Congratulations to Mr. Mike Stein of the Coffee County Democratic Party for penning what is easily the most absurd Op-ed that I’ve seen appear in The News. The level of hypocrisy he was able to fit into a quarter page was truly astounding. Once again members of the Democratic Party have sought to use tragedy for political advantage, this time an incident where six Tennesseans, three of them young children, were killed. Decent people would at least wait for the funerals to be conducted and all the facts to come in. Today’s Democrats rush for the microphones before the smoke clears.

Three Democratic Members of the General Assembly stopped Democracy in action by taking a bullhorn to the well of the chamber. There they labored to whip already agitated protesters in the gallery into an all-out riot. From there, where? Vandalism? Arson? Murder? Insurrection? The moral action for Mr. Stein would be to chastise those members for acting the fool and apologize to the citizens of Tennessee for their behavior. Instead he decided to declare the members of the majority party racists because they failed to expel all three Members in response to the disruption of decorum. I agree with him that the third member should have been expelled, but a few members of the legislature didn’t feel her actions were as grievous as those of the other two. There was no racism.

What followed the accusation in the ample space The Tennessean provided Mr. Stein was a pecksniffian tirade blaming Republicans for the actions of decades of Democratic legislatures and governors that would leave any semi-aware reader gobsmacked. He accused the Tennessee Legislature of living “up to its heritage as the birthplace of the KKK” when it was the Democratic Party in Tennessee that actually started the KKK and whose members filled wore their hoods for decades. He accused Republicans of “pushing an unpopular voucher program” he said would benefit “affluent white families” when the program would actually allow mostly black students to escape dangerous failed public schools in places like Shelby County. He cited the racial segregation after Brown his party caused. He invoked the January 6th riots when his Members were calling for a repeat and worse at our Capitol.

For decency, Mr. Stein should apologize for his baseless accusations against the citizens of Tullahoma and one of our Representatives. Instead, like the petulant personal promoters his party sent to Nashville, he’ll continue to muckrake and drive the state apart for political gain and power. Some “party of love.”

Joseph Sheeley

Tullahoma