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Sunday, August 24, 2008
Update: Arrest unrelated to lockdown
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Denver — A spokesman for the U.S. Secret Service said late Sunday that the arrest of a man carrying firearms at House Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s downtown hotel was unrelated to a security lockdown at the nearby Pepsi Center, site of this week’s Democratic National Convention.
According to the hometown Denver Post, Pelosi was evacuated from the Grand Hyatt after a man tried to check in to the hotel while carrying a rifle case. The man did not have a concealed weapons permit, the Post reported.
When police shut down the security checkpoint at the Pepsi Center, a crowd of journalists, delegates and others who trying to get into the convention hall were left outside to wait. Georgia Democratic Party chairwoman Jane Kidd and executive director Matt Weyandt, seen to the right, were among those stuck outside.
While many of those on the unsecure side of police barricades were told the shut-down was because of the Pelosi incident, Secret Service Special Agent Malcolm D. Wiley Sr. said late Sunday that the lockdown at the Pepsi Center was due to a protest being held outside the arena.
Wiley said the protest was planned and permitted, but when a mass of people assembled just outside the barricade, law enforcement shut down the metal detectors until the crowd dispersed. Furthermore, Wiley said, the Pelosi incident was actually Saturday.
— Aaron Gould Sheinin
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Georgia: In the cheap seats
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Denver — The powers that be here have decreed Georgia in the back of the house.
The Democratic National Committee on Sunday released the delegate seating plan for the Pepsi Center, for the convention that begins Monday.
If Georgia’s 102-voting delegates were any further from the podium, they’d be in Boulder. Still, they’re not as bad off as Missouri and Arizona, which might have to worry about snow, they’re so high up in this Mile High City.
You can see the delegate seating chart here.
— Aaron Gould Sheinin
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The ‘King’ of … something
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Denver — When Georgia Democrat Kirk Dornbush stepped away from his seat at this morning’s meeting of the DNC’s credentials committee, he left a most unique seat-warmer, a two-foot tall trophy dubbing him “Chum King of 2007-2008.”
Sitting next to the hardware was Georgia Sen. David Adelman (D-Atlanta), who said his friend Dornbush hauled the trophy all the way from Atlanta.
And what is “chum” you ask? In this case, it is not cut up bait fish tossed over the side of a boat to attract big game fish. Now, Adelman said, in politico-speak, chum is the memorabilia that parties hawk to raise money. In another parlance it’s known as “swag:” T-shirts, stickers, buttons, etc., the detritus of easy reproduction.
Dornbush, according to Adelman, is “not necessarily the best,” salesman of chum, “he’s the most enthusiastic.”
Of course, the credentials committee meeting is not as much fun as this would make it seem. The dry business of awarding credentials to each state’s delegation is typically not worth watching.
But this year, of course, there has been d-r-a-m-a on the committee as the DNC and the Florida and Michigan parties were to be penalized for holding primaries earlier than allowed.
The rift earlier in the year threatened to throw the whole convention into chaos, had Hillary Clinton not dropped out of the presidential race, leaving Barack Obama alone to claim the nomination.
Since Obama is the unchallenged nominee-to-be, this action is less important than it once was. Still, there is the formality of the committee voting to allow the delegations from Florida and Michigan to be seated.
— Aaron Gould Sheinin
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Why upperclassmen might soon be due more respect
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Date: Aug. 25, 2008
Memo to: The 270,000 students at Georgia universities
Subject: 21 and loaded
No doubt during your wanderings you have noticed a new breeze on your campus. It is sharp and distinct and impossible to miss.
For it carries the wafting fragrance of freedom. How to recognize this breeze? First of all, it does not smell like beer.
Possibly you’ve heard some talk by out-of-state university presidents that the drinking age should be lowered to 18 to curtail binge-drinking.
Put this out of your mind.
Solid, conservative institutions such as the North Georgia Conference of the United Methodist Church and even the state university system itself will make sure that irresponsible young people are protected from themselves.
No, this particular freedom smells something like gun oil.
A certain state Senate committee began meeting this month. It has taken on the task of reviewing where those who possess concealed weapons permits are allowed to pack heat.
Booze-serving restaurants and MARTA buses were added this spring.
Georgiacarry.org and some Republican lawmakers would like to see many more locales added, including churches and state universities.
You can see where this might be headed. Concealed weapons permits are available to anyone over the age of 21 with fingerprints and a clean record. By this time next year, should the Legislature act, Big Man on Campus could have an entirely new meaning.
It is not a sure thing. Leftist institutions such as the North Georgia Conference of the United Methodist Church and even the state university system oppose changes to the current law. It’s a scandal how some people think students must be protected from themselves.
“The government put a fully automatic weapon in my hands at the age of 17,” said attorney Ed Stone with Georgiacarry.org. He would like to see college students permitted to arm themselves. Currently, it’s a felony to be caught with a firearm on a Georgia campus.
Mitch Seabaugh of Sharpsburg is chairman of the Senate firearms study committee. He’s promising nothing but a careful look.
Possibly, he said, an armed student or faculty member could have made a difference at Virginia Tech in 2007. But Seabaugh also concedes there might be “some situation where someone loses his temper and has been drinking and then uses a firearm inappropriately.”
Seabaugh also wondered out loud whether a firearm could be considered secure in a dorm room. “You have a lot people walking in and out,” he said.
But there are other facets that need exploring, Seabaugh said. Students who hunt could be allowed to keep shotguns and rifles in their car trunks. Faculty members, rather than students, might be extended permission to carry weapons.
The Senate chairman is particularly concerned about the case of a 45-year-old permit carrier who was prosecuted for having a weapon in an on-campus hotel that serves the University of Georgia continuing education center.
How do you legally distinguish between a 21-year-old student, a 45-year-old visitor, and a 62-year-old professor? That’s what the legislative process is all about, Seabaugh said.
Maybe this’ll be a breeze. But it doesn’t sound like it.
Photo credit: Associated Press
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Four women kick it off
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Denver — Four powerful women marked the launch of the Democratic National Convention on Sunday, with Atlanta Mayor Shirley Franklin among them.
Joining Franklin as co-chairs of the convention are Kansas Gov. Kathleen Sebelius and Texas Sen. Leticia Van de Putte, plus national chairwoman Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.)
Franklin praised Pelosi as the first female leader of the U.S. House.
“On behalf of all the mayors who are looking forward to change in Washington, I say congratulations,” Franklin said.
There was a group of young journalists in the press conference, noted by their lack of height, but also for their red T-shirts declaring them as part of “children’s pressline.”
During a q&a session, Franklin caught a query from one of the kids about corporal punishment in schools. Specifically she was asked about a case in Texas where a student was, according to the questioner, paddled for missing a math problem.
Atlanta’s mayor handled the question by saying she does not condone corporal punishment in her city’s schools.
— Aaron Gould Sheinin
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Greetings from the DNC
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Denver — Happy Sunday morning from the Colorado Convention Center, where it isn’t yet noon.
The opening press conference of the 2008 Democratic National Convention is about to get under way and Atlanta’s own Mayor Shirley Franklin is part of the show.
Franklin is a national co-chair of this extravaganza of speeches, hyperbole, parties, security and traffic.
Look to this space through the week for a look at what Georgians are up to. There are more than 150 fellow Peach Staters here, including an official delegation of 132, including 102 voting delegates.
Most of the Georgia crowd, including me, are staying at the Doubletree Denver, which is a bit of a misnomer. It’s really in Stapleton, about six miles away from downtown, where all the action is.
We’re sharing that hotel with delegations from Alabama and North and South Dakota. And, yes, politics is involved in the decision of who stays where. The more important you are in Democratic politics, or to the coming election, the better your hotel. And by better, I mean nicer and closer to the convention hall, in this case the Pepsi Center.
That’s why New York, California and Illinois are right close and we are, well, we’re not as bad off as Hawaii, which is stuck out in Littleton. That’s kind of like being in Conyers, I think, if the convention were at the World Congress Center.
— Aaron Gould Sheinin
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