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Tuesday, July 8, 2008
State GOP has $1.4 mill on hand to begin general election season; 2010 gubernatorial hopefuls spread the cash around
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
The state GOP has $1.4 million in cash to begin the general election season next week.
My AJC colleague James Salzer says the Georgia Republican party reports collecting $766,000 since March 31. Much of the money has come from elected officials and their political action committees.
Among the big contributors: The state Senate PAC ($60,000); Cobb County Commission Chairman Sam Olens, who is considered a possible gubernatorial hopeful in 2010 ($10,000); state House Health and Human Services Chairwoman Sharon Cooper (R-Marietta) ($20,000); and House Higher Education Chairman Bill Hembree (R-Winston) ($10,000).
Updated: Late Tuesday, the state Democratic party reported raising $307,000 over the past three months, and ended June with $485,000 on hand.
Among other financial notations:
— Insurance Commissioner John Oxendine, a candidate for governor in 2010, put out the word this week that he’s donating $26,750 to the state legislative campaigns of Republican incumbents and hopefuls with opposition this fall, Salzer reports.
However, another likely GOP gubernatorial candidate, Lt. Gov. Casey Cagle, is writing checks too. He’s given $2,300 each to state senators with primary opposition, Bill Cowsert (R-Athens) and Dan Moody (R-Dunwoody).
He also wrote a $1,000 check to Steve Gooch, a friend who is running against one of House Speaker Glenn Richardson’s committee chairmen, Amos Amerson.
Oxendine and Cagle can afford the largesse. Under state law, they can’t spend the money they’ve raised for their current offices on their race for governor. At the end of 2007, Oxendine had $925,000 left in his insurance commissioner’s campaign account, and Cagle had $501,000 in his lieutenant governor’s warchest.
— Also, Jon Flack at Tondee’s Tavern is honing in on the top lines of financial reports filed by Georgia congressional candidates.
Most interesting is that U.S. Rep. Jim Marshall has $1.3 million, while Republican challenger Rick Goddard boasts $459,000. And in the 10th District primary, Republican incumbent Paul Broun of Athens is still at a financial disadvantage to challenger Barry Fleming of Harlem.
Brown has $202,000 to Fleming’s $344,000.
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The Barr effect: Zogby says he’s the difference between Obama and McCain
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
A national Zogby poll of tens of thousands of voters is stirring talk about the impact of Libertarian candidate Bob Barr on the presidential race.
The massive survey was released Sunday. It puts Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama at 44 percent. Republican John McCain at 38 percent, and Barr at 6 percent — exactly the margin between the two candidates for the major parties.
On MSNBC’s “Morning Joe” today, McCain was asked specifically about the Barr effect. Here’s what McCain said:
“I’m confident that at the end of the day, Republicans and Democrats and Libertarians and vegetarians will vote for me. We’ve got a lot of work to do. I’m the underdog…..I’m confident we’re going to win, but I have no illusions about the challenges we face.”
The entire interview is below:
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Obama on faith-based programs, gun rights, and Iraq: ‘I’m not flip-flopping’
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
When he wasn’t talking about the economy this morning, Democratic presidential presumptive Barack Obama was rebuffing Republican charges of flip-flopping.
Obama told the crowd at McEachern High School that he’d long been in favor of involving people of faith in politics and in government programs — so long as they respect the line between church and state.
And yes, he did endorse the U.S. Supreme Court decision last month that declared firearm ownership to be an individual right. “I also recognize that we need to make sure we have decent controls over the use of illegal firearms in our county. Those two positions aren’t contradictory,” he said.
But Obama saved his biggest explanation for the war in Iraq. Listen to his comment on the topic here.
Obama’s grip on the Democratic base can be attributed in part to his opposition to the war from the start.
But, he emphasized:
“I have also consistently said that once we were in, we had to be as careful getting out as we were careless getting in. You’ve got to make sure that our troops are safe. You’ve got to make sure the country doesn’t collapse.
“And so what I’ve called for is a phased withdrawal, a phased redeployment, that is not precipitous and is responsible, get our combat troops out at a pace of one or two brigades a month. At that point, we would have our combat troops out in about 16 months.
“Now, assuming I take office in January, then that means we would still have our troops there for about two more years from now. There’s nothing rushed about that. At that point we will have been there for seven years. So when I hear John McCain saying we can’t surrender…Nobody’s talking about surrender. We’re talking about common-sense. We can’t be there forever.”
The Obama speech in Cobb was broadcast live by CNN. And Republicans quickly charged that Obama said something “dramatically different” a week ago in an interview with the Military Times:
“If current trends continue and we’re in a position where we continue to see reductions in violence and stabilizations and continue to see some improvements on the part of the Iraqi army and Iraqi police, then you know my hope would be that we could draw down in a deliberate fashion in consultation with the Iraqi government, at a pace that is determined in consultation with General Petraeus and the other commanders on the ground and it strikes me that that’s something we can begin relatively soon after inauguration.
“If on the other hand you’ve got a deteriorating situation for some reason then that’s going to have to be taken into account.”
Below is a YouTube link to a substantive portion of the Military Times interview, which includes the quotes cited by the GOP above. You’ll note that the opening phraseology tracks very closely to what Obama said in Cobb.
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Audio from Barack Obama’s appearance in Cobb County
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Here’s the audio from Barack Obama’s speech at McEachern High School. It runs about 20 minutes or so.
A question-and-answer session followed.
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Barack Obama arrives in west Cobb
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
He’s just started speaking. Main theme: “I want to put the American Dream in the reach of every American.”
U.S. Reps. Hank Johnson and Sanford Bishop are here as well. Obama had kind words for U.S. Rep. John Lewis, who came late to the Obama campaign. “I’m proud of him.”
U.S. Rep. John Conyers of Michigan is here as well. Don’t know what that’s about.
The Insider will post the sound ASAP.
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Macon Telegraph endorses Dale Cardwell in U.S. Senate race
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Former TV journalist Dale Cardwell just got the endorsement of the Macon Telegraph in the Democratic primary for U.S. Senate:
While [Jim] Martin has the most experience in a governmental setting - with the direction our government is headed - that’s not a plus for him. And while his name recognition and experience may lead him to the nomination, we have to go with our gut feeling and try a different path.
That would mean either Dale Cardwell or Rand Knight. While Lanier has deep understanding of the pressures of Washington, it’s hard to be a real reformer when you’ve made your living from the same system he now bashes. All would shake up the Senate side of the Capitol however, particularly if they are able to successfully win without taking money from people who buy our government.
The balloting was close, but we endorse Dale Cardwell for the Democratic nomination for U.S. Senate.
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Notes from the Barack Obama rally: Building data banks, arranging the scenery
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
A few notes from the Barack Obama rally:
— Jacob Klein, the Obama field organizer for Atlanta’s northwest suburbs, just finished a spiel aimed at turning 2,500 or so spectators into a data bank.
Klein asked everyone in the McEachern High gym to grab their cell phones and send a text message to an address he announced from the podium.
All those messages, presumably, were captured. The organizer promised occasional text messages from the campaign. But not too many. Spam annoys even Obamites.
— The crowd here is 80 percent African-American, perhaps more. But as we’ve come to expect, the people posted behind the presidential candidate are a more careful mix. Right now, there are 37 in the three risers. Of them, 17 are white.
— Who’s here? U.S. Rep. David Scott, whose congressional district is the closest Democratic one. And his primary opponent, Donzella James. House Minority Leader DuBose Porter, who has gubernatorial aspirations. Former state party chairman Calvin Smyre. State Rep. Doug Stoner of Smyrna, who inhabits a neighboring Democratic district. And state Labor Commissioner Michael Thurmond.
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Waiting for Obama in a not-so-Republican pocket of Cobb County
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
The Insider’s back from a busman’s holiday in D.C., and in the gym of McEachern High School, waiting for Democratic presumptive Barack Obama to come greet a crowd that’s growing and growing and growing.
The school parking lot was already filled at 7 a.m., and a stream of people were already making the trek from the nearby Kroger’s.
This is the district of state Rep. Earl Ehrhart, the Republican chairman of the House Rules Committee. And there are plenty of Republican votes here. Four years ago, President Bush made an appearance at another Cobb County high school only five miles or so away.
But to call this firm GOP territory would be to ignore the changes in Cobb that have occurred over the last few years.
The crowd that’s assembling here is largely black. This may speak to the drawing power of Obama, or the method of ticket distribution. But it’s not a geographic anomaly.
McEachern and its ornate west Cobb campus (the public school has a private endowment) has 2,466 students. Only a few years ago, it was majority white. Now, white students comprise only 34 percent of the enrollment. Over half, 54 percent, are African-American. The remainder are primarily Hispanic.
“The demographics have changed rapidly in the last eight to 10 years,” said Cobb school board chairman Betty Gray, who has a seat near the front row of the Obama rally. (Yes, she is a Democrat, and, yes, she has primary opposition.)
“Certain clusters of schools have come to represent change. Change has come quickly, and we’ve assimilated as necessary,” she said.
David Wilkerson, chairman of the Cobb County Democratic party, is here as well — making good friends by doling out what tickets he has at his disposal.
Wilkerson said the Obama campaign is searching out office space in Cobb. Probably south Cobb, but perhaps north Cobb.
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