Thursday, October 16, 2008
News U.S. Congress (Fulton County): Incumbent protectorate I
Posted by Ken Edelstein on Thu, Oct 16, 2008 at 3:01 PM
A lot of Fulton County residents may want to throw the bums out of Congress. Just not their bums.
Eighty-three percent of Americans say the country’s headed in the wrong direction, and Congress regularly gets lower approval ratings than President Bush.
But Georgia’s districts are so well gerrymandered to protect incumbents from one party or the other that our congressmen only face the risk of losing in their party's primary. And in July each of the state's 13 incumbent U.S. House members won their nomination.
That’s why — barring a strike of lightning between now and January — Republican Tom Price, who represents North Fulton; Democrat John Lewis, who represents the county’s midsection, including Atlanta; and Democrat David Scott, who represents South Fulton, are certain to return to Congress.
We’d love to see Lewis concentrate more on the hard work of passing legislation, but he consistently supports the right things and, more importantly, is a brilliant spokesman for justice and equal opportunity. His only opposition will come in the form of two write-in candidates, but he deserves your vote of confidence.
Scott is a capable legislator who’s disappointed us with a feeding-at-the-tough approach to spending campaign money on relatives. But his opponent in the heavily Democratic district that forms a horseshoe just west and south of Atlanta is Deborah Honeycutt, who has no elected experience and presents herself as a religious-right ideologue. Scott should cruise to victory.
Price — who represents the wealthy Sixth District, which includes Cherokee County and parts of DeKalb and Cobb, in addition to North Fulton — is also likely to cruise to victory. We’d love to see him get a scare from Democrat Bill Jones, though.
Price, a member of the House Financial Services Committee, is one of the “Georgia Seven” — a group of radical rightwing GOP congressmen who, among other things, are unrepentant over their disastrous penchant for deregulating financial institutions. They generally vote in lockstep with President Bush, except when they part ways because the White House and the Republican House leadership isn't conservative enough for them.
Jones is a retired Air Force and Delta pilot who now serves as CFO for a high-tech company. He would likely represent the interests of the average resident Sixth District more effectively than Price does. But too many of the district's suburban voters are still enraptured by Republican talking points to give Jones a fair listen.
Come to FreshLoaf or our Voter's Guide on Oct. 21 for an easy-to-use list of recommendations.
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