(Updated with Video) Baldwin County's Howell Visits Washington D.C.

Conservative Democrat & 2010 HD 141 Candidate Quentin T. Howell (D-Hardwick) was in Washington D.C. on Wednesday as part of a congressional delegation to meet the administration of President Obama as he talked about issues that are facing rural Georgia & voicing the concerns of everyday hardworking families. Howell asked citizens to submit questions to him to take to officials of the Obama Administration during this trip

Howell, a local Radio Host which broadcast across much of central Georgia & community activist says: "this is for Republicans, Democrats, Tea Party members, liberals and conservatives alike,” He goes on to say “Our community has been on life-support for a long time. It is going to take action across political lines and outside of our comfort zones to make us well again"



The Obama administration officials have met with rural leaders from states across the nation to find out information from the people.



Howell said the people in the group all share a passion for their communities.“The people who are going have been extremely active throughout their cities and counties,” he said. “Within the group from across the state, we will be part of a group hoping to narrow the focus on middle Georgia.”

Like much of Georgia, Baldwin County where Howell resides has been hit extremely hard by job losses over the past decade. Howell has made it his mission to turn the fortunes around in Baldwin County who job looses range from the Rheem Manufacturing Plant closing to the closing of two of its prisons to name a few.

Howell, who said he plans to focus on jobs, has taken part in administration discussions before, previously with members of the George W. Bush administration.

Howell ran for HD 141 last year getting 43% of the vote against Rusty Kidd (I). Not bad for a first time candidate. The odds are that he will make another run for HD 141 in 2012 against Kidd.

This is a great example of what a "PUBLIC SERVANT" is supposed to be. Only if we had more like Quentin T. Howell

Dr. Jeane Dugas Resigns as DPG Chairman of the 2nd Congressional District

After 8 months on the job, Dr. Jeanne Dugas former Chairwoman of the Muscogee County Democratic Party resigned from her post as Chairman of the 2nd Congressional District for the Democratic Party of Georgia last week according to a source with knowledge of the situation. Reason why Dr. Dugas is unknown.

Dugas, a liberal democrat, who hails from Columbus ran for the 2nd Congressional District seat back in January at the DPG Leadership Elections held in Warner Robins, bested her opponent (yours truly) Conservative Democrat Keith MacCants, Founder & Editor of Peanut Politics & ex-Vice-Chair of the Macon County Democratic Party to succeed Margaret Tyson who didn't seek re-election.

There will be a special election held in November to elect a new Chairman of the 2nd Congressional District to finish our the four year term.

So who wants it?

GGW (GOP Gone Wild): What's their Real Goal?

Every since the 2010 elections in which the GOP won 60+ seats in the House of Representatives, the GOP have pretty much blocked, delayed, or stalled anything the president puts forward to try to get this economy moving again.

Every since last year's elections, the GOP (Grand 'Ol Party) ideology has harden to extreme levels to the point that "Compromise" is now a dirty word in Republican Circles.

So my question is what is exactly the republican's goal here?

They say its to reduce the deficit (which many agree), cut spending (yep) & reform entitlements (ok), but today’s Republican Party instead is holding our country’s fiscal solvency hostage in order to achieve radical ideological and political goals.

The ideological motivation for hardline conservatives here is that they think they finally have within their grasp their dream of drowning in the bathtub; any portion of government that benefits the middle class, working class, or poor. They have long wanted to get rid (or drastically) Medicare, Social Security, investments in infrastructure and education, and the social safety net, but they know that such steps would be politically disastrous for them. So, Republicans have spent the past 30 years driving up deficits in order to create a situation where voters feel that we “must” destroy government programs in order to restore fiscal sanity.

Now I admit, government has gotten way too big & have made a mess of things here in the U.S. but why would you hit SS, Medicare, things that many are relying on in today's weak economy?

Now I haven't been a been a supporter of the president & some of his policies, but Im going to come to his defense here: Under Republican presidents, they have drove the deficits up during the Reagan and Bush 41 & 43 Administrations by then record numbers & now it seems that the years prior to 2008 didn't exist & now UN-OH look our deficit is spiraling out of control under president Obama. Yes the president has added to a already skyrocketing deficit & debt, but you need to acknowledge that all this got started long before Obama got into the White House.

Rep. Paul Ryan’s Path to Poverty plan devotes all of the “savings” from abolishing Medicare and cutting social programs to further reductions in taxes for the wealthy, rather than to deficit reduction. And that is why the Republicans are opposing a balanced approach to deficit reduction that involves both spending cuts and revenue increases and, instead, pushing for a “Cut, Cap, and Balance” approach that involves $5.5 trillion in cuts to Medicare, Medicaid, Social Security, and discretionary social spending, and zero in new revenue. The way I loom at it, their priority is destroying government, not reducing the deficit.

The GOP’s pathological intransigence is also motivated by the cold economic calculation that a bad economy bodes well for their desire to defeat President Obama in 2012. That is why from the day that President Obama took office in January 2009, the Republicans have done everything they can to prevent job creation, including weakening the stimulus bill, (who depending who you ask work or didn't work) filibustering TANF and extended unemployment benefits, refusing to approve non-controversial appointees to important positions in the Treasury Department and Federal Reserve, and opposing tax relief to small businesses and a temporary cut in payroll taxes that they supported before Obama was President. And in 2010, the GOP campaigned on jobs, but they still have yet to propose any legislation that would create actual jobs. And then they rattled the economy and the markets by pushing our nation to the brink of having to default on its debt. As Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell has made clear, the Republicans’ number one priority is not job creation or economic recovery but, instead, is to try to ensure that President Obama is defeated in 2012. Holding the debt ceiling increase hostage in the name of dismantling our government is a critical part of the GOP’s attempt to achieve that goal.

In short, the GOP has walked away from the debt ceiling negotiations because their goals are destroying government and defeating President Obama, not because they want to reduce the deficit. It is sad that today’s GOP has put their ideological hatred of government that helps anyone but the rich, and their dislike of our President, love him or hate him is trying his best!

I can see this ad being remade in 2012 by the Republican Nominee against Incumbent Barack Obama

Lyndon Johnson in '68....Barack Obama in '12?

An unpopular Vietnam War, Partisan Divisions in Congress & among the American People, Economic Woes & the rise of the anti-War New Left & Neo-Liberalism were reasons Lyndon Johnson decided not to seek re-election in 1968

Are a worsening Economy, rising Unemployment, sinking poll numbers, exrteme partisan divide in Congress & among the American People where the word 'compromise' has become a dirty word, deep animosity towards his presidency & the rise of the anti-government Tea Party will be reasons president Obama decides not to run for re-election? Not in a million years, but you have to wonder..........

Montezuma Election 2011: Your Vote, Your Voice, You Decide!

This coming November will be no doubt the most important city election Montezuma has ever witness as the direction & future of the city will be decided in November.

4 years ago saw the election of Bobby Lewis & Carl Peaster to the Montezuma City Council, while Tarschea Fudge Riley came within inches of victory.

Well here we are again as Incumbent Mayor Willie J Larry of Montezuma will have to defend his record as Montezuma Mayor, which has been less than stellar as LeVonda Journey-Bush will seek to unseat him as mayor of the City. This maybe the best shot to unseat Larry who was elected in 1999 as the city continues to deteriorate. If Larry runs on his lackluster record, his goose is cooked!! COOKED!!!! Expect him to run a personality based campaign to distract voters from his not-so-stellar record as mayor. Journey-Bush who has been a regular at the Montezuma City Council Meetings will be making her first bid for office, but she will a formidable candidate, make no mistake about it!

JOBS, ECONOMIC DEVELPOMENT, PUBLIC SAFETY, ACCOUNTABILITY are the issues in this election. You can also apply this to the city council races as well

Also incumbent City Councilmen Charles Ivey, Norman Carter & Jim Trask will have to defend their seats against challengers Beau Palmer, Frank Lester III (who previously served as councilman), Juliath 'Dee' Gilmore, Judy Hasselkus & Tarschea Fudge-Riley who lost by a mere margin back in 2007.

No need to highlight elections of Oglethorpe, Ideal, Marshallville. Montezuma is the one to watch!

The race to watch is Montezuma as the city has been hit hard by loss of businesses, jobs, friction among the city council members & the mayor. One of the main issues will he the ridiculously high wate & sewage rates the voters have been saddle with for years now..........some citizens have seen their bill go as high as $290, even higher!

This is what I call a BACK DOOR TAX INCREASE!

The city is definitely at a crossroads with no light at the end of the tunnel. Rumors of its major employer Allens, Inc leaving town continues, the loss of population over a 10 year period deepens & with no real plan for the city on the horizon, this is a opportunity for voters to make it known that they are fed up with the lack of progress the city has made & want to stop the regression the city has been in during the last 6 years.

I rarely cover happenings in my home county, but I will be keeping my eye on this one leading up to November

President Obama: The Least Respected President in our Lifetime?

President Obama will go down as the least respected president in our lifetime.

President Barack Obama wanted to deliver his economic speech to the joint session of Congress next Wednesday. House Speaker John Boehner, told him no. He'll have to do it on the 8th. Boehner cited a scheduling conflict, but the real "conflict" appears to be the GOP presidential debate scheduled for the same date. The president has been forced to capitulate and will now have to compete with the opening night of the NFL season for viewers.

What may seem like a minor slight underscores the crux of the problem in Washington: A blatant, sustained and unabashed disrespect of the president of the United States of America.

And it is historic.

Never in our nation's history has a president been publicly denied access to the chamber for an address, according to the House historian.

This is just the latest in a string of eyebrow-raising and even historic slights..

And for those who want to say it's just partisan politics as usual, or just the kind of thing that goes with being an unpopular president, let's consider a few lowlights:

The "You lie!" shout from South Carolina Congressman Joe Wilson during the president's speech on health care reform before the joint session of Congress in Sept. 2009

The recent posturing, walk-outs and tantrums thrown over the debt ceiling debate, which eventually led to our country's credit being downgraded.

Newt Gingrich referring to the president as "the food stamp president" and saying that Pres. Obama "knows how to get the whole country to resemble Detroit


Congressman Mitch McConnell's bold proclamation that he wants to be Senate Majority Leader to make sure that Obama is a one-term president.

Rush Limbaugh saying that he wants to see this president fail. (Note: Limbaugh has modified that statement to say he meant his "policies." But when it was said, it was less than a year into Obama's presidency and he was still cleaning up the mess from the previous president's policies, which Limbaugh had very little to say about during the Bush era).

Former Fox News host Glenn Beck declaring on the air that the president hates white people" and "the white culture."

Television personality Donald Trump's over-the-top taunting of the president, hyping unprecedented demands to see the president's birth certificate.

The shouts of "We want our country back!" by the Tea Party. (Where has it gone?)

And the frequent habit of not calling the president by his proper honorific: "President Obama", rather than just "Obama" -- by quite a few elected officials, pundits and others.

The question among some of us who love this country and want to see it succeed is what is all of this really all about? Because it just seems as if there is a pissing contest going on, but the only ones getting wet are the American people; many of whom are suffering through the worst economy of their lives.

Some may call this obstructionism. But I think there's something else going on here. And despite what many people are saying, there is also a 'Racial Undercurrent" to this as well, make no mistake about it, (so much for a post racial society). But if it quacks like a duck and walks like a duck...

At the very least it's un-American. Because while all of this is going on, Americans are suffering.
This shouldn't be about President Obama. All 535 lawmakers who were sent to Washington to make a difference must ask themselves this question: is opposing everything this president does for the sake of opposition, or worse for a more insidious reason, helping this nation get back on her feet?

If the answer is no, then they need to knock it off. And if they're not going to do it, it's time for the silent majority to do it for them. Enough is enough!

Rep. Clarence J. Brown - Socialism, 1949

Listen to his Congressman descibe what socialism is......

Herman Talmadge 1974 Interview

Listen Closely!

Oh, The Minority Party Blues: The Present and Future of the Georgia Democratic Party

Following the 2002 elections, the Democratic Party was on its way to being firmly ensconced as Georgia's New Minority Party. Roy Barnes loss in 2002 & again in 2010to NathanDEAL Democratic Party will have been absent from the Governor's Mansion for at least another 4 or 8 years depending on the circumstances. The legislative side, they lost the state senate due to party switchers & retirements & in 2005 lost the house due to division & disagreements among the Black Urban Democrats & White Rural Democrats.

But the Democrats’ status as the minority party is not just a product of its failure to recapture the Governor's Mansion; Democrats’ fortunes have been declining in all three facets of a political party’s existence: in government, in the electorate, and as an organization.

At the state level, the Democratic party in government has declined from its once dominant position losing every single statewide constitutional office last year. Only at the local level democrats still reign supreme, but that's too is being threaten by the locomotive that is the Republic Party of Georgia. The democrats here in Georgia have no where to go but up. Demographic changes are one of the keys democrats can start winning again. But that doesn't mean that they should totally write off white voters in its quest to regain some of its lost stature as the party who was responsible of making Georgia the jewel of the south, the empire state of the south, the leading state of the south.

How did they get to this point has to do with political realignment, new citizens moving in from all parts of the country who didn't know what all the Georgia Democratic Party had done to make Georgia such a attractive place to live & raise a family. But poor decisions by party leaders have also contributed to the decline. Taken together, realignment and the Democrats’ own behavior, the growth of the state of Georgia and its increasing identification with the
Republican Party have made it difficult for Democrats to win in a state once considered
a Democratic stronghold go a long toward explaining how Democrats ended up in the minority.


Like much of the South, the state as a whole is becoming more conservative. Republicans set out to attract “traditional” Democrats who felt at odds with their party on issues of national security, law and order, preferential treatment for women and minorities, and social issues such as abortion and school prayer, etc.

But one should not solely attribute the Democrats’ misfortunes to the processes of realignment.
Democrats themselves certainly share in the blame, as many of their decisions over the past ten years have proven unwise. Not having organized county party committees, a built-in ground game (Grassroots Organization), developing a bench of democratic talent (a Farm Team) & nomination candidates who cannot appeal statewide ( like Georganna Sinkfield Secretary who ran for Secretary of State last year & Jim Martin who was the U.S. Senate nominee in 2008) for example.

While the Democrats’ tendency to nominate liberals for Metro Atlanta or liberals from other progressive bastions from the state that has kept them from winning races for statewide, it is not as if they haven’t been trying extremely hard to break out of that rut.

The remaining Democrats in state government are charged with trying to promote the Democratic agenda or at least slow down the Republican Agenda. But Democrats also faced the challenge of rebuilding the party organization in a way that might make future electoral success possible.

The first task for Democrats was the selection of new leadership to reinvigorating the party Organization: (Michael Berlon: Chair of DPG, Stacey Abrams: House Minority Leader, Steve Henson: Senate Minority Leader). Without an occupant in the Mansion, Democrats would rely on a these people to be both the public face of the Democrats in government as well as the field general, marshalling the Democratic response to the Republican agenda. The selection of Michael Berlon over Darryl Hicks who made two unsuccessful statewide attempts for office showed that democrats wanted a progressive counterpoint to the republicans instead of a centrist approached offered by Darryl Hicks.

And while this was largely received as a win for the Progressive vision for the Democratic Party, Berlon also worked to reach out to the center in an effort to broaden the appeal of the Democratic Party.

Together, Berlon, Abrams & Henson face the task of working together to create a viable
message for Georgia Democrats as well as substantive positions on a host of issues. But they didn't stick together when it came to the revamping of the valued Hope Scholarship, which willl make it extremely harder for rural stsudents, as well as students in low performing school districts to obtain a Hope Scholarship so they can attend a college of their choice. Now students have to make a 3.7 GPA in order to obtaion one of these scholarships.

The immediate future of the Democratic Party looks to be a trying time. On the other hand, however, the prospects for ascension to the majority party in Congress are extremely limited but promising. First off, they must get their organization down here below the Gnat Line together. Secondly, Young Democrats of Georgia Committees must be set up in many counties as possible, as well as high school campuses in addition to college campuses like Ft Valley State, Georgia Southwestern State, South Georgia College, Gordon College, Albany State, Brewton-Parter College. Third, they must recruit candidates that fits the background of a house or Senate District. A one size fits all method isn't going to work. I know a few candidates who ran in red districts tried to run as progressive. Not going to Work! Fourth: Stop trying to mimick the DNC. Become the GEORGIA DEMOCRATIC PARTY AGAIN!

And last COMMUNICATION! Patrick Davis who's a politically astute columnist in Macon said this & I quote: "This gap between Atlanta and 'rural' Georgia is still very wide and the Republicans continue to win due to myths and mis-information and I believe this hinders candidate recruitment in various local and state elections. I hate to say this, but as a state party, we are still allowing Republicans to control the debate -- even in counties in which Democrats should do MUCH BETTER in.. One example is Telfair County and its county seat McRae that's usually vote REPUBLICAN. McRae's demographics have dramatically changed in TEN YEARS. It has gone from a population of 2,600 to 5,300. In 2000, it was 53% white, but now in 2010 it is 37% African-American, 32% white and 27% Latino.Where's is the DPG on the issue of immigration reform and HB-87? Local media is non-existent down in this part of Georgia.

And quote Davis again: "Better communication is the main cure for Georgia Democrats. In many places in rural Central and South Georgia, daily media is almost non-existent. So public discourse on an issue such as how the HOPE scholarship being cut and how it... affect rural Georgia goes virtually un-discussed. Most weekly rural newspapers are primarily advertisers with little content or substance. THE DPG has to take on a larger role of getting the Democratic message out. The communication department of the DPG needs to be revamped and expanded. Thus far, those folks have been non-existent.

I absolutely agree with Patrick Davis 100% on this. I have seen stories being reported in the news that occurred 2-3 days ago & sometimes the week before. Communication is key. Hit the small town newspapers, send weekly columns to the editor. This is a area that the party is severely lacking. A state as huge as Georgia, there should be multiple communications people working under Eric Gray at the DPG to get the word at a rapid-like pace.

The democrats have a long, (not too long) way to go before they fix what's been ailing the party.