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 all-star panelist Aaron Gulbransen in the studio to comment on recent polling for midterm elections, and the governor and senate races in Georgia.
Leahy: In studio, Brent Hamachek, manager of Human Defense Media Group, and Aaron Gulbransen, the official guest host of The Tennessee Star Report. We have a little housekeeping here. On Saturday the 6th, the annual National Constitution Bee, we’re holding it.
We got a little nonprofit called The Star News Education Foundation and this was our 6th year where students come and compete. It’s sort of like a spelling bee except it’s about the Constitution and we’re going to do it here in Brentwood.
You go to nationalconstitutionbee.org and sign up. The winner gets a $10,000 educational scholarship for 8th through 12th grade. You can do whatever you want to with it. And then $5,000 for the second place and $2,500 for the third place.
It’s interesting – you would think after six years, K-12 public schools would be all excited about it. (Buzzer sound) You would think wrong about that, Aaron.
Gulbransen: I would imagine if you were to ask the average person who helped shape the curriculum, they don’t enjoy putting the Constitution in there.
Leahy: No. And Brent, you and I were talking about this earlier. Diversity, inclusion, equity, and transgenderism are not in the Constitution, but apparently that’s the big curriculum item these days in K-12 public schools.
Hamachek: Right. Folks don’t have enough of an understanding of just what a miraculous document in its time the Constitution was.
You have to go back into the 1700s and realize that the ideas and principles that were embodied in it were fresh from the Enlightenment and these were brand-new things.
They existed in the time of Cicero and they went dormant for 1,500-plus years and then they were revived. And then a bunch of really smart people got together and said let’s see if we can’t build a country out of these and create something from scratch. This is the most brilliant exercise of statesmanship in history. People just have lost their appreciation for it.
Leahy: Let’s talk about this in terms of the midterm elections three weeks from today. Aaron, how much, in terms of the voter mind, is this utter rejection of the left-wing agenda at every level, how much is that motivating conservatives to turn out in this midterm election?
Gulbransen: I think the everyday kitchen-table issues like gas prices, the price of groceries – what is it, 8.2 percent inflation?
Leahy: Inflation is the number one concern.
Gulbransen: All of these things are what are motivating conservative voters. Democrats are trying to hang their hats right now on the abortion issue and they’re thinking it’s going to motivate their people to show up. It’s not really polling like that.
And as it turns out, a couple of Rasmussen polls that I saw and a few of the others. Abortion is not as big of an issue to even some parts of the Democrat base, but especially amongst independents, as how much their gas costs or how much as their grocery bills cost, or the fact that $1 is worth 8.2 percent less than it was a year ago.
These are things that impact your daily life. Here in Tennessee, we’re seeing it, too. So, Kamala Harris, vice president of the United States, was at an event with Planned Parenthood. The head of Planned Parenthood in Tennessee did this hike across the state.
You can see this both at the local level and the national level. They’re trying to motivate their pro-abortion voters. And there are single-issue pro-abortion voters just as there are single-issue pro-life voters.
But I don’t think that’s going to be what gets them, certainly not going to get them over the hump in the House. And it’s really not what these elections are going to be in the Senate, either.
Leahy: By the way, speaking of elections in the Senate, I have some polling information now – they come out all the time these days, RealClearPolitics average of polls. The latest poll today, this morning from Insider Advantage in Georgia has Raphael Warnock up two over Walker.
That’s within the margin of error. And Brian Kemp is up seven over Stacey Abrams. Your thoughts about Georgia, Aaron?
Gulbransen: If Kemp wins by seven, I still think regardless of what the polling does, you’re getting Walker in the game there.
Leahy: Yes, probably. Now, what’s interesting is Stacey Abrams, who came within like, one point of winning last time. She ran against Kemp and is not performing as well this time around as last time. What do you attribute that to?
Gulbransen: Fatigue. (Laughter) It happens.
Leahy: Stacey Abrams fatigue. We’ve heard the term Trump fatigue, but in Georgia, voters you think might have Stacy Abrams fatigue?
Gulbransen: Look at it historically speaking. I mean, let’s go back. How many times has it been where the president of the United States has served two terms and then it switches to the next party? The country wasn’t quite fatigued with the whole Reagan agenda in 1988, which is why they elected George H.W. Bush.
But historically speaking, the American public – and even more so now because of how bombarded they are with not just the ABC Nightly News, but with everything on social media.
And Stacey Abrams has not done her best to be a sympathetic figure. She has embraced this full-on far-left mentality and then also trotted around Georgia acting like a victim.
Leahy: She never conceded.
Gulbransen: Did she contest it or not?
Leahy: But apparently she’s not an election denier, according to the mainstream media. But she never conceded.
Hamachek: I think the answer with Stacey Abrams is kind of simple. I want to be kind, so I’ll say she’s sort of an imbecile. She really is.
Leahy: But she went to Yale Law School.
Hamachek: She’s an imbecile, and I think the run of an imbecile is limited. So she had her moment of popularity. She peaked. Everybody’s had a good look at her, and I’ve got to believe that even if you agree with her on every issue you’re just kind of holding your head in your hands, saying, oh, my goodness, did she really say that? She’s just insufferable.
Leahy: I think we would basically say Kemp is going to win the governor’s race in Georgia and that might help drag Herschel Walker across the finish line. At least into a runoff.
Gulbransen: Yep. All bets are off.
Listen to today’s show highlights, including this interview:
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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 “Stacey Abrams” by Stacey Abrams.
