There are a lot of Republicans seeking the nomination for Insurance Commissioner this year.  They are:

• Dennis Cain
• Rick Collum
• Seth Harp
• Ralph Hudgens
• Tom Knox
• Joe Mamalakis
• Stephen Northington
• Gerry Purcell
• Maria Sheffield

What a list, huh? Time and space don’t really afford me the luxury of going into detail with all of these candidates and the differences between them, so I’ll just get to the point and tell you I’m supporting Gerry Purcell for Insurance Commissioner.  You can check them all out for yourself, but Gerry is a good free market guy with plenty of experience dealing with the insurance industry.

For the office of Secretary of State, we’ve got two candidates on the Republican ballot:

• Brian Kemp
• Doug MacGinnitie

Brian Kemp is the incumbent who was hand picked by the Governor. You may remember that story.

Doug MacGinnitie has been my choice all along. He’s a solid candidate that I had the opportunity to meet several months ago at a Paulding County GOP meeting. You can read my thoughts on MacGinnitie from that meeting here.

On the Republican list for State School Superintendent this year, we’ve got:

• Kathy Cox
• John Barge
• Richard Woods

This is a Republican primary, so we’re talking about Republicans. Of these, I’d probably take John Barge, but I really think the Libertarians have the best candidate in Kira Willis, who will be on the ballot in November.

The candidates for Attorney General are:

• Sam Olens
• Preston Smith
• Max Wood

I’m technically still undecided on this race.  I really like Preston Smith. (He’s the guy who called out the Republican leadership from the floor of the Senate for pushing new taxes and refused to vote for the new taxes after being told he would lose committee chairmanship over the vote. The entire speech is posted here, and it’s definitely worth reading.)  On the other hand, Max Wood is (by far) the most qualified for the position.

So that’s where I’m torn on this one.  Undecided, split about 50/50 between Smith and Wood.

The Governor’s race. This one hits close to home for me because I’ve spent time working in it. The candidates here are:

• Jeff Chapman – former state senator from Brunswick.
• Nathan Deal – corrupt former Congressman. Likes government involvement until he finds out you don’t. Then he doesn’t like it either.
• Karen Handel – former Secretary of State who chooses political positions based on current political landscape rather than on principle.
• Eric Johnson – former state senator from Savannah.
• Ray McBerry – Atlanta businessman.
• John Oxendine – awful, dirty, greasy, despicable politician who is currently is the state Insurance Commissioner. This guy is the reason nobody likes politicians. I honestly have nothing nice to say about the man.
• Otis Putnam – Wal-Mart employee who decided to run. I’m not sure why.

So that’s the batch of Republicans we get to choose from in the gubernatorial race. You might notice from those descriptions that I’m not really crazy about some of them.

Here’s the situation. There are four candidates that are leading in the polls and in cash. Those four are Oxendine, Deal, Handel, and Johnson.  There’s going to be a runoff, and it will likely be between two of those four candidates.  Of those four, Eric Johnson is the only one I could trust.

Of the others, Jeff Chapman gets my attention, but I’m torn between him and Johnson. Eric Johnson called me one day, which certainly caught me off guard, and we talked for 10 or 15 minutes about the race. I think he would govern well (certainly better than Oxendine, Deal, or Handel), but I still have trouble deciding on the race.

Maybe it’s a problem with me swallowing my pride and admitting I was wrong about one of these candidates I used to support. Maybe there’s something else.  Either way, I’m still working through the decision making process on this. I hoped that by now I would have decided on my candidate for Governor, but I’m just not there yet.

Next up in this “Who’s on Your Ballot?” series is the Public Service Commission race.  There are 4 candidates running for a seat on the Public Service Commission:

• Joseph Brush
• Tim Echols
• John Douglas
• Jeff May

Before I sat down to write this post, I had no idea about any of the candidates in this race.  It’s not one of the highly publicized races in the statewide elections, so even though I try to keep current on what’s going on, this is one that I really knew nothing about.

I found video footage of the Atlanta Press Club debate, which I hoped would help me decide on one of the candidates.  A lot of what they say sounds the same, really.  They’re all Republicans in a Republican primary election discussing energy, so you can imagine they’d all sound a lot alike.

One question, however, stood out to me.  I didn’t initially see how it applied to the PSC, but the more I think about it, the more it makes sense as a valid question of the candidates.  It was a yes/no question of whether we should repeal the 17th Amendment.

(The 17th Amendment is the one that changed U.S. Senate elections so that senators are elected by states’ citizens rather than by the states’ legislatures. The 17th Amendment is part of the reason the Senate is full of such an awful bunch of politicians, and it needs to be repealed. But that’s a different discussion for a different day.)

Brush answered first and said no. Douglas declined to answer saying it wasn’t relevant to the PSC. Echols said no. Then May said yes.

In a debate where the four candidates sound very, very much alike, May’s support of repealing the 17th Amendment did a lot to set him apart from the crowd; and it made the difference for me. I’ll be voting for Jeff May for PSC on July 20.

Part of Paulding County is in the Georgia State Senate district 31.  We’ve only got two people in this race:

• Pete Bridges – Mayor of Tallapoosa
• Bill Heath – Incumbent senator and business owner; lives in Bremen.

When I saw Heath had opposition in this race, I decided I’d give the opponent serious consideration. Heath is a good guy, and generally he does a decent job on the issues.  There’s room for improvement in this seat though, and I was willing to at least listen to a challenger for the seat in the state senate.

The problem is that Pete Bridges doesn’t really seem to be campaigning, which makes me wonder if he really wants the job. If he is campaigning, he’s not campaigning in Paulding County, which tells me he’s not interested in the issues relevant to our county.

Bridges has a lot of signs up around the county, but there have been at least 3 events in Paulding County where Bridges and Heath had an opportunity to address voters, and only Heath showed up. (Heath attended all three events.) If a candidate isn’t willing to engage with me in the campaign, how likely is he to care about my views when he’s in office.

I’ll be voting for Bill Heath in district 31.  If Pete Bridges wants my attention next time around, he can try actually campaigning for the office he seeks.

Here is some video I took this weekend of Preston Smith, candidate for Attorney General.  He was in Paulding County to speak to the Paulding GOP women’s group.  (Ladies, if you’re interested in that group, let me know, and I’ll get you in touch with people who can get you more info.)

If you don’t know Preston Smith, he’s the hero of the Senate that gave this speech on the Senate floor, calling out bad Republican leadership by name.  I’ve read that speech probably two dozen times.  If you haven’t yet read that speech, you really, really should go do it now.

(These videos are a little shaky at times.  Sorry about that.)

First, the speech (parts 1 and 2):

Then there was Q&A time.

The first questioner asked Smith if he supported using external counsel to team with other states suing over the mandated health care and also about Georgia’s water issue.  (The questioner rambled for almost 4 minutes, so I just cut that part out.)

A question about his opinion of the Arizona immigration law:

A question about why he chose to run for Attorney General instead of Lieutenant Governor (or other office):

If you follow this blog much, you’ll know it’s not much of a secret who I support in the House district race.  I’ve previously written about Daniel Stout, and I’ve been (and will continue to be) active with his campaign. He’s a great representative, and we need to keep him in office.

Daniel is running against two other candidates, Steve Golden and Paulette Rakestraw-Braddock. Because of my involvement with the Stout campaign, I’ve chosen not to say anything specific about either challenger.

Daniel votes for smaller government and lower taxes.  (His voting record – in detail – is available online here.) He stood up to the Republican leadership – under heavy pressure – and refused to vote for that absurd hospital tax.  (He was, by the way, the only Paulding representative from the House or Senate to vote against that tax.)  Daniel scored 100% on the Americans for Prosperity score card that was recently released.

Daniel is one of the few people in Atlanta with the courage to stand on principle in every instance. There really is no reason for someone who values limited government and lower taxes to consider anyone other than Daniel Stout in the District 19 race.

Karen Handel posted this clarification about her position on life.  Basically she still says she’s pro-life, and basically she still isn’t.  Well she is, just not all of the time.

At the bottom of that page, she lists some quotes from people to support her (alleged) dedication to protecting the unborn.  One of those quotes (the one by Stephen Dillard) is rather long, but it says everything you need to know about Karen’s stance on the life issue.  This part of it really stood out to me:  (the emphasis is mine)

“Her willingness to permit abortions in certain rare circumstances is grounded in the reality of the current political landscape, and should in no way be interpreted as a belief on her part that children conceived by rape or incest are somehow less than fully human.”

Karen Handel’s position on life is grounded in political landscape, not on principle.

Political landscapes will change.  If she is willing to draw the line on life based on political landscape, she’ll move it when the landscape changes.  The fact that she chooses her position on the issues based on politics scares me.

Georgia needs a Governor who will take stands on issue based on principle, no matter what the political landscape may be.  As this post on her own web site shows us, Karen Handel is clearly not that person.

Some Handel supporters are fine with her position on life.  If that’s you, then I’d ask you to consider her willingness to make her stance on issues based on political climate.  She could be tough on spending now, but what if the climate changes?  She could be good on the economy, or education, or water, or anything else, but what happens to her stance when the political climate changes?

For the pro-life voters who are still supporting Karen, I encourage you to give serious consideration to where you believe life begins.  If the life issue really is a big issue for you, then figure out what you believe and compare that to what Karen believes.  Then ask yourself if you’re willing to compromise what you believe by voting for Karen Handel.

Give this serious consideration.  That’s all I ask.