Whether real or imagined, I get treated in some very small circles like a king or queen maker out here in Oconee in the de facto General Election called the Republican Primary. You have to figure the G.O.P. vote will be pretty much split down the middle on most races, making the 35% of the electorate on the Democratic side a fairly valuable and viable constituency. I was doing this long before lunatic Limbaugh unleashed Operation Chaos.

With the revelations this past weekend of "The List" and one candidate supposedly owing a boatload of money in child support, it should make the forums starting this evening rather lively, although I will probably go hear Packway Handle Band play at Ashford Manor Bed and Breakfast after a few questions.

Dan Matthews

If Tommy Malcom defeats Bill Cowsert 2 or 3-to-1 in Oconee County, will Cowsert corral enough in Walton (at best a push) and Clarke to offset the anticipated Malcom crush in his home county?

Dan Matthews

What's to say Malcom is going to beat Cowsert out in Oconee County? I haven't met anyone with any complaints regarding the job Bill has done up in Atlanta. Moreover, he's got the fund raising advantage, the better name recognition, the support of the state GOP, and the volunteer army of UGA College Republicans all apparently in his corner.

Nothing against Tommy, but seeing him at the Walton County BBQ fund raiser last weekend, he looks in a bit over his head.

Then again, maybe Bowersville could lecture me on how Bill is part of the evil GOP establishment.

Bill is definitely in it. However, so are the vast majority of Oconee County GOP voters. Remember, in the OC, if not in D.C., Paul Broun is the establishment.

Maybe Tommy Malcom is following the Broun playbook? A bunch of yard signs + a road named after an ancestor = victory!

on one hand I would like to help keep Vernon Jones out of the General Election. It is fairly obvious that his candidacy will kill any opportunities of democratic gains in the legislature. It is not likely that any of the democratic candidates can win, but what will help democrats in general.

On the other hand, I would rather Barry Fleming be my congressman. Paul Broun is an embarrassment. After exhausting anything that can really be said about that democratic "candidate" it obvious that the GOP nominee will win the general election. It is exciting though...this will be the third primary I get to vote in this year!

Kandrew, I only get involved in my district races. If Blake wants a debate on the 50th Senate seat, I'm ready...but until then I'm mute on the Cowsert/Malcom race.

would you care to expand on "Broun is an embarrassment?"

http://www.peachpundit.com/2008/06/02/with-all-due-respect-this-is-ridic...
http://www.digitaljournal.com/article/254471
http://www.onlineathens.com/stories/052408/news_20080524036.shtml

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i9P4dNPVMk4&feature=related
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rxU40e13u5E

He's also the wort public speaker I've ever heard... he's like an orangutan with a lobotomy.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TNj3oTeK73E
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_JnNFEkejCc

So, Blake, are you peddling your own personal Operation Chaos? Ha-ha, let me tell ya'll what to do: If you are a democrat, vote in that primary; if you are a Republican, then, you know ... Problem solved!!

I suffer from enough of my own grammatical inconsistencies, but please people, Democratic and Democrat are ALWAYS capitalized unless you are talking about a style of government, like democratic republic. I see most people do capitalize Republican or G.O.P.

Cross over Athens, bother the status quo
Dan Matthews

I am all for it. Especially in places like the OC or ACC, where the primary is often the real election.

that Broun is an embarrassment.

I will try to elaborate the best I can. I think the fact that your average Canadian citizen, even British citizens, know more about the U.S. Constitution than Broun is a decent start.

His "crusade" to align the constitution with the bible is proof positive that he has no idea what this country stands for. All of that and his proposals and cosponsorships of shadow bills aimed at misleading the complacent public is also a testament to his being an embarassment. The man has done nothing of consequence since arriving in D.C. He values nothing...every is too expensive to vote in favor of, unless it deals with putting monuments of the ten commandments in front of our courts. Screw the children...they do not need health insurance, but the terrorists will win if we subsidize healthcare for the poor and those families that are "in transition."

The guy is a doctor for god's sake. How can he seriously think that profits for insurance companies are more important. Gas is $4/gallon, how is this good for America? Unemployment and underemployment are rising, how is this good for America? Expontially, people are losing their homes, how is this good for America? Americans or Banks even...?

Paul Broun does not care, let the market fix it. Well, the market created the problem...just like the problem we had late in 1929. What did it take to fix the problem? Not more cut-throat capitalism. I do not advocate socialism or communism. America is not ready for one of them...and nobody is christian enough for the latter. Bowersville only understands absolutes, so he will never understand the implications of Keynesian economics...or neo-Keynesian econ.

Have you ever heard of the Black Swan theory, bowersville? Read up on it and look back on this latest economic crisis.

I've been accused of being a Republican in Democratic clothing on this blog for suggesting that I will cross over in this election, but I'm still going to do it. Even if it's just one vote that I affect (mine), at least I will have done what I think is best for Athens. I can only ask that others consider doing the same thing.

I do want to say, in response to the gentleman who I do not know and who does not know me, that I have voted for Republicans in the past, which obviously comes as a shock. Coverdell and Norwood, and sadly Broun last year. However, there are Democrats out there like myself who aren't liberals. For a while, the Republican Party was almost welcoming as the Democratic Party shifted farther and farther left. Now the opposite is true. The Democrats have returned to the center as the Republicans become increasingly rabid in their pursuit of all things far-right. Broun is a perfect example of that. I wouldn't tell the gentleman why he votes for Broun, but I will say that I don't believe many moderate Democrats like myself would vote for a person who puts his radically far-right policies over the people he purports to represent. Of course I'd rather have an "establishment" Republican rather than someone on the fringe, particularly if "establishment" means rational and approachable.

I have watched the Republicans on this blog and other blogs talk endlessly about how the party has lost the base. Not really. That's obvious in places like northeast Georgia, where we lost one Republican to an illness and elected someone even more conservative in his place. The tone of that electorate is increasingly bitter, much like when the Democratic Party was shifting more left and in the minority. What the Republicans have lost are the folks like me and the true independents. I can't think of a Republican I'll vote for this November. Maybe when the party gets back to their economic agenda instead of pushing this needless war and meaningless social issues that only play to the conservative radicals I'll reconsider on a candidate-by-candidate basis, but not this time.

All that said, I realize that as I cast my votes in November, it's casting a dissenting vote against the inevitable. That's why I feel it's important to cross over in July to try to get the better of the bad party candidates on the ticket so that the mindless masses can usher him into office.

or contrary to what some may be expecting. First to the readers of PeachPundit.com, I have commented frequently on that sight for about 2 years under the same moniker, Bowersville. I chose to not comment on the most recent blog heading about Broun because my sentiment was spoken by Bill Greene,

"Fleming is trying to portray Broun as bad on the porn issue because he(Broun) voted against H.R. 3791, the Securing Adolescents From Exploitation Online ("SAFE") Act, due to it's blatant unconstitutionality.

"This new bill nullifies Fleming's attempts(to condemn Broun by being soft on Internet child predators), and still abides by Broun's emphasis on constitutionality(Congress *does* have the constitutional right to control what is sold on bases...)

CD10 is a bastion for Social Conservatives. like it or not, that is the battleground.

I'm not disclosing anything that is not already known by anyone that is politically astute, Broun is pandering to the Social Conservative wing of the Republican Party because Fleming is pandering to the same audience and tried as late as last Friday on the Austin Rhodes radio show debate in Augusta, to portray Broun as soft on Internet predators.

If you are looking to save the Ag center, don't look to Fleming, he has vowed not to except earmarks either.

Now if you are a Democrat, you will be misguided, no matter how exciting, to vote in the Republican primary. If you want a Blue dog Democrat with a chance to win in November, vote Saxon. The national Democratic Party will be considering the numbers and deciding on whether to contribute or not.

who my senator of the 50th is, I refuse to mention her by name Blake.

That person decided to run for CD10 before she decided not to run for CD10. She decided not to run again for the 50th Senate before she decided to run again for the 50th Senate.

Jim Butterworth, graduate of UGA, ROTC, Air force B1 pilot, Honorably Discharged from the military and currently a commercial pilot and presently the Chairman of the Habersham County Commission is the front runner.

Is this a primary battle against She Who Shall Not Be Named in the hills of Habersham?
How old is Butterworth, or what year did he graduate from UGA?

Dan Matthews

I have to wonder why it's so important for you to discourage me from taking the Republican ballot in July? If the battle is really for social conservatives, perhaps it doesn't matter that I vote for Fleming in July, because by that assessment, my vote is inconsequential. I don't believe that to be true.

I am having the hardest time choosing between Fleming and Broun. A well placed Republican operative is supporting the Fleming line, but I think Broun will roughly replicate his support from the 2007 special election and Fleming will be largely cloning the coverage that Whitehead received. It will be that remaining swing vote of the crossover Democrats and independents that shall decide the Republican primary for Congress. Saxon seems to think that it is better for him if he runs against Broun, but I tend to disagree.
Dan Matthews

I don't know, Dan. The reason I say that is because I think Broun has lost some support in ACC. I remember it being something around the lines of 9 to 1 in Broun's favor last summer. I'm not so sure it will be that high this time, even though it's a Republican primary. Maybe I'm wrong. I guess we'll see.

Broun has toasted a good amount of the Democratic cross over support he had so overwhelmingly, and what little he had decreases every day.

Dan Matthews

There is no chance for saxon to win. We know how Broun will act in the General election and we know how he will misrepresent the 10th district in 2009. Hopefully Fleming will moderate in the general...he will not need to, but he might do it anyways. It is hard to say.

Fleming is not known so well so he really should be playing the moderate republican. Really, being pro-life and anti-gay is all that the social conservatives need to hear. Broun has taken many steps further to the right, but that would not make fleming a liberal if he does not believe in everything that broun makes up. You can still be fiscally conservative and spend money too! Yeah, its true. Paul Broun's world would not have healthcare, electricity, schools, roads, etc. Now, I am not an expert on national security issues...but I do believe that national security and defense is more than just a military with a bunch of guns and no playboy magazines. It is a working and growing infrastructure as well. Broun either does not get it or does not care. Fleming either does not get it or is waiting until the general election campaign (because most GOP voters in the 10th are fairly stupid). Saxon just does not get it but he supports it because that is what the democratic party's line is. Hardly a democrat I would want in office...we can have apes represent us if that was all we demanded from our representatives.

Than us ever knowing your real identity.

Find a new ax to grind, or at least have the decency to reveal yourself.

Dan Matthews

I disagree, Jacob. Barry Fleming has been pretty conservative in the General Assembly. Anyone looking up his record would know that. However, he's at least honest about it, and that makes it more acceptable to me than someone who promises to represent my beliefs too and then turns around and tells me in every correspondence that people with my ideology are the reason this country is going to hell.

An (embarrassing) admission as to how poor my geography is: I finally realized today that Bowersville was a town and not the poster's last name.

You are wrong to think that a candidate with less than 3/4 a million dollars can win beat an incumbent in a general election. It has not happened since contribution limits were increased with the passage of BCRA. This is a fact. In a district with 21 counties a competitive candidate will need to purchase quite a bit of broadcast media. Thus far, Saxon is doing no better than Denise Freeman did the first time she ran.

I am grinding no ax, you should really dig into the facts. Money is the mother's milk of politics. Losers have none, winners do. Saxon has no money, therefore: he is a loser. My name is Jacob Durden. How long have you been working for Saxon?

Annoyed Dawg, nobody looks up candidate records. Fleming could get away with nearly anything he wants to say, particularly in this district.