More Thoughts on Perry
“Stacey [Abrams], would you like to take his [Brian Kemp] place? It’s okay with me.”
What would be an appropriate response from a good Georgian to a man who was born and raised in New York coming here and saying it’s okay for one of the most progressive politicians in state history to replace the demonstrably most effective conservative we have had as governor in memory?
I am prone to abuse of profanity, and so I have thought of quite a few, none of them are appropriate to be printed here. Let’s just say one of them involved the horse he rode in on. There is an appropriate pejorative that does fit a Republican who thinks Democrats would be better in office though; RINO. I hate the term, by the way, in the same manner that our Editor in Chief, Jason Pye hates, well, just about everything. It’s a term’s which use is meant to intentionally exclude people we disagree with on just a few things. It weakens the party because it shrinks the number of people we are willing to tolerate voting for the GOP. So I am loath to use it, ever. And yet, here I am because I can think of no other more appropriate term for someone who says they are Republican yet prefer Abrams over Kemp.
I voted for Donald Trump on three separate occasions, so I am not a Never-Trump guy. One only needs to look at how President Biden is handling the business of our great nation to realize that virtually anyone would have been better than what we are stuck with right now. It is because of this that I do not regret my votes for Trump, he was the better of my options at the time I cast those votes.
The way I have observed the events that have unfolded since the last time I found myself filling in a bubble next to Donald Trump’s name have led me to a belief that he is not interested in advancing the principles of the Republican Party but instead burning it to the ground as a way of getting payback for his loss. Those events culminated over the weekend when the former President uttered the words at the beginning of this column. I can think of no other reason why Mr. Trump uttered those words.
If Mr. Trump believes that he is going to come to Georgia and win the White House back, well that ended in Perry. While he was a master of getting his supporters to stay home and we lost two (TWO!) US. Senate seats as a result, he now has turned off a whole bunch of Georgia Republicans who reluctantly supported him last time out. He would need those Republicans to win again and now there is little hope of getting them back on his side. The likelihood that he would win here in the future has nothing to do with rigged elections and everything with uttering support of a democrat over a man who has been dealt a bad hand and still governed as a liberty-loving conservative.
We here in Georgia really do not understand just how good we have had it under the leadership of Brian Kemp because our state never locked down during the pandemic. While we were free to roam, to worship, to eat in restaurants, other states had none of it. Churches in other states had to sue to protect their first amendment rights, but not here. Pastors were threatened with arrest for holding services, but not here. While other states see a mass exodus of their brightest and most capable citizens, Georgia continues to see her population swell. Our economy is bouncing back with unemployment levels at pre-pandemic rates. State tax revenue is up all while the Governor led an effort to cut income taxes. Every week sees a new announcement of a large business moving to Georgia and creating even more jobs. And Governor Kemp fought to protect the most precious right of all, the right to live.
It is no simple task to balance public health with the financial wellbeing of 10 million people during a pandemic. It is extraordinarily difficult to preserve individual liberties while being screamed at from the White House briefing room about the decision to lift restrictions on our economy. And yet Brian Kemp has done exactly that. He has put Georgians first and never waivered.
If you are a conservative and are willing to ignore the results that have been accomplished by this Kemp administration, why? Because you are mad that Kemp didn’t ask, “how high” when Trump said jump? We have all kinds of colloquial expressions to describe this behavior involving your face and nose and babies and bath water. These types of reactions are foolish and result in self harm.
I will not be participating in the burning down of the GOP. And I ask that you don’t either, even if that is the obvious goal of Donald Trump. My Children’s future is more important than the damaged ego of a New Yorker.
