The Chicken Whisperer: The Senate

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This is the first of the rundowns on the races tomorrow. I'll get the Senate and the 6th District Congressional candidates analysed and I'll also briefly hit the 37th District for the Georgia State Senate. Most of the information I have gleaned are from the candidates website and the flyers that have come to my house. In a few cases I can speak from personel experience on the candidates or on their TV ads.

The Republican Primary for Senate is a 3-man race between two sitting Congressmen and a former head of Godfather's Pizza and executive at Pillsbury.

This winner of this race will, in all likelyhood, be the next Senator of Georgia given the large pro-GOP swing in the Georgia's electorate. So, let's take a look at the candates.

Johnny Isakson is big gun in this race and the likely winner. Isakson is currently Congressman from the 6th District (my home district). I've seen him speak a few times both when he was a State Senator and a candidate for the various statewide offices he had ran for before (governor and Senate). He is the consumate legislator, a career politician with all the idealogical furvor, or lack thereof, that entails.

He is apparently outspending his opponents something like 4-1 and has the endorsement of the party establishment and the Georgia newspapers (though an endorsement by the AJC is not a good thing in my mind). Looking at his website reveals that he is your typical legislative tool. The bills he has authored and co-sponsored are not what I'd call major initiatives. That may seem unfair, but this is Newt Gingrich's former district, so Johnny's just a bit of a letdown from the masterful idea guy that Gingrich was (of course, Gingrich has the ego to match his large political brain). Contrasting Isakson's site with Collins is interesting. Isakson has a very detailed site that lists the House bill numbers that he was involved in or voted on. It's chock full of info. Of course, it could be a quantity vs. quality exercise as well. Collins website, on the other hand, doesn't have a whole lot there. He has a few priorities that he talks about which I'll get to later.

The issues that Isakson highlights are mostly GOP boilerplate: pro-life, anti-gay marrage, support Bush's tax cuts, support for the troops, protecting the 2nd amendment, etc. All the Senate candidates have basically no difference on these. He does go into detail on his support for "traditional" values. He mentions his support for Bush's faith based initiatives which I actually don't have a problem with. I think religious organizations can be just as effective at doling out charitable programs as any of the many non-religious entities that currently do it. And it's an expansion of private solutions using government money. While I'm not a fan of using government money for some of these "problems" in the first place, I don't see any great conflict of interest if the goals of the programs are being met by religious entities.

Despite his cookie-cutter Republican legislative history, he does highlight 4 things of interest on his website. Most impressively, he says he back's former House Majority leader Dick Armey's flat tax plan. If we were to ever have a total reorg of the tax structure, I favor a flat tax over a national sales tax. The reasons for this are long and varied. But, I do like a flat tax better, though if we could ditch the current system for a sales tax, i'd be ok with that too. Sadly, neither plan has a bat's chance in hell in getting passed in the foreseeable future.

Isakson also says he authored a bill to limit "pork barrell" spending. This is nice, though the devil is in the details and I haven't had the chance to chase down the details of that bill. What I find wrong with it is that he spends an inordinate amount of time on his website talking positively about how he'll "Fight to bring Georgia our fair share of transportation funding, reduce gridlock in metro Atlanta, and expand the transportation network throughout the state." Furthermore, he'll "Work to bring solid transportation funding to all parts of our state, so that new economic opportunity reaches all Georgia communities." In other words, he'll bring home the "Bacon." Moreover, he talks about protecting "agribusiness" and Georgia's farmers. He happily voted for the Farm Bill that was a subsidy laden piece of pork. Pardon me if I'm a little skeptical about his efforts to control spending, particularly of the pork barrell variety.

Lastly, he proudly notes that he voted for the Prescription Drug benefit and the Medicare reform. He voted for a NEW entitlement. One that gets the government more involved in our healthcare than it already was. THere are a few good aspects of that bill that created that entitlement but they are far outweighed by the bad.

Isakson's accomplishments outside the standard "backing the Bush administration" stuff is full of funding proposals. Isakson appears to be a compassionate conservative. Unfortunately, compassionate conservatism in practice is basically a form of expensive big-government conservatism.

I frankly do not believe Isakson would be any different in the Senate. He might lower my taxes which is nice, but I seriously doubt he'd ever actually CUT spending. He is not unique in this, and that's why I don't see him as the ideal candidate for Senate.

Mac Collins is basically a more protectionist and less accomplished legislator than Isakson. He is even more open about his support for farm subsidies and he too backed the Prescription Drug entitlement. He also mentions "fair" trade rather than "free" trade. This is a euphamism for protectionism. Oh sure, it might be totally protectionist, but Collins approaches trade from a how do we protect American businesses and American jobs. The problem with this is that the approach punishes the American consumer and raises the cost of living, on the very workers they wish to protect. Competition is a good thing. Collins does not believe this. So, Collins will not get my vote.

This brings us to Herman Cain. He's a businessman and he has been the head of the National Restaurant Association as well. The president of such an organization probably acted as a lobbyist on more than one occasion. His resume is impressive and seems to be one grounded in the private sector and one loath to have government intervention.

Cain's website is no better or worse than his opponents. As with Collins and Isakson, it has much of the GOP boilerplate issues: back Bush in the War on Terror, pro-life, against same-sex marriage, pro-2nd amendment, etc. But, he does highlight some issues that the others do not, and contrast himself on others.

He has a section on affirmative action. Cain, you see, is black. So, he probably feels the need to address it as his opponents have said he is in favor of affirmative action. Reading his discussion on affirmative action doesn't really clear up the picture. He says he's against quotas. That's good, but most affirmative action programs have not really had quotas as a rule and in fact quotas are mostly considered illegal in all areas of our society with the exception of college admissions. Even that loophole has been tightened, but not entirely closed. Cain goes into some detail on this last point. What Cain doesn't really say exactly, though he implies it, is that he's against racial preferences, like in minority contracts that government's give out. But, frankly, I'm not totally sure where he comes down on this. I like everything he has to say about race and why it should not divide us. I also believe that if he wins the nomination and the election, a black Republican Senator from the deep south will go along way towards getting us beyond race. Maybe. That's the idealist in me coming out. But, like I said, I'm not entirely certain Cain wants to eliminate all affirmative action or has a Clintonian "mend it, don't end it" attitude. This not a point in his favor.

What is in his favor are his other priorities. He lists tort reform, a balanced budget, pork barrell spending, and social security reform as priorities. This is all to the good, though seeking a balanced budget is not as simple as writing a law requiring it. In fact such laws can trigger tax increases, and this is bad. Both Cain and Isakson support Social Security reform and list this as priorities. Collins doesn't mention it on his site. On Tort reform, Cain wants to institute a loser pays system for tort lawsuits. I like this and it's good to see he lists this as a priority. I'm sure as a former businessman he knows first hand the problem with our ambulance chasing legal climate. He also blasts his opponents on Pork Barrell spending. That's great and I'm glad to see it though I'm not so naive that I don't understand that it's easy to blast pork barrell spending when you've never actually served in Congress.

But, what I think really comes out in Cain's favor is that he comes out AGAINST the prescription drug benefit. The money quote "After reviewing information regarding the prescription drug bill now in House-Senate Conference, I urge you to vote against H.R. 1. The legislation under consideration is bound to become another massive entitlement program that is destined to fail and burden the next generation because it does not contain incentives for consumers to use health care prudently." Couldn't have said it better myself. Also, Cain is in favor of school choice which I didn't find any mention of on the other candidates' website.

Also, Cain, like Collins, is also in favor of a national sales tax and the abolition of the income tax. As I noted above, this is not my first preference for tax reform, though I'd take it in a heartbeat over our current system.

So, who am I gonna vote for? Isakson or Cain. Collins, is a protectionist at heart, and does not actually believe in a small less intrusive government. Isakson is a career politician and that's not a good thing in my humble opinion. He talks a lot about leadership, but my impression is that he's more of a legislative follower rather than one who is at the center of GOP strategizing and idea peddling. Still, I like a lot of his priorities. Particularly social security reform and tax reform. Also, I understand it's much easier to say you are against things like the precription drug benefit when you are not actually there having your Congressional seniors beating down your door saying "you better for this, or the president is gonna be pissed." Still, I see nothing in Isakson's make up that he'd be willing to upset the applecart. Given that we have managed to have a 2 years of GOP control over the 3 pillars of our federal government, and they have spent taxpayer money like drunken sailers, I'd really like to think that my representative would be there to not only talk the "small government" talk, but also walk the walk. Nothing in Isakson or Collins make up leads me to believe that they'll change in the Senate where they would have more power (where a couple of Senators can wield enormous power in such narrowly divided body).

I think I'll probably vote Cain because his priorities seem more in line with mine, at least on the parts he actually differs from his opponents. Saying you are against a drug benefit backed by the enormously powerful AARP takes some political balls. He deserves credit for that. Also, he mentions school choice as a priority, the others do not (and Isakson touts his endorsement by a teacher's union). Also, being an openly conservative black man is one of the most difficult positions to take in our modern body politic. You have to bet that Republicans don't live up to the stereotype of being bigots, and you have to withstand the openly bigotted stance of liberals who believe that a black conservative doesn't think for himself (liberals believe all blacks should think alike, though conservatives are supposedly racist), even though by being black and conservative, he's displaying that he really does think for himself.

The point maybe moot. The main question going into tomorrow is whether Cain or Collins can force a runoff. Isakson is polling at something like 45% with Cain and Collins hovering in the teens. So, it's not like this one is close. But, in a runoff, things can change and Isakson has proven time and again that he has limited appeal in statewide races. So, who knows. I'll probably vote Cain tomorrow and reevaluate the two if a runoff occurs. Also, I need to remember to Tivo the debates should that happen. If Collins forces a runoff and eliminates Cain, I'll wholeheartedly support Isakson.

Comments

I heard Cain interviewed on the 'Royal Treatment' a couple of months ago and I was impressed. It's been too long for me to remember specifically what he said that I liked, but I do remember that he was an intelligent, knowledgeable, straight talker.

Posted by: Jason | July 19, 2004 at 05:26 PM