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The State Democratic Party yesterday unleashed a Halloween themed shot at Nathan Deal yesterday. Instead of going with orange and black, they went with a red and black motif – on Georgia/Florida weekend, which is another large holiday in this State. Very good timing, but it is another attack ad. Do the holiday motifs/subliminal “Go Georgia” message help, or are they outweighed by this being another attack ad when many people claim to be sick of them? Here’s the ad: I don’t do “shotgun” posts that often. I typically try to focus on one thing and elaborate on it at some length. That said, this morning I simply don’t have the time to do that with everything that has caught my eye that I’d like to write about, so I’m doing a “shotgun” to at least make you aware of them and provide some BRIEF commentary: 1) Mike Keown caught LYING about his term as Mayor of Coolidge. Sanford Bishop has previously been caught LYING about some scholarships he directed to campaign contributors’ and staffers’ families. These two men are the SAME. Neither can be trusted, and both want you to worship at the altar of Big Government. Voting for Mickey Mouse in this race was something I am quite proud of. Wish the GOP had given me a candidate I could vote for, but by and large that seems impossible for them. (Dems are also awful at that.) 2) A cheerleader in Texas has been kicked off the squad. What was her infraction, and why was it newsworthy? She refused to call out the name of a player individually, as the squad did at times. Because he had raped her. Seems like something Nathan Deal would approve. 3) The Georgia GOP continues their fearmongering, tying any Democrat to Barack Obama, no matter how tenuous the actual link is. (And let’s face it, Party link is only strong for those that are hyper-partisan or bound by loyalty oaths.) Joe Martin is my dead-last choice for the job, but it is because he spent 20 years “leading” education with NOTHING to show for it – not out of some fear of some boogey straw man. 4) While we’re on that particular subject, notice the GOP crying foul over the embellished Roy Barnes commercial? I say they’re HYPOCRITES, because every single mailer I’ve seen from them photoshops various Statewide D candidates side by side with Barack Obama and/or Nancy Pelosi, with ZERO proof that the two people in question were ever even in the same zip code at the same time, much less in the same room, side by side. How about you cry foul over THAT embellishment, GOP?? An interesting situation is developing right now, and I’m still working to sort through the reports. Here’s what happened: At 5pm today, Peach Pundit’s Clint Murphy reported via twitter that
I immediately retweeted this because Clint is typically trustworthy – to me, this wasn’t just some random report, but an actual initial report of an conflict in a developing situation. I put it out on my Facebook at the same time, for the same reason. Moments later, I began a private conversation with Clint on Twitter, where it was revealed that sources at the event had told him that there was a conflict between Nathan Deal’s staffers and some protesters that had gathered in opposition to Deal. Per what Clint had been told, Jeanne Seaver -a recent Republican candidate for Congress- and Congressman Jack Kingston had to get involved to calm the situation. After I talked to Clint, I called two sources who I knew to be at the event. One source said that he saw Kingston talking to the protesters, but that they were “smiling and laughing”. The other source said he didn’t see Kingston anywhere near the protesters, but that this source had been near the stage for the entire event. Upon talking to the first source, I put out another tweet and facebook post saying
I spoke with the second source about 20 minutes later. At this point, I simply do not know how to answer the question that is the title of this post. Clint is typically a solid source of information, but we are all known to be wrong at times. Hopefully, Savannah’s professional media was there and can elaborate on this situation, as they probably would have been in position to see what happened, if anything. The initial report from WSAV in Savannah does not mention any disturbance. Nor does the initial report from WTOC. Nor does the initial report from WJOC. At the moment, that is all I know. Stay tuned. [UPDATE]: An article from the Savannah Morning News indicates (at the very bottom of the article), that there WAS some form of altercation, but does NOT mention any form of physicality. One of the great defenses of the Christian faith is that the Gospel writers didn’t lie about the small stuff, even though this small stuff wasn’t popular at the time. For example, in that era a woman’s testimony was completely worthless – yet it was a woman whom the Gospel writers record as the first to find the empty tomb. When looking at a candidate’s character, one thing to look at is this same principle: do they lie about the small stuff, the stuff that ultimately may be unpopular, but doesn’t really amount to a hill of beans? Honestly, one of the primary reasons I like Austin Scott is that he doesn’t. But when you’re a candidate involved in MULTIPLE scandals, as Nathan Deal is, it becomes even more important. You build a record in the small stuff that comes to bear in the big stuff, for better or worse. Build a record of honesty in the small stuff, and people are more willing to give you the benefit of the doubt on the big stuff. Build a record of lying on the little stuff, and people are more likely to doubt you on the big stuff. Campaign scheduling really is “small stuff”. People won’t remember even the week after the election where you were the week before the election. And yet, Nathan Deal risks his honor over campaign scheduling: Here’s what Nathan Deal said on twitter yesterday: That was posted yesterday, and claims that Nathan will be in SWGA today. Here’s the schedule of the tour, provided in a GOP email: Note that the red boxes on the image (added by me) highlight a certain candidate as NOT attending a single event scheduled in SWGA today. The candidate NOT attending a single event in SWGA today is none other than Nathan Deal, who told supporters he WOULD be in SWGA today. Nathan Deal LIED about something so small and insignificant as campaign scheduling. How can we trust him on the MULTIPLE scandals he is involved in, much less the actual very serious issues facing the next Governor of this Great State? Andre Walker of Georgia Politics Unfiltered has been digging into the Congressional Record of one Nathan Deal to investigate claims from the Barnes camp that “Nathan Deal voted to increase his Congressional pay six times.” Indeed, this claim is on the roy2010.com website, as you can see from the screen capture at the bottom of this post. His results:
Links to much of the above are on Andre’s site. What it boils down to is that Nathan Deal actually voted AGAINST a Congressional pay increase SEVEN times – and simply failed to vote against the automatic increase TEN times. But he never actively voted FOR a pay increase. So Roy Barnes was, in fact, caught LYING -even though Nathan’s Congressional pay increased more times than Barnes said it did, it wasn’t because Deal voted on it, either way. Again, if you’re sick of the lies, vote for the only honest man in this race: Vote John Monds. Wendesday, Atlanta’s 11 Alive reported that Roy Barnes was using some edited footage in a campaign commercial. The video was from the Temple Debate, where Roy, Nathan Deal, and John Monds had a very spirited debate. After the debate, Nathan Deal made a hasty exit, with a handful of reporters – and a Democratic Party videographer – hot on his heels. The situation alone was bad enough, but someone in the Barnes campaign decided it would be a smart idea to embellish the video adding extra voices with unrelated questions. All of the actual questions shouted at Deal seemed to revolve around one of his latest controversies – that he used his Congressional office to lobby the Attorney General for a favorable ruling related to his business at Gainesville Salvage and Disposal. While this is the same company as the long-known story of his using his good buddy Lt Governor Casey Cagle to strong arm Revenue Commissioner Bart Graham into trying to keep his no-bid State contract, the lobbying of the Attorney General was for a separate business venture – a landfill adjacent to the GSD property. The Barnes camp, in their edit, added a narrator – no problem there – and at least one to two new voices asking unrelated questions such as “What are you hiding?” – more of a problem there. The added voices make it seem much more frenzied than the situation actually was – after all, these reporters are professionals. They also emphasize points from Roy campaign, which is one reason they immediately draw suspicion. (Another reason is, as many have noted, that they are clearly dubbed in.) As expected, the GOP is calling for Barnes’ head over this – and yet giving themselves and Nathan a pass when they embellish things to make ROY look worse than he is. No surprise that the GOP would be hypocrites. None at all. But neither am I downplaying that Barnes made an error here – as I noted above, the original video was bad enough, and I have no problem with the narration making it worse. I DO have a problem with the extra “reporter” voices, I simply feel that this is no worse than the embellishments Nathan Deal is just as guilty of using against Roy Barnes. At the end of the day, there is one way to send a STRONG message that you are tired of this kind of politics – vote for the one man in this race who hasn’t engaged in it: John Monds. For your viewing pleasure, here is both the original video and the Barnes ad in question: A lot has been discussed recently about Nathan Deal’s 1991 SB 51, which per multiple media reports would have weakened Georgia’s rape shield laws and forced rape victims to testify about their sexual histories and clothing choices. Over the past couple of days, a rape victim whose rapist Nathan Deal did his job as a prosecutor 30 years ago and put in jail has come forward and defended him. And how does Nathan Deal return the favor? He tries to profit from her story, as seen in this screen capture from his Facebook page:
Now, to be fair, this could be simply a very poor choice of thumbnail image to go along with this particular story. After all, as many of us know, when you post a link to Facebook, it scans the page for images and lets you select a number of them to use as a thumbnail. I’ve personally seen as many as two dozen images offered as thumbnail choices on some pages I’ve linked to, and there is always the ‘no thumbnail’ checkbox, which will result in no thumbnail being attached. Here’s the problem: I went to the page on Deal’s site, copied the url, and tested posting it in my own feed, just to see how many thumbnails were available. After all, the donate image could have been the only one available, and maybe – for whatever reason – the Deal camp doesn’t like using the ‘no thumbnail’ option. However, the ‘donate’ image in question was the SECOND choice, meaning it had to be ACTIVELY CHOSEN as the thumbnail on that post. The first image is a “HELP OUT” image, the third and fourth images are slightly resized versions of Deal’s “Deal. Real.” red and white logo. Please tell me how anyone could consider the “donate” image more appropriate on a story about RAPE than the other three? Heck, the “Help Out” image could have sent a subliminal message that Deal was trying to HELP rape victims, as the story it linked to says. But no, someone on Nathan Deal’s campaign ACTIVELY CHOSE TO SEEK TO PROFIT FROM A RAPE VICTIM. How sick, twisted, and pathetic can you get? For comparison purposes, here are the other three thumbnails that could have been chosen:
Earlier today, Roy Barnes released an ad accusing Nathan Deal of working to dismantle Georgia’s rape shield law, which would have forced women in Georgia to defend their clothing and sexual histories in rape trials, had it been successful. The bill in question was 1991′s SB 51, which Barnes claims was written by Nathan Deal while he was President Pro Tem of the Georgia Senate. Now, the Georgia General Assembly is notorious for their record keeping. Virtually anything you need can be found online on LEGIS – but only if it happened in 1995 or later, when Deal was already in Congress. That said, just because it isn’t online doesn’t mean the documents don’t exist – and I am actively on the case of getting them. These are serious allegations, and either Deal or Barnes is innocent here, but not both. Once we get the LEGIS level history of this bill, we will know one way or the other. For now, the target is 1991′s SB 51. That will tell all in this case. Here’s the ad in question: I saw this on Facebook today, and asked its author if I could post it here. With his blessing and encouragement, here is a statement from former GOP State Committee Member Michael Carter of Cleveland, Ga.
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Nathan Deal and Fiscal Irresponsibility
Let’s get real about Deal. This candidate says he believes in fiscal responsibility, going even so far as to introduce a bill in Congress called “The Fiscal Responsibility Act.”
And Nathan Deal is by far and away the least fiscally responsible candidate running for Governor this year.
Barnes balanced the budget every year he was Governor, getting a B from the CATO institute. Nathan Deal sure hasn’t done a great job as a Congressman in balancing the budget. Now, Nathan Deal is attacking Barnes for proposing a 300 million dollar tax cut for businesses without a plan to pay for it. Really? Because, one of the biggest contributions to our national debt has been the Bush tax cuts that were pushed through with no plans to pay for them. Deal had no problem supporting that mountain of debt (over 2 trillion) added to our grandchildren. How do we know his prior fiscal irresponsibility won’t carry over into his possible administration?
Barnes spent about 15k on air travel this gubernatorial cycle. Nathan Deal spent 135k. We’re talking NINE TIMES what Barnes spent on airplanes. Of course, it’s no surprise to find that the 135k is going to a company Nathan Deal co-owns. He’s spending nine times the amount of Barnes to get the same job done. How do we know his campaign’s fiscal irresponsibility won’t carry over into his possible administration?
And, of course, at this point an entire book could be written about The Deal Financial Scandal. Deal’s Financial Scandal has more twists and turns than Chutes and Ladders. There’s a great summary up over at The Perimeter Progressive, but saying that Deal has some personal financial issues at this point would be putting it kindly. How do we know his personal fiscal irresponsibility won’t carry over into his possible administration?
The next Governor of the great state of Georgia has the legal obligation to balance our budget. But everything we’ve seen from Deal, from his prior governmental experiences to his campaign experiences to his personal experiences, shows he’s just incapable of actually balancing a budget. How do we know his fiscal irresponsibility won’t lead our state into financial ruin?
We don’t.
No Deal Georgia.