The local liberal bloggers at Georgia Progress dug into Republican state House candidate Carter Kessler’s Facebook page, dredging up some disturbing comments like “the south will rise again.” He also called the Mayor and Commission “Soviets” and the 9/11 terrorist attacks a government conspiracy.
Flagpole’s election preview talks more about Kessler’s flip-flops (he pullled out the Etch-A-Sketch and ran to the middle after the July primary), as well as an accusation that state Sen. Frank Ginn, R-Danielsville, made homophobic comments about his openly gay challenger, Tim Riley.
Patch attended the Darwin for Congress rally on Friday (Flagpole covered it the previous week) and says that the local parties are organizing phone banks to call Ohio voters, and Democrats are offering rides to the polls tomorrow.
The last white Democratic congressman in the Deep South, John Barrow (D-Athens/Savannah/Augusta), is projected to survive yet another Republican attempt to oust him. He’s leading Lee Anderson by six points, according to a poll by the Athens-based progressive group Better Georgia. Georgia Tipsheet credits his effective (read: goofy) ad campaign.
Jim Galloway at the AJC reports that 34 percent of early voters in Georgia were African-Americans, the same percentage as last year and higher than the state’s 30 percent black population, even though President Obama didn’t campaign in Georgia. Don’t despair, Democrats: We’re just a few years away from becoming a swing state.
Incidentally, UGA political scientist Charles Bullock told Flagpole recently that the Obama campaign isn’t active in Georgia this year because it overestimated support for Libertarian Bob Barr, a former Georgia congressman, in 2008. Obama lost the state by five points, about what Team Obama thought Barr would poll here, but he only ended up with about 1 percent of the vote. This year, the Libertarian nominee is former New Mexico Gov. Gary Johnson.
Mitt Romney is certain to win Georgia, but over at the New York Times blog FiveThirtyEight, statistician Nate Silver projects that Obama will win 307 electoral votes to Romney’s 231. He gives Obama an 86 percent chance of winning re-election. RealClearPolitic’s no-tossup map gives Obama a 303-235 edge.
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