William GOP return not likely for a vote

I was talking to an SEC member last night. While they wished to remain anonymous they said they did not expect a vote to allow Kent Williams back into the party to even come up for a vote at the next SEC meeting.

I asked why.

The response was Williams disastrous meeting with the Shelby county and surrounding county SEC committee members. I had heard rumor of the meeting a few weeks back but asked for details from someone who was actually there.

What happened? I asked.

What I heard after that confirmed what I had heard previously and was almost a comedy of errors or a lesson on how to alienate Republicans of all stripes. While I could go on and on as to what was said I will only pass on some of the highlights.

One question posed to Kent was why he didn't appoint more Republicans to committee chairs. His response was that we didn't have 13 out of 49 Republican members who were even qualified to be chairs of the committees. He then went on to even name specific Republican members (While I was not personally on the short list I know the members named and most would consider those named way more then qualified).

The person who relayed the story to me said they thought personally if the members mentioned were not qualified to be chairmen of committees then how could Kent think he was qualified to be speaker of the house after only one term in office.

Kent then went on to name off more Republican members (Again, I was not on the list) and say they were "Bad" or "problem" members. The people present wondered if Kent was just pulling names out of thin air because those mentioned were, and are, well thought of members.

He went on to attack Jason Mumpower for being "Childish" for having over 100 flags flown over the capitol on the first day of session. Little did Kent know the flags were going to be given to the SEC members for their hard work and support for Republicans through the years.

One person asked about Kent's personal Republican philosophy. Kent said the "Reagan revolution" was a disaster. When Republicans were elected into the majority in Washington D.C. they were terrible. He blamed Newt Gingrich and the early Republicans for being being liberal big spenders and that was why Republicans deserved to loose leadership. But he then went on to say how he thought it was a legislators job to try and bring back as many "goodies" to their home district as possible. The SEC members shook their head at the disconnect between the two points of view and question his historical knowledge. Most knew it was the later Republicans who were the problem spenders and that Newt was a great idea man for the party.

Kent said how if the Democrats won 6 seats in the next election he would probably switch parties to be a Democrat. He said it not as a threat, more of a statement of fact. Even thinking that is a big no no if you are asking to become a Republican again. He went ahead and openly said it to the members present as if it was no big deal. That steamed a bunch of members.

One complained about Kent's often, repeated, expletive filled commentary. Some of the members were older and thought it was inappropriate and uncalled for. The crowd was not hostile. In fact, many came in support of Kent. They thought it was quite crude.

There are many more stories and I could continue but lets just say the person said Kent rambled on, non stop, for about an hour and forty five minutes of the two hour meeting and was all over the place. The person I spoke with said when he spoke with all the other members present after the meeting that Kent had found multiple ways, without their prompting, to turn off almost every single person in the room.

Of those present almost half were former Kent supporters who had voted originally to keep him in the party. When it was all said and done at best only one was still undecided or in support of Kent. Kent had actually lost support while talking. The consensus was he was bitter and just came off as not trustworthy. Most (even the former Kent supporters) felt they were being lied to throughout the meeting.

After that one meeting, the other planned meetings with SEC members in and around Nashville and across the state were cancelled. It was a disaster and the word spread quickly of what was said. Even one moderate SEC member said "We may not agree on all issues, but if we can not even agree that Republicans should lead committees then why would you even want to be a Republican?"

The member I talked with said it would look bad for Kent and his few remaining supporters if a vote was actually taken and he LOST votes from the original expulsion vote, as is now expected, so they did not expect a vote motion to even come up.