Fresh Loaf

State Sen. Eric Johnson, R-Savannah, gave word this past July that he’d step down as president pro tem of the Senate. And why not? The job isn’t what it used to be back when a neutered Lt. Gov. Mark Taylor had most of his real powers swiped by Johnson. Now that Casey Cagle runs the show, Johnson had become what I once called “Sen. Second-Banana.” So, as Johnson gets ready for his own run for the guv lite’s podium, he’s made room for other folks to climb up a rung.

But don’t get excited. It’s just the usual crowd. Sen. Tommie Williams, R-Lyons, will move up to president pro tem from his gig as Senate majority leader. And Sen. Chip Rogers, R-Woodstock, the current chairman of the Senate Finance Committee and a rising star in the GOP, will take Williams’ place as majority leader.

Sen. Dan Moody, R-Alpharetta, and Sen. Mitch Seabaugh, R-Sharpsburg, will keep their positions as majority caucus chair and majority whip, respectively. Ho hum.

They’ll do it every time. One of the great ironies of our democracy is that we leave election law up to politicians.

We figured it was only a matter of time until Georgia Republicans, distraught over last week’s elections, began suggesting tweaks to voting guidelines. It’s the political equivalent of Monday-morning quarterbacking – except that, instead of second-guessing failed plays by the losing team, you day-dream about how the rules might have been changed to produce a different outcome.

I should note that both parties do this – in fact, the Democrats may have started it after Wyche Fowler lost the 1992 Senate runoff – and it’s pretty scuzzy every time it happens.

You’ll remember, of course, that state Sen. Eric Johnson, R-Savannah, started the ball rolling back in October when he called early voting “a mistake” after the GOP noticed that the wrong people seemed to be going to the polls. Then, only a day or so after the election, attorney Stefan Passantino, who heads the political law group for McKenna Long & Aldridge, Georgia’s most politically influential law firm, wrote an op-ed for the AJC in which he brazenly lambasted early voting as “uncontrolled voting.” Trust me, it’s got to be read to be believed. (more…)

A couple weeks back, the AJC’s esteemed Jim Galloway ran a blog item that had Georgia politicos buzzing. In it, he quoted Senate Majority Leader Eric Johnson, R-Savannah, attacking the state’s new early voting program as a vehicle for voter fraud. Johnson called early voting “a mistake” and explained that it gave cheaters extra time “to go out there and pick up homeless people, and carry them to the polls, and register cats.”

Putting aside for a moment the fact that homeless people have as much legal right to vote as anyone else, Johnson’s statements were jaw-droppingly ironic because early voting in Georgia was a Republican initiative that party strategists believed would give the GOP an advantage at the polls. Statistics have shown that absentee voting is more popular among Republicans than Democrats. Therefore, the reasoning went, if absentee voting were extended to a month and folks no longer had to give an excuse to get an absentee ballot, then early voting could serve as an effective, state-subsidized get-out-the-vote effort for the GOP.

But it doesn’t seem to be working out that way. (more…)

Dick Pettys of InsiderAdvantage brings news that Sen. Eric Johnson, R-Savannah, has confirmed that he’ll run for lieutenant governor in 2010 — but only if Lt. Gov. Casey Cagle decides he won’t seek another term in office.

Johnson’s a champion for education — that was one of his pet projects during the last legislative session. Pettys says it looks like universal school choice might be a big part of his ‘10 platform and his strategy in January as well.

He’s also one of the more colorful characters under the Gold Dome. When Gov. George Pataki of New York pulled down Georgia’s old flag in its statehouse because it incorporated the stars and bars, Johnson climbed on the ledge of the third floor in the Capitol to pull down the Empire State’s colors. He’s always good for a quote, was/is an awesome blogger, and underwent one of the coolest extreme makeovers a lawmaker has ever attempted since Joe Lieberman became a Republican. (Come on, you know he is, he’s just too lazy to change the letterhead.)

But he’s also a lawmaker who’ll actually address your questions without trailing off into some “let’s-move-forward-with-solutions” nonsense speech laden with soundbites and canned phrases. You may or may not agree with him all the time, but at least he’s direct. Of course, that’s gotten him into some trouble before.

Plus, he says he reads Fresh Loaf, so we gotta show some love to a reader.

(The senator from the Garden of Good and Evil says he’s a Led Zeppelin fan, hence the rare photo posted to the right. Johnson stood in for Robert Plant during a tour after the famous singer suffered a panther attack.)

From the state Senate President Pro Tem’s sine die post on his now-shuttered blog:

* I hope you enjoyed this blog because I will never do another one. Man, it was hard. I don’t know how reporters and columnists do this day after day. I wanted to educate and entertain. I hope I did a little of both. So, I am outta here “sine die”.

Yes, senator, educate and entertain you did, indeed. Johnson’s daily summaries of the legislative process were enlightening and a daily stop for me and many other writers. But it was after reading that nothing makes him more psyched for a day of legislating than hearing “Stairway to Heaven” on the drive to the Capitol that I was hooked.

The state Senate president pro tem — he who bloggeth — adds some numbers to the legislative session going on under the Gold Dome:

* In the two year session, 1,956 bills have been introduced (or an average of 8.3 per legislator). There have been 2,632 resolutions introduced (or 11 per member). Most resolutions are just commending people and don’t take any time. Some are constitutional amendments.

* Not counting today or Day 30, we have passed 437 bills leaving 1,500 still alive (at least for the next 2 days). We have passed 1,534 resolutions leaving 1,078 floating around.

Of the few politicians who write blogs, state Senate President Pro-Tem Eric Johnson does a great job — and I really mean that. Often times the posts legislators write are rambling or appear half-hearted. Sometimes they overuse exclamation points. Johnson writes these bizarrely captivating bullet-point posts about his day and the political process, what it means, and how it works. And believe it or not, they’re actually entertaining. This one yesterday really made me scratch my head, though. I have to wonder if our most recent Add It Up was his muse.

(more…)

The influence of Fresh Loaf reaches the highest levels of government, as evident from a brief exchange I had with Sen. Eric Johnson, R-The Garden of Good and Evil, after Wednesday’s Senate committee hearing about the statewide water plan.

After chatting for a moment — and wondering if the gentleman from Savannah was going to pummel me for our paper’s past jabs — Johnson said, “I love Creative Loafing. Don’t always with agree with it in terms of ideology, but it’s a great read. I read Fresh Loaf every day.”

So do we get the credit for your sleek cranium, senator?

What’s bound to happen to the state’s first-ever comprehensive water plan? Even though both the state House and Senate Environment and Natural Resources committees have met, it’s still too early to tell.

State Environmental Protection Director Carol Couch, appearing before Senate and House environment committees last night and this morning, respectively, worked to dispel the “myths” about the water plan. This wasn’t a “water grab” by metro Atlanta, she said, but an effort to “[create] a level playing field.” The 25-member councils in each water-planning district were not, as Georgia Environmental Facilities Authority Executive Director Chris Clarke put it, “water czars.” The councils would merely act as liaisons between the state and municipalities. And the plan, as Couch, Clarke, and many members of the Legislature have said, is not a “lock box,” but a “living document” that is subject to tinkering and adjustment.

The environmental community isn’t sold on the idea, and, frankly, wouldn’t mind if the plan’s rubber teeth morphed into fangs. Gil Rogers of the Southern Environmental Law Center spoke at both hearings on behalf of the Georgia Water Coalition and outlined the vagaries of the three-year effort. He says the plan’s language is lax — too many sentences include “should” rather than “shall.” Some river basins, as outlined in the plan, travel through several proposed districts. The Chattahoochee basin, for example, is divided by three. If disputes between districts arise, how would they be resolved? How the plan addresses such a concern is “anemic” at best, Rogers says

The business community loves the product of the three-year effort that, according to EPD’s Couch, included a strong amount of public input. Name a business interest or organization that banks on an ample water supply — home builders, industry, agribusiness, chambers of commerce — and they stood before the committees to give their blessing. And as one environmentalist put it after last night’s two-hour meeting, “Funny how the people who got us into all this mess are the ones saying they love [the plan].” Missing from those expressions of adoration: Utility companies such as Southern Co., which according to the Southern Alliance for Clean Energy, gobble up a healthy portion of the state’s water.

The Senate committee voted unanimously in favor of a resolution supporting the plan. The House committee delayed a vote but may hold one at its next meeting, Thursday morning at 8:30. Word around the Gold Dome today is that Senate Republicans have concerns over the 11 water-planning districts presented to them. The regions are decided on county lines, not river basins, as environmentalists, scientists and many others have urged. There are also mumblings about a push for criteria regarding interbasin transfers — the second most widely criticized aspect of the plan and the one that worries downstream communities the most — be written into law. But with the issue’s urgency, such a move may not even budge.

It also makes you wonder, if they were looking for a viable excuse to get rid of the festival in the first place, and the drought made for the perfect scapegoat?

— Duane Moody wonders if the mayor’s decision to keep Pride out of Piedmont Park this year because of the drought might simply be a convenient excuse to thwart the GLBT community’s biggest annual party.

Duane may be on to something.

The mayor also told the Dogwood Festival people that they couldn’t have their festival in Piedmont Park. What color are Dogwood blossoms? WHITE! Think about it.

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The Speaker claims the Senate “shirked” its responsibilities today. I say we did exactly what we were sent here to do – to carefully and thoughtfully decide which actions benefit the people of Georgia.

— Sen. Eric Johnson, R-Savannah, blogging for Peach Pundit, calls B.S. on fellow Republican Speaker Glenn Richardson.

Long story short, the House voted yesterday to override 12 of Gov. Sonny Perdue’s vetoes from last year. The Senate is constitutionally required to “immediately consider” the House vetoes. Speaker Richardson is claiming “immediately consider” means vote now. Sen. Johnson says “immediately consider” means start reviewing it carefully.

CL’s Scott Henry explains more here.

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I think that shows the difference between Clinton and Obama. Bill & Hillary Clinton have displayed an interest in civil rights as well as the larger African-American community even when they weren’t running for office. Obama on the other hand, well…he needs the black vote…enough said.

— Andre at Georgia Politics Unfiltered thinks Clintonic interest in civil rights and African-Americans is sincere, but Obamanian interest is just political.

I wonder if he laughed when he wrote that, because I laughed when I read it.

Sen. Eric Johnson has pitched his own plan for reforming property taxes and it’s nowhere as extreme as Speaker Glenn Richardson’s effort to simply get rid of ‘em. Under EJ’s plan, your residential assessment would not go up until you sell the property.

As Johnson tells it:

Georgia homeowners have had no protection from ‘backdoor’ tax increases, and their ability to pay is not tied to the tax,” said Sen. Johnson. “This amendment would protect homeowners with a sliding homestead exemption that would, in essence, freeze their property taxes until the home sold.

Some cities and counties already have this scheme in place, including Johnson’s own Chatham County, and it’s intended to address the real problem of retirees who can’t afford to stay in their rapidly appreciating homes because of skyrocketing property taxes.

The plan works something like this: When you buy a house (or when the law goes into effect, whichever comes first), your assessment is frozen and your annual tax bill never increases for as long as you live there. However, when the property is sold (or inherited), the assessment is adjusted to fit the current value and all of the taxes that went uncollected while you owned the property is skimmed off the top of the sales price by the county tax collector.

The only downside for the homeowner is that he has to pay several years’ worth of taxes in one huge chunk. But hey — pay now or pay later, there are no free rides.

The adjustment may be rougher for the city or county, which presumably will see its tax revenues fall for the first few years of the program.

When the Genarlow Wilson decision came down, on that clear day of justice and rectitude, certain leaders in the Republican Party and their personal harpies in the media chose not quiet restraint but instead opted for fakery and obfuscation.

— GriftDrift gives Sen. Eric Johnson, and others like him, a piece of his mind.

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I am now listening intently, and I hope that we can curb any future instances of this egregious behavior. All my love… I miss you and hope you come out with something new for me soon.

Love you forever,
duane

— From “dear Cardigans,” Duane Moody’s open love letter to the Swedish pop band the Cardigans.

Also worth checking out, Duane’s paean to Guitar Hero III, which probably breaks some sort of blogging record for the most un-ironic exclamation marks typed by a grown man.

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Her perceived inevitably is particularly bothersome, as is the assumption that she’s the most experienced candidate (sorry Joe Biden, but a one-term senator who rode her husband’s cum-stained coattails to office is clearly more qualified than you).

— ATLMalcontent on Democratic presidential front-runner Sen. Hillary Clinton.

“Cum-stained coattails”?

Is that what they mean when they call him the “Comeback Kid”?

Sen. Eric Johnson, the General Assembly’s Senate president pro tem, has a nifty way of looking at things. Be it abortion, health care, or even rape, the architect-cum-politico has a way with words that rivals even the most knuckleheaded of legislators.

“Since it went into effect in May of 2005, the [state Department of Human Resources] reports that between 32,500 and 40,500 women have talked to their doctors about an abortion. After that conversation and the information provided to them by this law, approximately 10,000 chose to carry their babies to term. In addition, 2,300 minors considered terminating their pregnancy and only 500 did so. So we saved about 11,800 babies so far. Pretty neat, huh?”

— Johnson displays subjective mathematic skills on an Oct. 13 PeachPundit.com post about the “success” of a new law that requires women seeking an abortion to wait 24 hours and be informed of the procedure’s “medical risks … and status of the life in their womb” prior to receiving one.

“Just thinking out loud, we ought to look at — what if Grady ceased to exist? Maybe something better would come along. I think the burden’s on them to convince those that they want to receive funding from that the problems are being resolved. Otherwise, we might just test the capacity of other health care providers in the region.”

— Johnson’s comments during a Sept. 25 press conference on the prospect of losing Grady Memorial Hospital, one of the largest public health systems in the country and home to the state’s only poison center.

“It’s a rape in my mind.”

Johnson’s Feb. 16 explanation to CNN anchor Rick Sanchez on why he said Genarlow Wilson raped an unconscious girl at a party when, after viewing a video of the incident, the jury and prosecutors said the girl was conscious and the sex consensual.