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.
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