Take Me To Post Comment Form One of the great things about the primaries being over is getting to clean out my inbox of e-mails from some of the campaigns.
Not a few, mind you. Not even several. Try hundreds.
This candidate didn’t make the runoff? Let’s dump those 250 e-mails. This one? Another 125 to the electronic dustbin. Now, I only have 5,683 e-mails left in the inbox. Not the junk folder. The inbox.
Some I will keep for a little while. Like the e-mails from two candidates for one of the statewide races, each claiming to have won a debate and that their opponent is a doo doo head who doesn’t deserve your vote and can’t tie his shoelaces.
It all reminds me of the story of a campaign in Florida nearly 60 years ago involving Claude Pepper, if I recall correctly. Pepper served for generations in Congress, both in the House and the Senate. But in one campaign — and this story has been shown largely to be a hoax, but it remains a classic bit of American political lore — his opponent is said to have uttered the following to a less than sophisticated audience:
“Are you aware that Claude Pepper is known all over Washington as a shameless extrovert? Not only that, but this man is reliably reported to practice nepotism with his sister-in-law, and he has a sister who was once a thespian in wicked New York. Worst of all, it is an established fact that Mr. Pepper, before his marriage, habitually practiced celibacy.”
In our still contested Republican primary for governor, state Sen. Buddy Carter and U.S. Rep. Jack Kingston have weighed in on the side of Nathan Deal. Deal also has the support of former Speaker of the House Newt Gingrich. Karen Handel, who picked up Sarah Palin’s endorsement prior to the primary vote, now has Mitt Romney in her corner as well. She also the endorsement of a handful of Chatham County commissioners and Chatham Sheriff Al St. Lawrence.
Advance voting for the Aug. 10 primary begins Monday.