Live from Music Row, Wednesday 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 for another edition of Crom’s Crommentary.
CROM CARMICHAEL:
Michael, there were two articles that I have read over, and they are both from May 14th, The Wall Street Journal. And this is by Douglas Schoen and Andrew Stein. These are both well-known political pundits and I guess campaign people. They’re not idiots or crazy leftists.
They’re not crazy leftists. But they’ve written an article headlined If Biden Bows Out, How About Michelle Obama? And they’re touting it by saying this is a good idea for Democrats. And it just, and then there’s another article that I read called DeSantis Legislative Record.
And I’m comparing these two, Michelle Obama has literally never managed anything in her entire life. And when Barack Obama became a state senator, she got a $60,000 job at a hospital in Chicago. And then, when he became a U.S. senator, that same hospital promoted her to a $300,000 job.
Okay? And then when he became president, and she quit her job, they didn’t replace her. That’s how valuable she was. (Leahy laughs) They didn’t replace her. So we can say that what she did was so valuable that they needed no one to do her job.
And then she became First Lady. And then she has written a couple of little books, and she has opined on what is the appropriate diet for school children. And so that’s pretty much her record. And so here you have where the Democrats said that Biden should be elected because of his great experience.
And now that now these very same people are saying that Michelle Obama might ought to be the candidate because she would win a popularity contest. Then I compared that to the article on Ron DeSantis and his legislative record.
And this is not to say that Trump isn’t in the lead, but DeSantis hadn’t announced yet. But here’s his legislative record of just very briefly on taxes and spending. Florida has no income tax. It’s probably the fastest-growing state in the country.
More people are moving to Florida than any place else. And so he’s increased state spending by 6 percent, which is not miserly. But given the level of inflation, we have, a 6 percent increase is not terrible. He has spent a billion dollars restoring the Everglade’s water protection within the state.
On education, he has greatly extended educational savings accounts. It’s now up to $8,700 for any household in the state with 185 percent of the poverty line. I hope he raises that higher, or I hope Florida does if he’s not the governor. Crime, the death penalty no longer requires unanimity. By the way, the amount of crime in Miami, which was their deadliest city is way down. Tampa, way, way down.
And so crime and law and order, crime is down, and law and order are up in the state of Florida. Public unions, this may be my favorite one, Michael, and I did not even know this. Dues no longer may be automatically deducted from the paychecks of many government workers but must be paid directly to each member.
That gives the worker discretion and puts on the unions to persuade the members as to what they will do with the money if it is voluntarily given. This is what is the least the state legislature here in Tennessee should do in the state of Tennessee. If the share of dues-payers falls below 60 percent, the unions could face a new election.
And strong union audits and financial disclosures are now required in the state of Florida. And so the union members’ pensions will now be protected by the State of Florida. And we know that across the country that there’s a tremendous abuse of union money and how it is guarded. And these are the union employees’ money on immigration.
The legislature’s response to Biden’s border failures is to impose new burdens on federal Florida employers. It’s all they are really able to do, and they’re trying to mitigate the terrible policies of Biden on the border. On abortion, they passed an abortion bill that says heartbeat protection bill bans abortion after six weeks, with exceptions up to 15 weeks.
If there is a police report or other documentation of rape, incest, or human trafficking tort reform. Another biggie is if a plaintiff is found to be more than 50 percent responsible. For his own injustices, he’s no longer able to recover damages. ESG is where pensions for government employees and other pensions have been invested in ESG projects that have not given a good rate of return.
State and local investment decisions must now focus on maximizing returns, not factors related to ESG. And then, finally, they brought up Disney. The former Reedy Crook Improvement District around Disney, which was largely self-governing, is now the Central Florida Tourism Oversight District with board members appointed by DeSantis.
And the purpose of that was to send a strong message to the people in California if you’re going do business in Florida, then you’re going to respect our laws and at least be honest if you’re going to criticize them. And so the DeSantis record if he announces that he’s going to run for president, and most people think he will, I think his record is one that he can run on.
Listen to today’s show highlights, including this Crommentary:
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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 “Ron DeSantis” by Ron DeSantis.
