Joe Kennedy, former Republican.

Imagine losing the Senate a week ago, getting beat from Kansas to Texas, and the first thing the man who ran the place does is send word down the line that he does not want Tim Burchett in the seat Marsha Blackburn is leaving… because Tim might not do what leadership tells him to do. There it is. Not that he is unqualified, not that he cannot win, not that he did something wrong… he might not obey. And Tim's answer is the best thing I have heard out of Washington all week. "I love the fact that he's not for me." Then he says the big players in the party, the one or two who pull the strings and write the big checks, have never been for him and are always for him the day after the election. Read that again, because a sitting congressman just told you out loud how the club actually works. Let me explain why this matters. John Thune just presided over what his own colleagues are calling a "stunning defeat," and Senate Republicans are still lined up to hand him the minority leader job, so much so that Ron Johnson, Rick Scott, Mike Lee, John Kennedy and others had to sign a letter just to ask for a meeting first to talk about what went wrong. How is it that the guy who lost the majority has time to work against a Tennessee appointment but no time to answer for the loss? Who exactly is he protecting that seat from, the Democrats or his own voters? Here is the reality. The uniparty does not fear losing to the left nearly as much as it fears one more person in that chamber who will not take the call. They can live in the minority, they have done it before and the checks still clear. What they cannot live with is someone who reads the bill, says no to the omnibus, and goes home and tells you what happened in the room. Now keep in mind, Tim says this came from an off the record conversation with a prominent media figure, and none of it has been confirmed by Thune. Fine. Then Thune can clear it up in public, today, in one sentence. I will wait. The good news is Governor elect Blackburn already said Washington does not decide who the senator from Tennessee is, she does, and she is exactly right. Tim says he is running in 2028 either way. @MarshaBlackburn, the people of Tennessee are watching who you listen to. Appoint the man the swamp does not want. End stop.