Mary Norwood Faces A Runoff With Kasim Reed (ATL)...I Hope She Wins

Atlanta's race for mayor heads to runoff


An Atlanta councilwoman could become the city's first white mayor in a generation, facing off against a black state senator in a runoff next month.

With 100 percent of the precincts reporting early Wednesday, Mary Norwood received 45 percent of the vote, compared to Sen. Kasim Reed at 38 percent. City Council president Lisa Borders was a distant third with 14 percent and conceded early.

Norwood did not get 50 percent of the vote plus one to avoid a runoff. Election officials estimated voter turnout could be at its lowest in recent memory, with far fewer ballots cast than the 35 percent of registered voters who participated in recent mayoral races.

Norwood, Reed and Borders were the front-runners in the crowded field for much of the campaign and battled for weeks over public safety and open government, as the issue of race loomed over the contest. Political observers say the race will continue to polarize voters along racial lines in the weeks before an anticipated Dec. 1 runoff.

Borders thanked supporters at her Election Night headquarters downtown.

"I am conceding the race," Borders said about three hours after the polls close. "I'm not going to talk about endorsements tonight."

Norwood sounded upbeat.

"I am really focused on this city and our citizens and the issues that matter to our citizens," Norwood said. "So I have been totally focused on winning this campaign tonight or 27 days from now. This has been a totally unified, united campaign across the city and that's what I have wanted and that's what it is."

Reed, whose momentum has swelled in recent weeks, told cheering supporters he was "ready to go for this city."

"I will fight for you," Reed told the crowd. "I will stand up for you and we will make Atlanta the city on a hill again."

Atlanta has had a long line of black mayors since 1973. Current Mayor Shirley Franklin, the city's first female in the office, was barred from seeking a third term.


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Sources: Yahoo News, My Fox Atlanta, Google Maps

Sen. Leahy Tells G.O.P. "Stop The Racial Politics"!

Huffington Post----

The two top officials on the Senate Judiciary Committee left niceties at the door when they held a joint appearance on CNN's "State of the Union" Sunday.

Chairman Patrick Leahy (D-Vt.) accused the Republican Party of playing "Racial Politics" with the Supreme Court confirmation hearings of Sonia Sotomayor, even declaring that the leaders of the GOP had called her a "bigot" and the "head of the KKK."

"I have no idea how many [Republican votes] she'll get in committee or on the floor," said Leahy. "But she will have Republican votes... She deserves it. Now, I understand [Sen.] Mitch McConnell and I've worked with Sen. McConnell on different things. But like the other leaders of the Republican Party, he came out very, very early against her and he doesn't want to change his mind.

You had one leader of the Republican Party call her the equivalent of the head of the Ku Klux Klan. Another leader of the Republican Party called her a bigot. To Sen. McConnell's credit, he has not used those things, but the leadership of the Republican Party came out against her long before we ever had the hearing, long before they had a chance to look at her record. I think that's unfair."

"I hope we don't go back to the day when we used to put African Americans up for confirmation and say yes, but you belong to the NAACP so we're really suspicious of you," Leahy added later, refering to Republican concerns about Sotomayor's involvement with the Puerto Rican Legal Defense Fund. "Come on, stop the racial politics," he said.

Leahy later explained that he was referring to former House Speaker Newt Gingrich when he accused the GOP of labeling Sotomayor a bigot.

It was a fiery segment, during which Leahy talked over the protests of his colleague Sen. Jeff Sessions (R-Ala.), the committee's ranking Republican member. When the Alabama Republican finally got the chance to speak, he pleaded that Leahy had greatly distorted the tone and tenor of the hearings.

"Pat, I want to correct something," Sessions said. "No Republican leader said she was a bigot. You've overstated that. There's nothing wrong with us asking about her personal views about positions, legal positions that she took as a member of any organization. That's a normal thing to do. And I don't think that was unfair. She said that she thought she was fairly treated.

Other commentators, objective leaders, civil rights leaders have said that. We gave our absolute best to make sure this was a fair hearing, but it had to be vigorous. We had to ask about things that people cared about, her speeches, her prior pleadings that she did and some of her decisions, which are troubling. But Pat, you gave us a fair hearing. I appreciate that. A lot of people felt we were pretty tight on time, but you -- when the hearing came up, we had an opportunity. And I appreciate that."

Sources: Huffington Post, MSNBC, Reuters