Free Republic

<p>FRANKFORT, Ky. -- A judge refused yesterday to keep Ernie Fletcher, a Republican candidate for governor, from replacing Hunter Bates as his running mate for lieutenant governor, but state Rep. Steve Nunn's running mate said he'd appeal.</p> <p>Franklin Circuit Judge William Graham's decision allowed Fletcher, a member of Congress from Lexington, to stay on the May 20 primary ballot.</p>

<p>Amid last week's squabbling among Republican gubernatorial candidates about Hunter Bates' disqualification as U.S. Rep. Ernie Fletcher's running mate, there was another spat -- about Fletcher's television advertising schedule.</p> <p>When the war started in Iraq, Fletcher said he was suspending his commercials, which were running on only Louisville stations, for ''the initial stages of war.'' He resumed them Thursday, and former Jefferson County JudgeExecutive Rebecca Jackson's campaign, which is cash-poor and has not bought TV spots, made sure reporters knew about it.</p>

<p>''Our opponents are trying to decide this election in the courtroom,'' Ernie Fletcher said.</p> <p>Having knocked Hunter Bates off U. S. Rep. Ernie Fletcher's Republican slate for governor, state Rep. Steve Nunn's campaign went to court yesterday to disqualify Fletcher, too.</p>

<p>Hunter Bates lived in Alexandria, Va., from 1995 to 2002.</p> <p>UPDATE: Hunter Bates said today that he won't appeal yesterday's court decision removing him as U.S. Rep. Ernie Fletcher's running mate for lieutenant governor on grounds that he hasn't lived in Kentucky long enough.</p>

The Reporter broke with its own tradition by publishing an unsigned letter to the editor, apparently because that person was one of three that finally discovered, after 17 years, that op-ed columnist Michael Bates is a crank. The "concerned resident of Oak Lawn" wrote to protest Bates' April 11 column titled "Still a Clinton hater — and loving it," in which Bates proved he is still one of many conservatives who can't get over the fact that their embodiment of evil incarnate is still so darn popular. (To this we say to Mr. Bates, Nyah nyah nyah nyah nyah!) "Are...