The "Courage of Lee Beaman"

Michael Cass underscores Lee Beaman's contributions to Eric Crafton's English Only this morning, and the responses Cass gets from Beaman and Crafton make the auto dealer sound like some kind of hero for Nashville. I have not checked to see how much Beaman donated to CM Crafton's campaigns for Metro Council, but that $6,000 to Nashville English First looks like an investment in the CM's political future, too.

Mr. Beaman's donorship history does not look that courageous to me:

• The Center for Responsive Politics ranked Lee Beaman among the Top 15 Auto Industry Hard Money Contributors with the likes of Ford and Chrysler
• Of his $122,781 in partisan donations during one five-year period, Beaman donated $250 to Democrats, and he lives in a state where the ideological differences between Republicans and Democrats are relatively slight
• In 2004 Beaman donated $2,500 to the "Swift Boat Veterans for Truth" a shadow campaign designed to keep George W. Bush in the White House by means of assassinating the character of Bush's opponent
• Beaman and his wife Kelley donated $2,000 to Charlie Tygard's campaign while Tygard was attracting ethical questions and while Kelley lead an ethics in government advocacy group
• Beaman contributed $15,000 to Tennessee Forum, which was designed to advance a far-right GOP agenda in the state capital.
• Beaman donated $2,000 to California's Proposition 8 banning gay and lesbian marriages.

Mr. Beaman told the Tennessean that he contributed $6,000 to NEF without solicitation from Crafton. That self-initiated muscle-flexing is all fine and good, but it is amazing that the tough financial times that have most people strapped for cash don't seem to be bothering the auto scion's campaign financing habits at all.

If buying political influence on the right is what counts for courage nowadays, I'll take cowardice. If might makes right, I don't want to be right.