President Barack Obama and first lady Michelle Obama will visit Fort Stewart on the Georgia coast this Friday, U.S. Rep. Jack Kingston’s office confirmed this morning. We’ve got a call into the base for details.
But the Savannah Morning News offers this from Chris Crawford, Kingston’s spokesman:
“The congressman is glad the president’s coming,” Crawford said. “It’s a great chance to show off the facility and its suitability for additional missions.”
A major launch pad for U.S. military actions in Iraq and Afghanistan, the Army installation had been considered as the site for up to two more Army brigades, Crawford said. But mostly for budgetary reasons, that never happened, Crawford said.
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He may have been cleared by the Secret Service, but Ted Nugent now has a problem with Army commanders at Fort Knox in Kentucky, which has cancelled the aging rocker’s June 23 appearance. From USA Today:
“After learning of opening act Ted Nugent’s recent public comments about the president of the United States, Fort Knox leadership decided to cancel his performance on the installation,” says a message on the Fort Knox Facebook page.
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Pay attention to blogger Joanie Scott in Henry County. It looks like she has the goods on a land purchase by the county that sent $34,500 the way of a county commissioner and the chairman of the local zoning board.
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We told you over the weekend that opponents to metro Atlanta’s transportation sales tax had yet to organize for the July 31 vote. Last night, Debbie Dooley of the Atlanta Tea Party Patriots sent out this note to supporters:
We are working in conjunction with another group on several big events in June. The first event will be a T-SPLOST Town Hall held in the Buckhead area. The second event will be in conjunction with a state-wide summit Georgia Tea Party Patriots will host.
We will have a debate on T-SPLOST and also have break-out sessions for each T-SPLOST region so activists can learn how to defeat T-SPLOST in their region.
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On the same topic, my AJC colleague Daniel Malloy reports from Washington that the sales tax referendum in metro Atlanta may have just picked up a key endorsement:
Georgia Republican U.S. Sen. Johnny Isakson expressed his support for the project to the LINK attendees, but acknowledged its political peril.
“Hopefully we’re going to see some miracles with the T-SPLOST [transportation referendum] that takes place later this year,” he said.
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Buzzfeed reports that, last night, former Republican presidential candidate Jon Huntsman compared the GOP to China’s Communist Party:
Huntsman, the former Utah governor and once President Barack Obama’s Ambassador to China, expressed disappointment that the Republican Party disinvited him from a Florida fundraiser in March after he publicly called for a third party.
“This is what they do in China on party matters if you talk off script,” he said.
Huntsman also expressed regret for raising his hand at a debate – with every other GOP presidential candidate – when asked whether he would oppose even a slight tax increase in a deal that would produce spending cuts 10 times that amount.
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The AJC’s Politifact Georgia today takes a look at UGA President Michael Adams’ statement that the HOPE program is “still the richest scholarship program in America.”
- By Jim Galloway, Political Insider
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