Kasim Reed: “I have another election in me.” (Atlanta: live in, transportation)

[Fubarbundy]

Didn't know his first name is actually Mohammed. Glad it hasn't affected his previous hard fought and successful campaigns.

[AcidSnake]

Originally Posted by Fubarbundy

Didn't know his first name is actually Mohammed. Glad it hasn't affected his previous hard fought and successful campaigns.

I think all thanks should be to his opponent Mary Norwood on the first go around for not taking the mayoral campaign to a low level. It's pretty much about the policies more or less; the way a good political campaign should be about.

And that's not easy thing to do in the south, where people tend to pull out the rhetorical machetes and take it to the personal fairly quickly.

I feel like if a candidate of Norwood's demographic had made more of an effort to give the black community assurances that they will still maintain an economic lifeline in city government and at the airport...it won't be such stretch to imagine a white mayor of the city again.

But that whole "reaching across the political/racial aisle" capability seems to be in very short supply these days, unfortunately.

[jero23]

Originally Posted by AcidSnake

I think all thanks should be to his opponent Mary Norwood on the first go around for not taking the mayoral campaign to a low level. It's pretty much about the policies more or less; the way a good political campaign should be about.

And that's not easy thing to do in the south, where people tend to pull out the rhetorical machetes and take it to the personal fairly quickly.

I feel like if a candidate of Norwood's demographic had made more of an effort to give the black community assurances that they will still maintain an economic lifeline in city government and at the airport...it won't be such stretch to imagine a white mayor of the city again.

But that whole "reaching across the political/racial aisle" capability seems to be in very short supply these days, unfortunately.

With as many black Muslims there are in Atlanta, she knew not to do that because it would have been political suicide in a city with over 50% (54% to be exact) of its population being black to attempt to make an issue of the name "Mohammed". However, she still won't have enough traction to get over at the most 5% of the black vote because many of her staunch white supporters boldly makes notions like "Yeah, let's take back our city" on open social media forums like Facebook.

Many black Atlantans feel like she is a direct representation of an usurping by socially apathetic and socially unaware white Atlantans. They also recognize the black political and business structure that has given many black entrepreneurs, particularly black-owned construction companies and vendors, opportunities to equally compete for many major projects and thrive as a result; whereas, the rest of Georgia has been Good Ol' Boy business connects as usual shutting out many competent black-owned businesses from anything. Until the State of Georgia business practices moderate and dissolve its Good Ol' Boy practices, there will always be a major political pushback to any attempts to elect a white mayor from the Atlanta black establishment.

[jeoff]

Originally Posted by jero23

With as many black Muslims there are in Atlanta, she knew not to do that because it would have been political suicide in a city with over 50% (54% to be exact) of its population being black to attempt to make an issue of the name "Mohammed". However, she still won't have enough traction to get over at the most 5% of the black vote because many of her staunch white supporters boldly makes notions like "Yeah, let's take back our city" on open social media forums like Facebook.

Many black Atlantans feel like she is a direct representation of an usurping by socially apathetic and socially unaware white Atlantans. They also recognize the black political and business structure that has given many black entrepreneurs, particularly black-owned construction companies and vendors, opportunities to equally compete for many major projects and thrive as a result; whereas, the rest of Georgia has been Good Ol' Boy business connects as usual shutting out many competent black-owned businesses from anything. Until the State of Georgia business practices moderate and dissolve its Good Ol' Boy practices, there will always be a major political pushback to any attempts to elect a white mayor from the Atlanta black establishment.

If I judged candidates by the worst of what their "staunch supporters" write on facebook, I don't think I would vote for anybody, ever.

[jero23]

Originally Posted by jeoff

If I judged candidates by the worst of what their "staunch supporters" write on facebook, I don't think I would vote for anybody, ever.

I wouldn't either. However, considering how things are in the nation when it comes to terms of the awareness of disparities especially on race towards black people in recent years, many blacks will not overlook that or take such notions as lightly.

[arjay57]

If I were Reed I'd go after John Lewis' seat.

[bu2]

Originally Posted by jero23

With as many black Muslims there are in Atlanta, she knew not to do that because it would have been political suicide in a city with over 50% (54% to be exact) of its population being black to attempt to make an issue of the name "Mohammed". However, she still won't have enough traction to get over at the most 5% of the black vote because many of her staunch white supporters boldly makes notions like "Yeah, let's take back our city" on open social media forums like Facebook.

Many black Atlantans feel like she is a direct representation of an usurping by socially apathetic and socially unaware white Atlantans. They also recognize the black political and business structure that has given many black entrepreneurs, particularly black-owned construction companies and vendors, opportunities to equally compete for many major projects and thrive as a result; whereas, the rest of Georgia has been Good Ol' Boy business connects as usual shutting out many competent black-owned businesses from anything. Until the State of Georgia business practices moderate and dissolve its Good Ol' Boy practices, there will always be a major political pushback to any attempts to elect a white mayor from the Atlanta black establishment.

Atlanta is just a gold old black boy instead of a good old white boy network, no matter how you try to spin it.
(edit-the "gold" wasn't intentional, but it fits any of the old boy networks)

Norwood is a community activist who is about taking back the city from business interests regardless of their color. Personally I think she would kow-tow too much to the NIMBYs to be anything other than a disaster as mayor, but I think your characterization of her is unbelievably off-base.

[CashmereEsquire]

Originally Posted by AcidSnake

In the grand scheme of things Mayor Reed will never have the same sizzle as a Maynard Jackson or even an Andrew Young. He doesn't even any sort of uniqe pizzazz as far as I am concerned. He has no vision or imagination.

Reed is just a run-of-the-mill corporate goon with a short temper. But hopefully if he could avoid the purview of the feds, that will be a one-up in his favor.

Otherwise, meh.

But hey, there has been worse, so there's that.

I was too young to really grasp those two and remember first hand how things were like, lol I do vividly remember the city under Bill Campbell though.

[jero23]

Originally Posted by bu2

Atlanta is just a gold old black boy instead of a good old white boy network, no matter how you try to spin it.
(edit-the "gold" wasn't intentional, but it fits any of the old boy networks)

Norwood is a community activist who is about taking back the city from business interests regardless of their color. Personally I think she would kow-tow too much to the NIMBYs to be anything other than a disaster as mayor, but I think your characterization of her is unbelievably off-base.

There is no such thing as a "Good Ol' Black Boy" network, and that's an oxymoron and red herring especially you understood how the meaning behind the phrase, Good Ol' Boy. You just basically stated that "oh black-owned businesses get a fair chance to compete with the city when the state will pick anyone but a black-owned business, so it doesn't matter to me at all..." If you were aware how many black entrepreneurs and business owners were shut out of the state of RFPs for major projects then you wouldn't be so quick to dismiss their claims without looking into them. That goes back to the portion about "socially apathetic and unware..."

FYI, that is not my personal characterization of Norwood. Many people have express those very sentiments and all I'm doing is pointing this out. My personal take on her is quite nuance, but nobody who wants to be mayor would "like" on Facebook from their own personal account those type of comments from their own supporters.

[bu2]

Originally Posted by jero23

There is no such thing as a "Good Ol' Black Boy" network, and that's an oxymoron and red herring especially you understood how the meaning behind the phrase, Good Ol' Boy. You just basically stated that "oh black-owned businesses get a fair chance to compete with the city when the state will pick anyone but a black-owned business, so it doesn't matter to me at all..." If you were aware how many black entrepreneurs and business owners were shut out of the state of RFPs for major projects then you wouldn't be so quick to dismiss their claims without looking into them. That goes back to the portion about "socially apathetic and unware..."

FYI, that is not my personal characterization of Norwood. Many people have express those very sentiments and all I'm doing is pointing this out. My personal take on her is quite nuance, but nobody who wants to be mayor would "like" on Facebook from their own personal account those type of comments from their own supporters.

Obviously they were shut out for decades.

But all you have to do is look at the political connections of people doing business in Atlanta and DeKalb to know its just the same thing, different crew.

With Norwood's background who has worked with community activists in neighborhoods around the city, the "Take Back the City" could easily have been posted by a community activist in SW Atlanta. Again, I am not a fan of hers, but racism is the last thing she was about. It sounds more like the prejudice was the person saying those things about a white candidate. They were too hung up in their own prejudices to listen to what she was saying. From her, take back the city is far closer to a Bernie Sanders comment than a KKK comment.