who keeps leaving the keys in their car in their driveway and then complains when the car gets stolen.
Leahy: This would be the responsibility of David Shafer the Republican party chairman down there. However, he may be constrained by the way the rules are interpreted under the consent decree.
Simon: It’s really a bad set up. The great guy down there is Garland Favorito. I interviewed him a couple of times and talked to him recently.
Leahy: Well Crom and Roger, Mondays are always fun when we have Roger in here. And Crom, we won’t see you until the next year. I hope you have a great Christmas.
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 “Polling Place” by Eden, Janine, and Jim CC2.0.
