While Nathan Deal and Karen Handel fight over abortion and teh gayz, there is another battle getting very nasty that you may not be aware of:
The Hudgens/Sheffield battle for Insurance Commissioner.
Both Hudgens and Sheffield are trying to put the noose of The Ox around the other’s neck. Both have been tied to him at various points – Sheffield as a lawyer and lobbyist for the Insurance Department, Hudgens as the Chair of the Senate Insurance Committee, where Ox was a frequent speaker.
Both have donors who have supported Ox in both his Insurance Commissioner and Governor races, though Hudgens has the support of Ox’s Assistant Commissioner and was the only candidate of these two to receive money from John Oxendine himself. The money in question here was $500 to Hudgens’ State Senate account in 2008, a year before Hudgens filed to run to replace Ox, from Ox’s Better Georgia PAC. [Continue Reading]
Some of you may be aware of this, others may not, but GOP Insurance Commissioner Candidate Gerry Purcell’s dad passed away yesterday. From following his twitter and Facebook streams, it seems that this was expected soon, but that never makes it any easier.
Our deepest condolences to Gerry Purcell and his family. You are in our thoughts and prayers.
For those curious about arrangements, this is from Julianne Purcell’s Facebook stream:
Many have asked about the funeral arrangements for Gerry’s father. The viewing hours will be Tues. 2:00-4:00 and 7:00-9:00 at Ginn Funeral Home, 90 Church St., Carnesville, GA 30521. The funeral is at New Bethel Church Wed. at 3:00. 1310 New Bethel Rd. Carnesville. Again, Gerry and I thank you all so much for your prayers and well wishes.
I got a tip last week about some fundraising activity that was drawing suspicion from the person who told me about it, and this person wanted me to look into it. It specifically dealt with itemized vs unitemized monetary contributions, and the allegation this tipster made was that at least one candidate had what amounted to a “tip jar” at their events.
State Ethics Commission regulations (and possibly State law) mandate that contributions from a single source be aggregated and reported on the very next disclosure reports once $101.00 comes in from a single source. Therefore, such a “tip jar” would be a violation of these regulations due to the fact that the source of contributions placed in the tip jar could not be tracked.
I looked at all contributions in all statewide races reported as of June 30 2009 and compared itemized contributions vs unitemized. I looked at both raw numbers and as a percentage of total money raised that cycle. This is what I found: [Continue Reading]
At this meeting, several candidates spoke, including Gerry Purcell (Insurance Commissioner), Melvin Everson (Labor Commissioner), Richard Woods (State School Superintendent), and Lee County Commission candidates Lester Leggett and Ed Duffy, who is running for re-election. State Rep Ed Rynders, running unopposed for re-election, also spoke briefly while introducing Melvin Everson.
The following is an email I got from Maria Sheffield this morning in response to last night’s “Apparently It Was All Talk” post. She raises some fair points – very similar to the ones Tom brought up in his comments. And maybe I was a bit too harsh on both Karen and Maria last night. When I am wrong I will admit it, and on this issue, I probably was.
Without further ado, Maria’s response:
I pledged to not appear at any event where both Ray and I were featured speakers on the program. To demonstrate that it was not just talk and that I was sincere about this, I cancelled my speech at the Moral Nation event in Hall County for May 22 (it got much traffic on Facebook) because Ray was a featured speaker.
I have also, in a less public manner, declined to speak at a number of GOP breakfast or meetings because Ray was also going to speak.
But Jeff, seriously, I am not a candidate for Governor and I never never stated or promised I would never be in same room with the man – I did not make that promise exactly so I would not be accused of what you have just suggested. [Continue Reading]
The following is from conservative activist Bryan Miller, via his Facebook page. In the comments on it, Maria Sheffield re-iterates what she had earlier said on twitter about not appearing where Ray McBerry is. Karen Handel made similar claims today at a forum hosted by Jim Galloway, while other candidates had a much weaker response.
Last Saturday, the 2nd Congressional District GOP got together for a BBQ and Congressional Debate at Lee County High School. I’m trying to adopt a general policy that if it is a political event in Lee County, I intend to be there with my video camera, so I was there. Heck, I even voted in the straw poll!
While there, I had a chance to meet with a few of the candidates that were present. Maria Sheffield was the late arrival, but she was also the most engaging with this political blogger. Seth Harp, one of her competitors who has sponsored at least one thing in the State Senate I am strongly in favor of (local referendums on Sunday alcohol sales), was rather dismissive. I also had a chance to speak with Gary Black for a few moments, as well as Mike Keown, Rick Allen, and Lee Ferrell. Harold Logsdon was there, but unfortunately I didn’t get a chance to speak with him.
Overall, the event went well. Quite a few people there were in campaign t-shirts of various campaigns, but Lee Ferrell was the only one I noted with any real “contingent” of what appeared to be staffers. The others had brought along a staffer/area volunteer or two, with the rest of the t-shirts for their campaign appearing to be simply supporters from the area. I did not personally witness any mass vote buying, nor did I hear any rumors of it. It appears that this was a genuine one person/one vote straw poll, so take that for what it is worth. (Still not very much, but relatively better than polls with mass vote buying.)
Over the last 18 hours or so, Preston Smith, the State Senator representing the 52nd District (which includes Rome and parts of my native Bartow County), has become the talk of Georgia politics. Over 100 people have already joined the effort to draft him to challenge Lt Governor Casey Cagle, and virtually every major political blog in the State, as well as many of the newspapers I read daily, have discussed his speech yesterday – many of the blogs re-posting the text of the speech in its entirety.
But one thing has not come out yet, and I think it needs to be discussed.
You see, this whole battle rages in and around one certain bill in the Georgia General Assembly – HB 307. The fact that this is a House bill that has now passed the Senate means that every single member of the General Assembly who is running for Statewide office has had some degree of say on this bill, and I want to run down the list briefly: [Continue Reading]
