Fresh Loaf

After the AP’s recent revelation that Atlanta Mayor Shirley Franklin was on the short list for a cabinet post she didn’t get, the Politico adds insult to injury by pointing out that Pres.-elect Obama hasn’t chosen any Southerners for prominent administration appointments. Unless, that is, you count the most thankless of White House gigs.

To be fair, the official voice of the White House will come with a Southern drawl: Robert Gibbs, Obama’s soon-to-be press secretary, is an Alabama native.

Why have no Southerners been selected? UGA’s Charles Bullock hazards a guess:

“Who comes to mind immediately?” asked Bullock. “No one, really.”

“The leading politicians in the South at least for the last generation have been active as Republicans,” Bullock added. “You just don’t have Democrats that come to mind as the go-to person or the expert. It highlights the thinness of the Democratic bench in the South… The skill set is so depleted.”

Sad, yet true. Who are his choices: former U.S. Rep. Ben “Cooter” Jones? Zell Miller?

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The Nov. 4 totals in the race for Georgia’s U.S. Senate seat left Republican incumbent Saxby Chambliss literally a fraction below the necessary 50 percent-plus one in his race against Democratic nominee Jim Martin. As ballots were still being counted — and talk of recounts abounded — both candidates said they weren’t waiting for the last vote to be tallied. The runoff, they said, had begun.

(Photo by Joeff Davis)

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A story recently posted by the AJC says the unimaginable: that statewide voter turnout for this election was lower than it was in 2004. Although there are nearly a million more potential voters than there were four years ago and the actual number of ballots cast was higher, the turnout was only 74 percent, compared to 77 percent in 2004. How could that be, when election officials were predicting a 85 percent turnout?

Well, UGA political science professor Charles Bullock, an expert on voting issues, admits it’s a surprise to him, given that voter turnout across the country was the highest it’s been in a century. However, Bullock says that if state officials based their Election Day expectations on early-voting numbers, it’s no shock that the reality fell short.

“Early voting has been shown not to increase overall turnout,” he says. “It’s often simply a reallocation of votes.”

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