What's Your Number?

Everybody, as a famous Mississippi resident noted, has a price.

I've heard my friends for a long time talk about how much more Jim Hood is going to get them paid. He's going to raise teacher pay, and public employee pay, and this, and that. And he'll do it by cutting grocery taxes!

(If you cut grocery taxes, property taxes go up, especially in municipalities, because that's where a lot of their funding comes from. But don't expect Jim or his media enablers to tell you that.)

So my question is: What's your price?

What's the price of being able to defend your home? Jim Hood doesn't want you to be able to do that.

What's the price of being able to defend your business from lawsuits, especially like those that Jack Phillips has had to go through?

What's the price of not giving boards and commissions over to the people who gave us this nickname?

What's the price of only defending Mississippi laws during election years when you need some pro-life cred with the "Bible thumpers?"

What's the price of watching unsolved murders continue to go unsolved just because nobody at the New York or Chicago or LA papers cares about them? Even when the crime occurred 35 miles from Jim Hood's house in Houston?

Bet you thought we forgot about that one, didn't you?

What's the price of giving power over to someone who has no problem using his office to punish his political opponents, or those of his friends?

Oh, you thought we forgot about that one too, didn't you?

So is your raise worth all those things? When you're probably getting a raise anyway, no matter who you're voting for?

Give me your number. Because you've admitted you have one. Just go ahead and say what it is.

Jim Hood Will Meet With Women Behind Closed Doors!

So will this guy.



Also, he will fight for an Equal Pay Act.

(The Equal Pay Act passed Congress in 1963, and was signed into law by President Kennedy, but since Jim Hood is just a good ole country boy that lives in the country, he doesn't know it. Things move slower out in the country, you see. Also, imagine the lawsuits his friends can file if he gets it passed! Win-Win!)

Seriously, though. You can't really win this fight. You either invite the controversy of not being alone with a woman, or you invite the possibility of scandal. There's only one solution in either the professional world or the political one in the age of "MeToo".



(Also, John Kennedy had some of his own issues with things that would be...less than charitably viewed today.)

Teacher Pay Raise

Jim Hood wants to "raise corporate taxes" to pay for a pay raise for teachers. Apparently, out in the country, where Jim Hood is from, remember, they didn't ever talk about the goose that laid the golden egg. In the last 16 years Mississippi has been able to attract businesses because of our low tax rate and favorable business climate, but hey, LEROOOYYYY JENKINS! to all that.

I have another funding source: All the attorney's fees that Mr. Hood has disbursed to his friends over the last decade and a half (and Mike Moore before him). When the state of Mississippi wins a lawsuit, it sure would be nice to get that money, instead of the guys that Jim Hood decides need to be able to fund his campaign make an honest living out there a-lawyerin', as they say out in the country, where Jim Hood is from.

In reality, the money is there. It's always been there. It just never actually reaches the teachers due to the bloat and bureaucracy that infests both the Mississippi Department of Education (Hi, Dr. Wright and your ridiculous salary!) and many of the school districts.

How come they never suggest cutting her $300,000 per year? I  know it's a drop in the bucket, but as a character in a movie once said, "What is an ocean, but a multitude of drops?"

Future Clarion-Ledger Exclusives on Immigrant Detainee

Immigrant Detainee Has Lunch

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Immigrant Detainee Buys Groceries

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Immigrant Detainee Walks Down Street

Immigrant Detainee Sings Karaoke

Immigrant Detainee Searches For Bigfoot

Immigrant Detainee Contacts Elvis

Immigrant Detainee Finds Pot of Gold at End of Rainbow

Immigrant Detainee Can Believe It's Not Butter

After what seems like forever, how far are we from seeing these headlines? I know a manipulative sob story when I read one. It's almost like...she's getting exactly what she wants. Fawning press coverage from the state's newspaper, which is owned by a national newspaper brand, which will then be on national wires.

Between that and the distinct "this is Anti-Woman" slant of the last week (keeping up with "Anti-Woman" bills? Who exactly determines that?) it's like...they're setting up a narrative. Who benefits? Other than the state's finest Conway Twitty impersonator, you mean?

Today's Bit of Media Hypocrisy

Bobby Harrison of the Daily Journal has an article about the confluence between interest groups and legislators. 

You can read it here, and conspiracies abound.

I will be interested to see if Mr. Harrison will also be doing a piece on what influenced Attorney General Jim Hood's decision to forgo his constitutional and statutory duty to defend the laws of Mississippi in the courts. I also will not be holding my breath while doing so. 

I will remind everyone that if any other elected official in the state refused to do his or her duty, Jim Hood would have thrown a library's worth of books at them. And he would be lauded for doing so by the press in our state. But he's Jim Hood, and they're the Mississippi press corps, so I will leave you with a bit of wisdom from ages ago:

He who expects little, is never disappointed.

All Your Google Searches Belong to Hood

Harmful Content

I'm sure Google searches for Jim Hood will now only tell you he is the kindest, bravest, warmest, most wonderful human being you'll ever know in life.

So Samson Doesn't Know If He's Running For Governor

Yeah, listening to his interview about "large campaign donors" and "tax breaks for the corporations" tells me he's really leaning toward not running, you know?  SARCASM.

Since he's so unconcerned about social issues, here are a few business issues he should ask.

Should the power of the state be used to compel a person to violate their conscience?

Should the state have oversight of medical operations that require invasive procedures? (Like a certain Dr. Gosnell)

Should the state fine businesses for not using someone's "preferred pronouns?" (Yeah, that's the new thing. It's happening in New York)

Should the state start regulating churches and require that they deviate from their teachings and beliefs? (As was mentioned here on Wednesday in Iowa)

These are questions that an honest state media would ask him. But (spoiler) they won't. Instead, he'll get to pontificate and will always get the last word in. Unfortunately, his opponent will probably be Tate Reeves, who's probably woefully unprepared for the onslaught that he'll face. After all, Hood is pretty much it on the left. There's Brandon Presley, who really, really, really wants you to know about that no-call list, ya'll (The PSC is basically a remnant of the state's 1891 anti-business and, oh yeah, racist constitution, and like your appendix, it might need to come out at some point). But Hood's got the trial lawyers in his pocket, and they're gonna sink or swim with him.

I can see his announcement now. The groundwork has been laid, the move back to Houston, the little law office he's renting. Can't run as an outsider from Jackson, after all. The whole spiel about fighting the robber barons for the little guy. The faux-centrist but-really-trying-not-to-offend-Democratic-intrest-groups-while-not-offending-conservatives schtick. He's thought on it, he's prayed on it. He's going from Samson to Hamlet. He feels that he's got to, for the good of the state. All he'll be missing is R2-D2 with a hologram of the Princess saying he's our only hope.

I Can Call Em

So remember when I gave you the Jim Hood playbook?  You remember-"I'm Jim Hood, and I'm against Crime!" (And the implication is that if you're not Samson himself, YOU DON'T CARE ABOUT CRIME).

I turned on my TV this morning, and what did I see?  A Jim Hood ad targeting Mike Hurst for not prosecuting Domestic Violence cases.

Cause that's a federal crime, you know?  (HEAVY SARCASM GUYS).

You know what else Mike Hurst hasn't ever prosecuted?  People who ran against his buddies. You know, like Hood did for Jamie Franks.