Facebook debate on primary meddling pits blogger vs. Thom Tillis
What started out as a simple get-out-the-vote message on Facebook from state House speaker Thom Tillis turned into a no-holds barred debate on the merits of the Raleigh establishment meddling in party primaries outside the beltline.
The whole debate got started — and eventually reported — by Lisa Marley, editor and publisher of the Truth or Dare blog:
In a candid exchange on Facebook with Truth or Dare, Speaker of the House Thom Tillis defended Arthur Williams publicly once again and inserted himself unnecessarily, once again, into our local House race. Tillis engaged in a debate with Truth or Dare and then deleted this blogger’s comments as well as some of his own, saying that Truth or Dare’s posting of these comments represented behavior that diverted attention from more important issues. Tillis then banished this blogger to the land of un-friends.
Tillis tried to prop up Williams’ liberal voting record and then defended his own intrusion into the NC6 race. Probably realizing that he’d stepped into it once again, Tillis removed certain comments from the thread including my comments and some of his own, and un-friended me. Fortunately, technology being what it is, Truth or Dare captured the full exchange before it disappeared from Facebook. It is posted below for your reading pleasure. You can still find parts of these comments on Tillis’ personal FB page, at least for now.
Note, this was captured via three screen shots. This exchange took place beginning at 10:30am, Sunday, July 15th and ended just before 11am. When you’re done with this, click over to the Beaufort Observer fortheir timely commentary.
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Thom Tillis is a sleazy backroom politician and we certainly do not need him as a US Senate candidate in 2012. His handling of Zippergate was atrocious. Does he think anyone would believe that he did not know who his own roommate and chief staffer was regularly bedding?
His trying to foist Jim Black Democrat Arthur Williams on the 6th district, and pulling Walter Jones into it, is nothing less than a declaration of war against the grassroots of the party. He was also involved in trying to foist major Democrat contributor Randy Ramsey on a senate district south of the 6th and some other bad apples in other parts of the state.
But in looking at how Tilis operates, we need to remember where he came from. Richard Turncoat Morgan, then a self-described moderate, wanted to get rid of many conservatives in the legislature, one of them being Rep. John Rhoades (R-Mecklenburg). Morgan handpicked Thom Tillis as his sock puppet to run against Rhoades, and showered him with money to outspend Rhoades in the primary. Some of that money was from corrupt pay-for-play deals. So Tillis is just taking after his political godfather, the corrupt party traitor Richard Turncoat Morgan.
Speaker Tillis did not compare Arthur Williams to Ronald Reagan and Jesse Helms, nor did I, though I did make the comment mentioning them as former Democrats turned Republicans. While Jesse Helms was always conservative, even as a Democrat, there was a point when Reagan also had only embraced conservative ideals for 18 months. Anyway, the point was missed and blown way out of proportion. As I said, I don’t have a dog in this fight, but if I did, giving what little I do know about the candidates, I would cast my vote for Ms. Lawson. I just don’t want the Speaker hung in effigy for something I said.