Braves Drama Continues
Tuesday night the Cobb County Commissioners will vote on a authorization to borrow nearly $400 million from the county to build the new Braves stadium. This number would be significantly higher than the $367 million that for months has been emphasized as the limit for which the county would be on the hook. The bond resolution that triggered the vote was released to the public at 6:00pm on Friday, after many had already left town for the long weekend. It is another case of Braves officials and the Cobb County Commissioners pulling a fast one on the public, adding taxpayer funds into the Braves stadium by releasing information at the last moment before the weekend and then holding the vote on the first business day back.
If the stench of this vote seems familiar to you, that’s because it is. The Braves pulled this same stunt to get the move signed off on in the first place. In an interview with the Atlanta Press Club last week, he stated, “It didn’t leak out. If it had leaked out, this deal would not have gotten done… If it had gotten out, more people would have started taking the position of, ‘We don’t want that to happen.” You know John, you may have a point there. Between the lack of parking, extreme traffic concerns, and a multi-use retail area that will be a ghost town 280 days a year, the Braves-to-Cobb saga is far from over. At least, though, it will be fun to watch, (unless you’re a Cobb resident footing the ever-rising bill that is).
Kingston Receives Tea Party Support
Last week I wrote a piece on the Tea Party’s struggles during the primary and on which of the two Republican Senate candidates their support would fall on. Well, as it turns out we didn’t have to wait long to find out. Julianne Thompson, Co-Chairman of the Atlanta Tea Party, publicly endorsed Kingston over the weekend. Thompson, who had previously endorsed Karen Handel in the primary, stated that, “if you find someone you can agree with 80% of the time you have found an ally, as Ronald Reagan once said”. So it appears Kingston, the Chamber of Commerce-backed establishment candidate, is receiving the first wave of Tea Party support. Kingston has been tacking to the right throughout his campaign thus far, and don’t expect that strategy to change as he attempts to cast Perdue as a moderate in the runoff.
More good news for Kingston, the first polling of the runoff, done by Public Policy Polling, (a left-leaning outfit) shows Kingston leading Perdue 46% to 34%, with 20% still undecided. As evidenced by endorsements from Thompson and Erick Erickson, Kingston is the candidate so far receiving support from Handel’s camp, giving him an edge early in the runoff.
