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Thursday, February 15, 2007
Sadie Fields says Sue Everhart is okay by her
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Perhaps the most important political news on Thursday came from Sadie Fields, leader of the Georgia Christian Alliance.
It was an endorsement of the candidacy of Sue Everhart for the chairmanship of the state Republican party. We told you last week that Gov. Sonny Perdue had given his blessing to Everhart. The only other announced candidate in the race is Anthony-Scott Hobbs, the chairman of the Cobb County GOP
Fields remains the most influential member of the state GOP’s Christian conservative base. Her endorsement is an important imprimatur from the right side of the Republican party.
We’re reluctant to say that it’s a guarantee that the leaders of Georgia’s two major parties will be women, but it comes close. The GOP selection process begins late this month, and ends with a mid-May state convention in Gwinnett County.
Says the release issued by Fields: “Sue is the most qualified candidate in the race for Party Chairman. She is the current First Vice-Chair of the Georgia Republican Party and a long-time Republican Party leader and grassroots activist. “
She wants to put backless gowns on hospital salaries
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Just when you thought things were too dull in the Legislature, the war on hospitals goes boom.
One of the most hotly lobbied issues this session centers on where a body can and can’t put a hospital. For years, the state has controlled the location of hospitals, along with the number of beds, with “certificates of need.” Licensing, in other words.
The system stems from days when hospitals were charitable operations run by public authorities or charities. Hospitals too close together were considered a waste of money.
But now a 50-bed cancer hospital that wants to establish itself in metro Atlanta, over the objections of Emory University and Piedmont hospitals.
The hospital’s lobbying effort has persuaded lawmakers to take a new look at the entire hospital-authorizing system. It’s not an exaggeration to say that billions of dollars are at stake.
State Rep. Jill Chambers (R-Atlanta) is one of many who have dropped legislation on the topic. She wants certificates of need abandoned entirely. Let the free market reign, says she.
Established hospitals have pushed back.
And in the Capitol, push quickly comes to shove. Chamber has now dropped a companion measure, H.B. 427, to require non-profit hospitals to disclose all compensation received by hospital executives.
(It would also require hospitals to disclose “hospital-acquired infection rates.” Chambers’ mother had a bad experience on her last trip to a certain medical center.)
At the root of the legislation is a suspicion held by many state lawmakers that non-profit companies that run many of today’s hospitals aren’t as poor as they say. In fact, Chambers said, some have cash stashed in off-shore accounts.
Which is why she wants them to open their books.
By the way, Jeannette Jamieson of Toccoa, a Democrat, is the third signature on the bill, which means it can be described as bipartisan. And Earl Ehrhart, the House Rules chairman, provided the fourth signature. Which means the bill has legs, at least on that side of the Capitol.
Apparently, he stirred himself up with his own sermon
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
The Rev. Timothy McDonald became the star of Wednesday’s House committee hearing on payday loan legislation. Not necessarily in the most desirable way.
When he and other opponents of the measure found they would not be allowed to speak, McDonald began shouting.
“Do you think I’m scared of security?” he yelled. “Shame, shame, shame.” Our story here says so.
Committee chairman James Mills (R-Gainvesville) ordered McDonald out.
McDonald is senior pastor of First Iconium Baptist Church and former president of the Concerned Black Clergy.
But Mills thought the preacher looked more familiar than that. And he was right. McDonald was the “preacher for the day” for the House only a few days before.
Addressing the entire chamber, McDonald demanded that lawmakers to be open-minded, but “fixed in your convictions.”
We do not know when he’ll be invited back.
Watch funeral for U.S. Rep. Charlie Norwood live
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
You can watch the funeral for U.S. Rep. Charlie Norwood of Augusta by clicking here.
It starts in a few minutes at 2 p.m.
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The Iraq debate: Something about sheep, and a football-game revolt by the cheerleaders
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Debate over the Iraq resolution in the U.S. House enters its third and final debate today.
So far, two Georgia congressmen have made a bit of news in the process. Said U.S. Rep. Jim Marshall of Macon, one of the few Democrats to oppose it:
“The anti-surge resolution is akin to sitting on the sidelines, and booing in the middle of our own team’s play because we don’t like the coach’s call. I cannot join mid-play nay-saying that discourages even one of those engaged in this current military effort in Baghdad.”
And U.S. Rep. Lynn Westmoreland, a Republican from Sharpsburg, has ticked off the animal husbandry lobby with this gem:
“Some people from the other side seem to believe that if we pull out of Iraq, that the Iraqi people are going to go back to tending sheep and herding goats. That’s not what’s going to happen. If we pull out of Iraq, what’s going to happen is you are going to see more bloodshed than we have seen in a long time in this world.”
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