Wither Freddie?

So is the Fred campaign at an end? I bear him no personal ill will – but I do find it ironic that he seemed to do so much better before he was an official candidate. And I do agree with Knoxviews contributor Elrod that Fred’s campaign provided a distracting magnet for TNGOP cash and attention. I just hope he stays in until the 5th of February so he can continue to do so.

I am a little sad that the value of my little personal heirloom has probably already bottomed out. Any offers? No timewasters, please.

But the best thing about the Fred campaign has got to be this picture. If I’m not mistaken, I know this woman. I don’t know if this is her grandson, but I guess it must be. She’s had some bad luck lately, but this is a fantastic photo. (It’s published under a Creative Commons license under the Flickr ID Freddthompson).
There are some other great pictures of Lawrenceburg around and about because Fred’s homecoming. (The bloggers who bring us the great pics and blogs at Sugarfused and Nashville Files were there with their cameras.)

One Saturday in January

Hey South Carolina and Nevada – what a great day to hold an election. Seems like maybe more people could get out and vote on a Saturday, maybe that’s what the US should do. And then I wouldn’t feel bad about staying up all night to watch the returns. But of course, so many states are going for the early voting that maybe it doesn’t matter anymore.

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My dad and brother will be visiting soon and will be here on election day. Both of them have opted for early voting. Apparently VolBro has already voted and we don’t agree on a primary candidate.

VolBro says that Hillary Clinton is the Republican’s best chance at the White House because she’s so divisive. You know, I used to think that, too. But the Clintons have overcome that before.

Besides, seems to me like the last election we had was the Democrats to throw away – given that the Republicans were running that “uniter” George Bush. If ever a candidate was divisive, that must be the guy. Seems to me divisiveness maybe isn’t the handicap people think it is.

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I sure hope Fred does well. It’d be great to see prices going up on this thing..

At that point in time

Did y’all know Fred Thompson wrote a book about Watergate? Well, he did. At That Point in Time It’s not in print anymore, but I got my grubby little paws on a grubby little copy this weekend.

See:

And yes, it’s a little rough around the edges, but the darn thing is 32 years old. (Younger than I am, though.) My dad brought it over. It had been languishing on his bookshelves for years, apparently.

It’s a signed copy, to my grandfather. He apparently thought so much of it, he passed it on to his son-in-law within a month. I guess he was a pretty fast reader.

My dad thought I’d get a kick out of it. And I have. But I’ve gotten an even bigger kick out of the fact that an autographed copy is selling for almost $750 – and that’s without the dust jacket.

My dad doesn’t want me to sell it, but it’s sooo tempting when I know the book will return to its normal low,low value after Fred’s campaign crashes and burns.

I know what my granddad would do. Oh yes, he’d sell. This was a man who sold junk antiques into his dying week and had a price tag on the walker he used to get around the shop. (For $5 more than my mom and my aunt paid for it)

Of little account

VolDad phoned me the other day and amongst his general news and asking after Cletus, he told me he’d found a family heirloom – maybe.

At some point, Fred Thompson had signed a book for my grandfather – I guess it was this one. And at some point, my grandfather had loaned or given the book to my dad. Since my dad hasn’t been his son-in-law for almost 20 years, it had to have been a long, long time ago.

My dad and I speculated that the book would soon be valued at a lot more – or a lot less. But at any rate, he’d give me the book if I wanted it.

I told VolMom, a life long Dem, about the rediscovered tome and she said “Well, I hope it stays worthless.”

Fred marrying ambition

More on Fred. Here’s another article in the LA Times about Fred’s early days, marrying young in Lawrenceburg. A lot of it’s about his former in-laws, the Lindseys. I can’t say I’m a political fan of Fred Thompson, but I liked his work in Law and Order and I can’t help but be a little excited about reading these stories about my old home town in newspapers of natonal note.

This article is full of little known and rarely recalled facts about the wild nature of Lawrence County politics. Including matters of the ballot being settled by the bullet. I wish my grandfather was alive today so that I could ask him about all that. He was heavily involved in Lawrence County politics in those days and had a political rivalry with one of the Lindseys mentioned in the story. But I didn’t know about the shoot-out (my grandfather wasn’t involved, I can’t imagine that he would have been at least he’s not mentioned in the story).

Here’s another little known fact: I used to have a picture of Fred’s ex-mother-in-law hanging up in my kitchen.

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H/T Volunteer Voters

The feud is off!

My great aunt Tiny probably carried her grudge to her grave. Many other proud Lawrence-burgers weren’t too happy about it either. One night, many, many years ago apparently Johnny Carson announced on The Tonight Show that Lawrenceburg, TN shared the honor (along with Detroit) of being the American city with the most unsolved murders. And apparently he didn’t say it in a helpful way.

I never saw the episode, but I heard about it. Even in my 20s, people ocassionally asked me about it. I used to say – it’s not the murder rate, it’s the unsolved murder rate. That means no official clear up. In Lawrenceburg, we have our own justice, I’d say.

But I guess the hard feelings are over, ’cause The Tonight Show was filmed in the Big Burg yesterday. I mean it must have been since Fred Thompson was going to announce in town and he threw his hat in the presidential ring on the show last night.

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To be fair, I did read somewhere on the Internet that he’ll be having a homecoming in Lawrenceburg on the 15th. (I hope VolMom can tell me all about it, but I bet she doesn’t go.)

The Vol-in-Law said “I bet if he wins, he won’t even put the presidential library in Lawrenceburg.”

Would you?

Gettin’ ready for Freddie

A recent edition of the LA Times features Lawrenceburg, Tennessee Woo-hoo. It’s all about how the town is getting ready for Freddie – that is Fred Thompson’s announcement of his intention to run for the presidency. Apparently folks are convinced he’s going to announce in the Big Burg. My old home town has cleaned up the square and forbidden trash by the side of the road. Does this mean they’re getting rid of those old guys who inhabit the benches on the square? Has VolMom planted up the town square with flowers as she is wont to do – or has the drought and her librul politics overcome her civic pride and gardening passion?

Chunky Moore’s menswear and the Ledbetter drug store sure are getting some good press out of all this. Here’s a tip – Ledbetter’s used to have awesome real milkshakes made right in front of you at the counter. I don’t know if they still do that, but it’s worth asking if you’re a visiting journo or political junkie. The Vol-in-Law and the rest of the groomsmen rented their tuxes from Moore’s – I don’t know if you need to rent a tux while you’re in town for the day – but maybe Chunky will sell you some wing tips real cheap.

As for me, I just think it’s pretty wild that people I know are written up in the LA Times. I recognize every name in that article.

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HT: The Tennessee Politics blog

i said i wouldn’t do it

I keep saying I’m not going to blog about the presidential elections – until – you know, it’s an actual election year. And I’m not – it’s just that Fred was in town yesterday – and that’s really more like blogging about a colorful former neighbor than it is about the election – since Fred hasn’t even declared.

Anyway Sean Braisted picks up The Tennessean coverage of the Fred visit:

“The United States, Great Britain and our coalition should be proud of what we have averted. Imagine Saddam Hussein and his murderous sons in power today, successfully defying the international community and free to pursue weapons programs.”

Hrmm…imagine a region more stable with Saddam in power. Imagine Iraq not being a proving ground for future 9/11 type terrorists. Imagine a more diplomatic resolution to our worries over WMD in Iraq. Imagine a country not in the throws of a 21st Century civil war…Imagine, its easy if you try.

My faux Estonian* carpenter once said to me – well, right after Saddam Hussein was captured “I don’t know why everybody is so happy about Saddam, he was the right man for the right place.”

(He also said that things were much better when Estonia was part of the USSR because at least you got an apartment.)

I didn’t much subscribe to either Igor’s or Mr Braisted’s view, but I’m beginning to wonder if the bloody calculus is starting to tip to Saddam’s favor? And when you do really start to reckon that maybe things would have been better off under that butcher, then you know we can’t go on keeping on with what we’re doing.

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Meanwhile, Fred Thompson’s lecture to the Policy Exchange garnered some attention on this side of the water, too. Mostly for Fred being homophobic. Is he? I mean if he hadda been on his way out of Lawrenceburg, that wouldn’t have surprised me. But now? After all those years filming in La-la Land and NYC and living in DC. I doubt it. But you never know.

Iain Dale has the views and the links to Fred’s actual speech.

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I was gonna post this yesterday – but I had a bad day with the baby….

*faux Estonian – turns out that he was really ethnic Russian – and you know what they say about Russian carpentry