From the latest issue of the Wrestling Observer Newsletter:
The proposed Toby Keith-Jeff Jarrett promotion, which is a long way from happening, stemmed almost exactly as youd think. TNA was for sale and Jarrett through his connections with the Nashville music industry and Keith in particular, tried to put together a bid to buy the company. The deal was very close at one point. Bob Carter came to Keith to finalize the deal and the two sides were close on a price, although they were not quite there. The belief is they were going to hash it out, but Carter only had one request in selling, which was that Dixie Carter would remain with her title, have some power in the company and remain a television character. Keith said he wasnt going to buy the company with any creative limitations, so the deal actually fell apart because Bob Carter in the end was going to protect his daughter. Someone in TNA who was aware of how it went down noted to us that, Thats why we all are still here, noting if it was about business, TNA would have never survived after the last golden carrots (prime time TV and Hulk Hogan) failed to increase popularity or take the company from losing money. At that point, the feeling was from Keith and Jarrett that they didnt need to buy the company, as they could start their own company from scratch. The deal falling through would have been shortly before Jarrett quit TNA in December. The other thing noted is when this story got out inside of TNA, those who had tried to believe the Janice Carter memo and thought the idea was that the Carters wouldnt sell, and the talks were for just a minority investor, realized theyd been had.