Wednesday, June 15, 2005

Georgia 2006

We talked Georgia state politics over dinner tonight with a knowledgeable friend. His take is that of Gov. Sonny Purdue‘s Democratic challengers, Cathy Cox is terrific, and stands a chance, except that a bitter primary fight with Mark Taylor will probably destroy both of them. Taylor, in this friend’s view, is a smarmy but smart old-style southern politician.

Sounds like what we need is the Republicans to self-destruct. (Sonny tried with the Georgia state flag.)

Our friend points to the AJC opinion page today, where Bob Irvin, a former Republican state representative and House minority leader calls on Ralph Reed to, “Please withdraw your candidacy for Georgia lieutenant governor.”

Reed, he says, is “simply too divisive” because of “the ongoing scandal over casino money” which is “only the latest, but not likely the last, scandal to surface.”

Irvin, an evangelical Christian, calls Reed an albatross who could destroy the Georgia GOP majority coalition because he is four things that Georgians don’t elect--a lobbyist, a Washington man, an ideologue, and a career politician:

In the last few weeks, I can’t tell you the number of people who have come up to me and volunteered something like, “I’m a Republican, but I’m not voting for Ralph Reed.” Generally, they live in the suburbs, the decisive battleground in this and future elections, but some of them are in South Georgia.

They are mostly long-time Republican activists, people I have known for 30 years or more in the finally successful effort to build a two-party system. Reed’s nomination will alienate them. His defeat will alienate his naive but devoted supporters. Either way, we’re left with a minority.

Howard Dean says Georgia is still in play. Maybe so.

Where’s our Arnold?

Michael Moore made a lot of sense when, on the Today show back in January, he said:

Where’s our Arnold? Why aren’t we running our Arnold? Why do we continue to run these wonks? The American people--see the Republicans, as much as they berate Hollywood, actually they love Hollywood. In fact, they know that Americans love Hollywood, too, and that’s why Republicans run people from Hollywood. Reagan, Arnold, Gopher from “The Love Boat.” He was in Congress...Sonny Bono...Fred Thompson. They know that Americans love Hollywood. That’s why they run people from Hollywood. And--and when the Democrats run stars: Bill Clinton, the rock star; John Kennedy, the movie star, they win. And when they run wonks, they lose. And they’ve got to start thinking about the people who connect to the average American out there, and who are really--you know, people who move the American public in--in a very visceral way...when we start running people that are beloved by the American public, we’re going to win.

Well, yeah. And we’re making progress on that front. California’s got its Draft Warren adherents ("making a better governor out of a better actor") and today in the NYTimes there’s this:

MINNEAPOLIS, June 13 - The swells who showed up before Al Franken’s speech at a Democratic fund-raiser to down finger food and punch were thrilled to see him, all the more so because he continues to make threatening noises about running for the Senate here in 2008...Mr. Franken, who left Minnesota at age 22 but has made a habit of coming back frequently, has suggested he may move his radio show to the state sometime next year. His delivery manages to be caustic and laconic, an unhurried savaging of all that is conservative and Republican, all wrapped up to a trumpeted call to arms.

RELATED: On that same Today Show, I liked what Michael had to say about Hillary too.

Journalist or commentator?

An apparent goal of the Republican Noise Machine is to confuse commentators with journalists. Today comes word that conservative goal is meeting with significant success:

According to an Annenberg poll conducted this spring, about 40 percent of Americans consider Fox News talk show host Bill O’Reilly a “journalist”—while only 30 percent of the people surveyed said they considered famed Washington Post reporter Bob Woodward to be one...Meanwhile, more than a quarter surveyed said that another champion of judicious reportage, radio talk show host Rush Limbaugh, was a journalist. Limbaugh said Monday that he was “not really surprised” by the results showing that 27 percent of Americans would describe him as a journalist. “I am America’s anchorman, doing news play-by-play 15 hours a week for nearly 17 years now,” Limbaugh said, “and this is just more evidence that the old media’s monopoly-like dominance is finished.”

Frist refused roll call & where was Saxby?

AJC:

WASHINGTON - Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist (R-Tenn.) refused repeated requests for a roll call vote that would have put senators on the record on a resolution apologizing for past failures to pass anti-lynching laws, officials involved in the negotiations said Tuesday.

And there was disagreement Tuesday over whether Saxby Chambliss, one of Georgia’s two Republican senators, had supported the measure when it was approved Monday night...Chambliss’ name was added to the list of co-sponsors after the resolution was adopted, according to the Congressional Record. But his office said he had signed onto the bill as a co-sponsor before Monday’s vote.

Via AMERICAblog:

Bill First, the Republican leader of the United States Senate, vetoed having a roll call vote on a resolution apologizing to victims of lynchings. He tried to hide the resolution in the middle of the night so no one would no about it.