7/09/2005 03:47:00 PM|||Nathan Moore|||

Don Sundquist, former Tennessee governor, pariah of the Tennessee Republican Party, the flag bearer for both the state income tax and TennCare, has been named by the Bush Administration to headup a task force to fix Medicaid. Right.

Among the former governor's most recent highlights

Former Gov. Don Sundquist was "the impetus" for the federal investigation into state contracts that has led to the indictments of two of his friends, a federal judge says in court documents.

Federal prosecutors have evidence that Sundquist "improperly interceded" on behalf of a firm called Education Networks of America, or ENA, that wanted to do business with the state, U.S. District Judge Karl Forester wrote in a court filing.

Why would Bush appoint this man to head a Medicaid task force, much less anything requiring reasonable levels of sanity and political acumen? The president might as well have appointed Bill Clinton to head a sexual harassment prevention committee and Ted Kennedy to do a probe on alcohol consumption and drowning.

And further

The chairman of the Tennessee Democratic Party, Bob Tuke, called Sundquist's new post "bizarre."

My God, I'm agreeing with Bob Tuke on something - well, to the point that what Tuke said was not an understatement. Howard Dean's election as DNC chair looks like a sober move by a bunch of mainstream Democrats compared to the selection of Sunquist to head up Medicaid reform.

Please, someone, email and tell me. Tell me that some penny-ante favor to Sunquist does not trump the good of the Republican Party.

|||112094335110284946|||Sundquist....arrgh