I’VE BEEN GETTING SPAM-SLAMMED BY TENNESSEE DEMOCRATS AFRAID THAT DEMOCRATIC JUSTICES ON THE SUPREME COURT WILL LOSE THE RETENTION VOTE. Now it looks like they may have violated state election laws with this campaign. More here.

I don’t have a dog in this fight, but Tennessee’s constitution says that the Supreme Court is to be elected, and the system under which that retention vote takes place — though upheld by, ahem, the Tennessee Supreme Court — isn’t really an “election” as such, and was put in place by Democrats in the 1970s who saw a Republican wave building in the state and wanted to hang on to the Supreme Court. The thing about a retention vote, though, is that it’s an easy win if nobody makes an issue of it, but if people organize against you there’s no opposing candidate to point to and attack.