Wednesday, July 18, 2007

A Victory For Athens

If the results hold true (as Billy reports below Paul Broun is extending his lead), then this really is a victory for Athens-Clarke, no matter how you slice it. And you have Jim Whitehead and his anti-Athens strategy to thank for it.

Since I wrote last week, I can't tell you how many people I've heard from the past few days saying that Paul Broun, Jr. was the only choice, and that there was no way we could "let that (fill in the blank) from Augusta tell us what to do here in Athens." Over and over, even from friends who would have preferred death to voting for a Republican. Several even said they were forgoing the "none of the above" strategy in favor of the hometown Broun.

Throw in the MCG satellite campus brou-ha-ha, and Broun targeting Democratic voting households with calls and mailers, and I think we saw an "Athens surge" at the polls yesterday. Coming on the heels of ACC Dems failure to put Marlowe in the runoff, this would suggest we're still a force to be reckoned with, no matter how much Ralph Hudgens et al want to draw us out of existence.

As Mike-el pointed out in comments "Broun taking A-CC 5,122-601 is just staggering." And if the vote count holds, it is the reason Mr. Broun will go to Washington.

Let's just hope the Republican Broun remembers the largely Democratic "Athens surge" that put him there.

4 comments:

Polusplanchnos said...

Are we going to have to wait for the certified results to see how many people did take the "NOTA" strategy?

DoYouHaveAnyIdea said...

Let the race for the 10th begin!

Mike-El said...

ABH is reporting there were 78 blank ballots cast in Athens.

Anonymous said...

I think if Broun will just a little more respect (than Whitehead or Charlie Norwood used to do) towards people who disagree with him (a la Ron Paul) it might be a nice change of pace. I get a little tired of hearing how i dont love America and I am regsitering Al Qeada members to vote in North Georgia.