Blogger Curtis Coleman, Republican U.S. Senate candidate in 2012, will speak today at the Central Arkansas Republican Club at 11:30 a.m. Super blogger Jason Tolbert of The Tolbert Report will be on hand with his flip cam, so Mr. Coleman better be on his best behavior. Remember what happened to state Sen. Kim Hendren with Mr. Tolbert showed up with his Flip Cam? Thought so.
An e-mail came in to The Think Tank yesterday indicating that Chris Matthews of MSNBC was talking about Mr. Coleman’s infamous southeast Arkansas comments. I can’t find the clip, but apparently he quoted Arkansas Democratic Party executive director Mariah Hatta on the air. Previously, Politico picked up Zack Stovall’s Arkansas News Bureau story.
UPDATE: Here’s the transcript from MSNBC.
UPDATE II: Here’s the video.
UPDATE III: Oh man, blogger Curtis Coleman fell into Jason Tolbert’s Flip Cam trap and goes on camera to clarify his “you need a visa and a shot to travel to southeast Arkansas” comment. If I counted it right his explanation was more than 3 minutes, involved a listing of every city in “southeast” Arkansas and the number of friends Mr. Coleman has from there. All of this to say he didn’t mean it the way it was interpreted. Of course, if you watch the entire video you’ll note that he does say this:
I could have easily said that in southeast Arkansas about northwest Arkansas.
I’m sure they’ll appreciate that.
UPDATE IV: Ben Smith of Politico picks up on Mr. Tolbert’s interview on his own blog.
UPDATE V: And yes, as I suggested earlier, Mr. Coleman must be dumb. He says so himself in Mr. Tolbert’s interview:
It is a thousand more times more likely that I am stupid than I am racist.
The fact is Curtis Coleman is a businessman with conservative principles who will be a great senator. It amazes me how bloggers attempt to gain a litttle notoriety out of every single word or action from people in the spotlight, instead of focusing on issues that actually matter to this country. Good luck with your own search for the spotlight.
OK, that was kinda mean. I have no idea who Blake Rutherford is or his motives. I apologize. I do wish the issues would be the focus, instead of the minutia of the political game.