John Pointer to challenge Mary Mancini to lead the Tennessee Democratic Party

The Tennessean reports in today's edition that Democrat Party Chairman Mary Mancini has drawn a second challenger, John Pointer.  Pointer is a former State bureaucrat. Under Sunquist he served as  State Director of the Office of Small and Minority Business and under Gov. Phil Bredesen he served as an assistant state director specializing in Section 8 federal funding in the Tennessee Housing Development Agency. He was more recently the owner of a Sears store in Columbia Tennessee. 

John Pointer

The Small Business Development Center (TSBDC) network associated with Middle Tennessee State University helped Pointer secure financing of the store and they tout Mr. Pointer as a success story on their website, never mentioning that he was a former director of the Office of Small and Minority Business for the State. I don't know that anything is wrong with that, but it seems a little unseemly.  (link)

Pointer says he wants to bring a “business-like approach” to leading the state party and  that Democrats have failed to reach out to middle class families in rural parts of the state. Mancini is also being challenged by Jamie Isabel, a former Metro Councilman.

Despite the Democratic Senate caucus shrinking to the size that they can fit in a phone booth and the Democratic House Caucus shrinking to the point they can fit in a hippy VW van, I think Mary Mancini has done a good job.  She has attracted fans of Lambchop, the three listeners to Liberadio(!) and those who advocate for many fringe progressive causes and the snowflakes who are still in denial about the recent election out come.  Well, they were already loyal Democrats but she may be able to keep them engaged.  If you attract enough small factions, who needs middle class families in rural parts of the State?

I am pulling for Mary Mancini. She deserves another term.

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