Sunday, October 26, 2008
News, In this Issue..., Politics
Election guide 2008
The Sunday Paper examines Atlanta’s House and Senate races, explains three proposed Constitutional amendments, and looks at how Georgia may vote in the presidential contest
In the House!
By Josh Clark, Chuck Stanley and Stephanie Ramage
Of Georgia’s 13 Congressional districts, nearly half are either wholly or in part within the metro Atlanta area. We looked at six races, throwing in the 8th Congressional district because commuters from Macon tell us they pick up our paper. Of these 12 candidates, three are pilots, four are physicians, one is an Ivy League graduate, another is a university vice president; one is in advertising and another identifies his occupation as “Congressman.” Of the six metro area/Macon incumbents, four are Republicans.
Incumbents' Web pages can be found at
www.house.gov.—Stephanie RamageIncumbent: Republican Lynn Westmoreland, 3rd District
Includes Fayette, Coweta, Henry and Spalding Counties.
Westmoreland, 58, lists his occupation as “Congressman.” He served 12 years in the state House before winning election to Congress in 2004. He is a member of the U.S. House committees on Transportation and Infrastructure, Small Business and Government Oversight and Reform. He voted against the $700 billion bailout (both times) and urged other House members to sign a petition that calls for lowering gas prices by increasing oil production in the U.S.
During his first term, Westmoreland appeared on “The Colbert Report,” where he expressed support for displays of the Ten Commandments in public buildings. When host Stephen Colbert asked him to recite the Commandments, Westmoreland scored 30 percent: “Uh, don’t murder. Don’t lie. Don’t steal … I can’t think of any more.”
Congressman Westmoreland has publicly referred to Barack Obama as “uppity,” telling reporters at the Capitol, “[Sen. and Mrs. Obama], they’re a member of an elitist-class individual that thinks they’re a bit uppity.”
Challenger: Democrat Stephen Camp, 34, an attorney who lives in Newnan. Westmoreland failed to show up for a recent debate, giving Camp free reign to get in plenty of barbs about how Westmoreland insisted the Bush-sponsored bailout was a false alarm. “He says he favors an alternate plan,” Camp told the Westmoreland-starved audience. “What is it? Because unless he’s working on it right now, it’s not on his Web site.” To see Camp’s Web site, visit
www.camp4congress.com.
Incumbent: Republican Tom Price, 6th District
Eastern Cobb County, northern Fulton County, the Dunwoody area of northern DeKalb County, as well as all of Cherokee County.
Voters probably best know Price, 54, as the leader of a band of Republicans who refused to leave Capitol Hill last August despite the absence of live microphones, C-Span cameras or the majority party after, according to Price’s Web site, “House Democrats turned off the lights and breezed out of Washington for a paid vacation without any meaningful action to bring down energy costs.” Although Nancy Pelosi was not convinced to call the House back into session prematurely, Democrats eventually did cave on the offshore drilling ban Price and his fellow Republicans opposed.
Price, an orthopedic surgeon, serves on the Financial Services Committee and the Education and Labor Committee. He has recently sponsored legislation that prohibits “discriminatory taxation” of oil pipeline property. He also sponsored a resolution that would eliminate restrictions on oil exploration both off the continental shelf and in Alaska’s Artic National Wildlife Reserve in order to fund a $10 billion prize for advancements in alternative fuel technologies.
Challenger: Democrat Bill Jones, 53, is chief financial officer of S.A. Technologies, a company his wife founded, which contracts with the Department of Defense and the CDC as well as other organizations. According to an interview with the Roswell Beacon earlier this month, as shown on
www.billjonesforcongress.com, he believes that “Tom Price has consistently voted to allow Wall Street to continue its deregulation; to continue to allow government-sponsored entities like Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac to pay multi-million dollar payments to executives.” Jones is a retired Delta Airlines pilot and lives in Marietta.
Incumbent: Republican John Linder, 7th District
Includes Walton County, most of Gwinnett County and parts of Barrow and Newton Counties.
John Linder, 66, describes himself as a pro-business conservative. He co-authored 2005’s “The FairTax Book” with talk-radio host Neil Boortz, which advocates the abolishment of the federal income tax in favor of a national sales tax. Linder remains one of the plan’s most vocal advocates, having sponsored legislation to implement the tax in 2007. Possibly influenced by Georgia’s ongoing drought, Linder also sponsored a resolution to create a “21st Century Water Commission” to develop strategies to meet America’s future water needs.
Before he was elected to Congress, Linder, a dentist and banking executive, served as president of Linder Financial Corp, described on his Web site as “an asset-based lending institution providing financial assistance to small and entrepreneurial businesses throughout the South,” and served seven terms in the Georgia General Assembly.
Linder serves on the House Ways and Means Committee, which has jurisdiction over tax, tariff and trade laws, health care, Social Security and Medicare. Linder is the former chairman of the National Republican Congressional Committee, and has been described by the Washington Post as “a close ally of former House speaker Newt Gingrich.”
Challenger: Democrat Doug Heckman, 49, who strongly opposes the fair tax and gives reasons why on his Web site,
www.dougheckman.com. As a U.S. Army colonel, Heckman was a senior advisor to the Iraqi Army, enjoying, he says, “countless successes” in Iraq at the beginning of the current surge, and he earned a Bronze Star. He served in Afghanistan soon after 9/11 with Task Force Dagger—“the unit tasked with training the Northern Alliance and kicking the Taliban out of Afghanistan," as he states on his site. "We were successful.” Heckman left Phoenix Investment Partners in June to become a full-time candidate.
Incumbent: Democrat Jim Marshall, 8th District
The district comprises 21 counties in Middle Georgia.
Marshall, 60, is a Princeton grad and Vietnam vet who’s worked as a short-order cook, high school teacher and hunting guide. He served as mayor of Macon from 1995 to ’99, and moved to Washington after the 2002 election. He serves on the House Armed Services, Agriculture and Financial Services Committees.
During his tenure in the House, Marshall has found himself in the odd position of being hated by both of the major parties. As the Atlanta Journal-Constitution mentioned last summer, Marshall has a “GOP target” on his back. But Democrats don’t like Marshall, either. According to the political Web site ProgressivePunch, Marshall voted 15 times (out of a total of 50) in line with Democrats on Iraq War bills. He also voted against the expansion of the state-funded children’s insurance program, SCHIP, in September 2007.
When National Public Radio interviewer Melissa Block told him the Dow had fallen 700 points after the financial bailout he voted for was defeated the first time it entered the House, he disbelievingly uttered, “Oh my God.”
Challenger: Republican Rick Goddard, 64, is vice president of Mercer University and a Vietnam veteran who was awarded the Silver Star and the Distinguished Flying Cross for heroism in air combat. He wants to make the 2001 and 2003 temporary tax cuts permanent. According to his Web site,
www.goddardforcongress.com, “Our country is under attack by Islamic jihadists whose sole goal is to destroy our freedoms and way of life. The fight in Iraq is just one battle in the war against these Islamic fundamentalists intent on spreading evil throughout the world.”
Incumbent: Republican Phil Gingrey, 11th District
Includes nine northwest Georgia counties in part or in full, among them Cobb, Bartow, Carroll and Paulding.
Gingrey, 66, is a former Marietta School Board chairman and two-term state Senator. Before entering politics, Dr. Gingrey ran a pro-life OB-GYN practice in Marietta where, according to his Web site, he successfully delivered more than 5,200 babies. After being elected to the U.S. House in 2002, Gingrey joined Tom Price in the “House GOP Energy Revolt” and was a staunch critic of the $700 billion bailout/rescue plan recently signed into law by President Bush. Gingrey is rumored to be eying a run for Senate in 2010 if Republican Sen. Johnny Isakson chooses not to run for reelection. Gingrey has appeared on the “Better Know a District” segment of Comedy Central’s “Colbert Report,” where he described himself as “a Georgia Peach” and called the Iraq War “possibly the greatest war.”
Gingrey currently serves on the Armed Services Committee, where he is a ranking member of the Select Panel on Roles and Missions. He is also a member of the Science Subcommittee on Technology and Innovation. He has recently sponsored legislation to make Medicaid and SCHIP benefits unavailable to families making more than two and a half times the poverty rate.
Challenger: Democrat Hugh “Bud” Gammon is a 57-year-old pilot who, according to his Web site,
www.budgammon.us, proposes a five-year waiting period for undocumented immigrants to become citizens after returning to their home countries. Regarding Iraq, his site says, “In January, with new leadership, we will work closely with the Joint Chiefs of Staff to start an organized, orderly, well-planned withdrawal of our troops. It could take 18 to 24 months. It will put the Iraqi government on notice they no longer have a blank check from the Americans and while we will help they must take responsibility for the training of their military and police forces.” His answer to our economic woes is to stop job outsourcing and develop alternate energies, including nuclear.
Incumbent: Democrat David Scott, 13th District
West and south sides of metro Atlanta, from Henry County to Cobb County and parts of South Fulton
Democrat incumbent Scott, 63, has served in Congress since 2002 and worked in the state legislature from 1974 until he left for Washington. He’s a member of the House committees on Agriculture, Foreign Affairs and Financial Services.
That last one is particularly poignant, since Scott made Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington’s 2007 list of “22 Most Corrupt Officials.” Scott shared public scrutiny with indicted Alaska Sen. Ted Stevens and Idaho’s “wide-stance” congressman, Larry Craig, when allegations of tax evasion and misappropriation of campaign finances emerged against him in 2007. During the prior five years, the veteran politician’s campaign committee shelled out more than $715,000 to Scott, his wife, daughter, son-in-law and the family advertising business in Clayton County.
Scott was also accused of using his Congressional staffers solely for campaign purposes. This is illegal because Congressional staffers’ salaries are paid by taxpayers who may or may not want a particular Congressman reelected. He also failed to pay about $23,000 in property taxes, while adding $60,000 to his investment portfolio.
In 2005, Scott was named “The Worst Black Congressperson” by the online political magazine Black Commentator, which cited the “gaggle of renegade right-wing House members [Scott] runs with” and his vote for the national voter ID card in 2005.
Challenger: Republican Deborah Honeycutt, 61, is a family practice physician and a past medical director of Spelman College’s health services. She has served as director of the Good Shepherd Clinic, a free clinic in Morrow. According to her Web site,
www.honeycuttforcongress.com, she has served on the boards of the Georgia Academy of Family Physicians and the CareNet Pregnancy Resource Center of Atlanta, and on the Board of Directors of the Georgia Partnership for Caring. She currently serves on the Georgia Free Clinic Network Board of Directors, and is co-chair of the Georgia Department of Community Health’s Minority Health Advisory Council.
SP