Down the Road

What’s missing from this billboard?


There’s the candidate’s name – but what’s he running for?

Presumably, these ads are promoting Rep. Wamp for re-election to Congress. In reality, of course, they’re all about the governor’s race in 2010. A dead giveaway is that they appear far outside Wamp’s actual congressional district.

I saw a ton of these all over East Tennessee while travelling for the Thanksgiving holiday. Were these billboards paid for by Wamp’s congressional campaign?

If so, I suspect they technically follow the letter of the law if not the spirit. After all, Wamp isn’t an official candidate for governor yet and shouldn’t be raising or spending money on his gubernatorial campaign already.

Wamp wants to make it official in January, if only Bill Frist would hurry up and announce one way or the other. Since Wamp doesn’t have Frist’s star power, he needs to start campaigning now.

My prediction: Frist is in, and no big-name Republican or Democrat has the guts to run against him.