I am very soft spoken.
Posted on 10/28/2009 3:42:52 AM PDT by markomalley
More than three decades after Maynard H. Jackson Jr. became the first African-American mayor of a major Southern city here, the era of uncontested black leadership in the cradle of the civil-rights movement is facing its first true test: A white city councilwoman leads the mayoral race by a wide margin just days before the Nov. 3 election.
Recent polls show Mary Norwood, a fiscal conservative who lives in a heavily white, wealthy section of Atlanta, with support ranging from 39% to 46% of likely voters. That puts her potentially within striking distance of winning outright next week or heading into a runoff with one of the two most prominent African-American candidates, City Council President Lisa Borders and former state Sen. Kasim Reed, both of whom have struggled to gather support from even 25% of voters.
Most striking in Ms. Norwood's numbers is her level of support among widely fractured African-American voters. An InsiderAdvantage poll on Oct. 16 showed Ms. Norwood leading all candidates among black voters, with nearly a third of African-Americans supporting her.
(Excerpt) Read more at online.wsj.com ...
If she wins it will be hugh.
Disenfranchised!
No justice, no peace!
FormerAtlantaAreaResidentBookmark
It could be series.
And the nasty comments being made by black “leaders” has been almost as astounding as the lack of backlash on them.
The taxpaying citizens of Atlanta are tired of funding the corrupt politicians and their families.
Privatizing the Atlanta airport would also get rid of the nepotism and make money for the city.
The high level of crime is also a downer.
This is all hoopla. When you have two black candidates and one white candidate in a multi-candidate race, the blacks usually split and give the white candidate a “chance” to claim the seat by plurality. Sort of like when Ears Perot jumped in the race in ‘92.
If nobody in a multi-candidate race gets over 50% of the vote, the top two vote-getters go into a runoff.
If Norwood survives the general, whoever gets into the runoff with her will go around screaming to the various black constituencies and whip them up into a frenzy and to the polls, and she'll lose the runoff.
I would like to think that ALL Atlantans, including the black community, are tired of corruption and 'business as usual', but I doubt it. The current mayor, Shirley Franklin, is actually a friend of my mother's. She's not radical, she's honest, and as far as I know she is clean. But she is burned out from fighting the entrenched City Hall corruption. I'm not sure a change of mayor to a white Northsider would do any good at all. There will have to be more indictments before anything changes downtown.
I agree with you about Ms. Shirley — she’s remarkably clean compared to prior administrations. AND she has been more effective as the CEO of the city. She has entrenched powers in her way.
Shirley will pick a favorite though once the primary election is over. THEN we’ll see who the winner will be.
Glad I live in Gwinnett, not Fulton county ;-)
Speaking of corruption, is former Mayor Bill Campbell still in jail?
I suppose I could look it up, but I despise the man so much that I would run out of saliva if I saw his name too frequently.
I knew him back when he was our City Councilman in the early 70s and sold out the folks who elected him over the old I-485/Morningside controversy (that's ancient history to anybody but an old time Atlantan). But we all knew from the git-go (and from personal experience) that he was dirty -- that didn't stop the idiots in Atlanta from voting for him over and over again.
One of the MANY reasons I now live in Cobb County, even though I still have to work in the City.
I hear from a friend of mine who lives in the Lilburn area that Gwinnett is having problems. Hope they aren't in your area.
Would she win in the runoff?
That'd be me.
But we all knew from the git-go (and from personal experience) that he was dirty -- that didn't stop the idiots in Atlanta from voting for him over and over again.
So was Maynard Jackson. Jackson is responsible for a lot of the issues with Hartsfield Airport. I thought it was rather ironic that they chose to add Jackson's name to the airport a few years ago, considering that he used the awarding of airport concessions to reward his family members and cronies.
One of the MANY reasons I now live in Cobb County, even though I still have to work in the City.
I left in '91, mostly because I was sick of having to plan my day around the terrible traffic congestion.....
I am very soft spoken.
Corruption? Well is sounds as though it might be a good opportunity for Georgian law enforcement to make an example out of some corrupt officials.
If you believe the article, lots of blacks prefer the white candidate over the black candidates.
This is obvious racism, and the DoJ needs to get involved. There should be a law preventing blacks from voting other than Democrat, and if it’s a non-partisan race, they must choose the black over the white.
At face value this seems worthy of a gasp. However, the guy running against her is a Shirley Man and she hangs around his neck like an albatross. Further, after seeing him on TV last night, the dude is a total dope. I’m not saying his alternative is better because she is like your typical commie Rat.
Another Atlantan checking in.
I have a bet with another Freeper that I will run naked down Peachtree if a white wins.
Wont happen. Might win a plurality but never the race. Our local media will make damnsure of that.
What you said word for word.
If I could also add to my prediction above.
When Norwood wins the plurality, it will not be because of O.
When she loses the race, it will be.
Did either of you read the whole article? It claims that, in polls, she is the leading candidate among black voters.
A white mayor was elected in Kansas City, Mo.
The mayorship (?) has been traditionally held by a black man (Cleaver, now a US Rep).
The attacks on the white mayor have been vicious and unending.
The legislature should have taken away the plaything that is the Atlanta Airport from the City of Atlanta years ago.
Bill Campbell firing Angela Gittens, who had been named Airport Administrator of the year by her peers in the year previous to her firing, made this obvious to even the clueless. While Shirley has been a big improvement, it was a really, really low bar.
I’m pretty sure Bill Campbell got out a couple of years ago.
One year.
Atlanta’s ex-mayor Bill Campbell leaves West Palm Beach halfway house
http://www.palmbeachpost.com/localnews/content/local_news/epaper/2008/10/24/1024mayor.html
Gwinnett is having to deal with revenue shortfalls and the commissioners have to make tough choices: cuts and taxes.
These are unpleasant and challenging, but not what I would call problems (in the Maynard Jackson sense). I’ve lived in 9 states, and I think Gwinnett county is really pretty well run overall.
I don't see how you can say that. They spend hundreds of millions on construction projects and then went economic times slow down fall in to a crisis where the only option is to raise taxes (severely) and they do it with all of the extortionist skills of a Chicago mobster. The county itself is a complete disaster from Jimmy Carter all the way up to Pleasant Hill.
There is no crime in Atlanta, whatsoever. I recently went downtown to 5 Points, wearing nothing but glued-on one-hundred-dollar-bills, and started handing out free crack and machineguns to every single person I saw, and I wasn’t robbed once.
Actually, the city has exported so many of its criminals
to the suburbs, it might be safer downtown.
I’m glad I live in Forsyth...
GO GO GO!!!
Hopefully Birmingham AL will be next...
WTF??? A TRUE TEST? Because heaven forbid a white politician might win the Mayors race??? Who the hell cares?? A competent electorate just wants the best person for the job, regardless of race or gender. So how is this some sort of "test"??? A test for what? How rediculously stupid and biased this article is?
But after 30y, will it be “historic”?
You must mean like the huge waterslide/park that the county built (right next to an existing park) in the middle of a drought. Near my office so I see the boondoggle every day.
Cleaver was the only Black to win the KC Mayoralship. He was preceded by a White Republican. KC, MO is only about 30% Black.
Thanks for the info. I wasn’t paying attention before “this. is. beatiful.”* Cleaver. You have noticed that they’ve pulled out all the stops to “get Funk”, though, and it’s an entirely racist thing at its core.
*Funniest thing I’ve seen in KC politics. Cleaver, looking much like Richard Pryor, standing in front of the creek at the Plaza that just had raw sewage dumped into it, getting mad at the jokes about it, gesturing at the creek and proclaiming “THIS. IS. BEAUTIFUL.” - then trying to keep from controlling his laughter at the absurdity.
I really like Cobb County and especially Vinings, but we're thinking of moving to Cherokee to get less house and more land, now that the kids are grown.
He’s a very strange man, I always want to call him “Eldridge” Cleaver after the ‘60s Black Power figure (although that Cleaver supposedly later became a Conservative Republican !). It’s too bad he ended up in Congress. He’s way too left-wing for that district (and despite he and Alan Wheat (1983-95) having represented it, it’s still a White district, just an urban Dem one). Of course, Dick Bolling was sort of a moonbat, too.
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