I don’t trust Haslam (not like I should trust politicians, and to correct Secretary Kissinger’s comment, it’s the 99.999999% of all politicians that make the other .000001% look bad). He’s a Willard-bot (an early supporter) and has been part of the same country-clubber establishment elite that kept the state GOP in the doldrums for so long. Only because of a perfect storm of reaction to national Democrats along with the 140-year ‘House of Cards’ the Democrats had established in the state did the collapse come so rapidly in the past few election cycles, and NOT due to any hard work on the part of the Haslam/Scumquist/Lamar!/Corker cabal.
I neither voted for him in the primary (I voted for the Conservative Lieutenant Governor, Ron Ramsey, who is in actuality, considered the most powerful political figure in the state), nor in the general (I voted for a Conservative Independent). TN Democrats couldn’t even get a first-tier candidate to run (they ran the son of a former Governor who was way out of his element as he’d never run for office before).
The thing about the TN Governorship is that it is somewhat weak, because it was designed so that in the case of a GOP Governor, a previously reliable Democrat legislative majority could override (by simple majority vote) any vetoes cast.
I have to believe Haslam (along with the other elites) isn’t happy with a legislature that is far more committed to traditional social issues (or rather undoing the damage) than he will ever be. However, because the establishment slipped in one of theirs into the House Speakership, it can put the brakes on any more overtly, bold reforms (although Speaker Beth Harwell isn’t a left-winger, neither is she a committed social Conservative).
Haslam, the always-smiling politician (which is a tell-tale sign right there) wouldn’t want to overtly risk any internecine war (he’s also too spineless), so he’ll usually get dragged along. But it is solely due to a now-heavily GOP legislature (which will now be even more so come next January with a lot of the remaining old Democrat machine jumping ship, including the execrable rodent tyrant Boss Hogg Naifeh, who has occupied a GOP-leaning district since he knocked off a freshman Republican in the Watergate debacle - as you well remember what it was like for any Republican running that year). It is not out of the question the GOP could get 80% of the legislature (they have 2/3rds already), leaving the remaining Dems hailing almost solely from urban areas (Blacks & White moonbats).
The downside, of course, to having such a lopsided majority is that with the Democrats a powerless rump, the left will work overtime to install GOP puppets (the downside in TN is that we have open primaries, which BADLY need closing) to wreak havoc as necessary. As we’ve so often seen, they’re more dangerous and deadly working within the GOP than staying where they belong in the Democrats.
Anyway, so long as the current setup holds, Haslam won’t be able to inflict the kind of damage so many RINOs do, so long as he remains Governor. My worry is that if Lamar! retires, he will want to go to DC, and it would be as a Senator his squishiness and smiling ‘moderation’ (sic) would be a serious threat. TN deserves far better from its Senators.
Haslam’s veto of the law overturning Vanderbilt’s discrimination against Christians bothers me.
I just left the state where Boxer and Feinstein are senators. Alexander and Corker are a huge improvement. I wasn’t here during that election, but I remember that the alternative to Corker was Ford.