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March 27, 2006

New Poll: GA Republicans May Be Vulnerable

According to the Atlanta Journal-Constitution, new polls suggest that W's low approval ratings and Ralph Reed's links to the Abramoff scandal (Reed is the former Christian Coalition head running to be the Republican candidate for Lietenant Governor) are dragging down Governor Sonny Perdue's numbers. The question for Democratic primary voters is, who's the better option: Lietenant Governor Mark Taylor or Secretary of State Cathy Cox?

Taylor likes to pose as an economic populist. Every year he discovers a new threat to the popular HOPE scholarship program, practically daring the Republicans to take him on and look anti-education. But HOPE is easy to demagogue on - it's a benefit that, overall, transfers money from largely poor instant-lottery players to largely middle-class parents of college students. That doesn't mean it's not a valuable program - it's almost always a good thing for a state to invest more in education, however it can find the money. Better for the state to capture its own gamblers' money, rather than letting that spending go to convenience stores set up just past the Tennessee or Alabama borders, or now, I'm sure, online, where no state gets a cut at all.

But the point is, HOPE hype alone does not a true economic populist make. Will Taylor actually have the guts to try to raise any taxes in the teeth of a legislature that's likely to stay Republican for the rest of the decade, thanks to gerrymandering? More to the point, can he rally public support in such a way that makes it possible for him to propose raising some taxes, and succeed? God, I hope so, although it seems like a long shot.

The second top contender, Cox, has a rep for competence with the Georgia lawyers I know. Lawyers, after all, are the ones who deal with the Secretary of State's office every day. But in her most high-profile decision in her job, she blew it: she pushed for those scandalous Diebold electronic voting machines which are not adequately protected from hacks and which leave no paper trail for a recount. Her office also bungled the 2004 elections, as understaffed polling stations in poor, nonwhite districts had lines stretching for hours, shamefully suppressing the vote by discouraging some from voting at all. I don't know what share of the blame she deserves for that, but it's certainly not evidence that her next stop should be the governor's mansion.

I do like the idea of more Democratic women running for office in the South. In terms of the battle for swing voters, I think the political calculus makes sense: stop coddling angry white men, and instead focus on winning over soccer moms. After all, there's no reason white Southern women need buy into the Fox News conservatism of so many white Southern men. It's not like patriarchy is working so well for them - especially if they've been divorced. The Bible Belt has the highest divorce rates in the country, and women almost always end up in worse economic shape after divorce than men.

But I'm not sure if any progressive can really trust or support Cox, given her spotty record on electoral issues. That means Georgia progressives might as well get behind Taylor, I guess, and do our best to pressure him from the left.

Unless, that is, I'm missing a big side of the story from only getting my GA political news from the AJC - a likely prospect, come to think of it . . .

Posted by tedf at March 27, 2006 03:44 PM

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