ummm...take a guess how many Georgia Congressmen showed up at the bottom on the Black Agenda Report's September 2007 CBC Monitor? Two out of the Four worst Black Congresspersons are from Georgia, David Scott and Sanford Bishop. Teh Awesome, Gentlemen.
David Scott scored 70% with a career average of 60%.
Sanford Bishop scored 70% with a career average of 47%
Here's the BAR assessment of David Scott:
Georgia's David Scott was a consistent "derelict" until challenged by Donzella James for his suburban Atlanta seat, in 2006. Scott, with access to millions in corporate cash, won handily - but was scared enough to slightly modify his previously knee-jerk pro-corporate actions. However, Scott's past history puts him firmly in the "worst" category, and he was still among the four Members that scored at the bottom of the class in the current Report Card, at 70 percent or less, along with Georgia's Sanford Bishop, Alabama's Artur Davis, and Brooklyn, New York freshman Yvette Clarke.
The September 2007 Report Card found the following:
The twice-yearly Report Cards reveal a Caucus that that no longer functions as a coherent body, and can therefore no longer claim to be "the conscience of the Congress." Despite the self-congratulations and ceremonial solidarity displayed at the CBC's annual galas in Washington, the Caucus has in reality fractured into three general tendencies: a consistently progressive, often courageous group, comprising about one-third of the membership; a larger fraction that usually adheres to the historical Black Political Consensus on issues of peace, and social and economic justice, but can be swayed under pressures from moneyed powers; and a small but disruptive, thoroughly corporate-bought faction that has abandoned the African American political legacy.
There is some good Georgia news below the fold.
"Three CBC members scored 100 percent for their perfect records."
The super-novas of the CBC so far in this 110th Congress are: Barbara Lee (CA), John Lewis (GA), and the freshman from Minnesota, Keith Ellison.
Happy feet, Happy feet, my congressman is a super-nova. Work it out with your bad progressive self John Lewis.
The pantheon of CBC members that deserve the highest status in the Honor Society for righteous service to their constituents over all five Report Card rating periods is comprised of these 14 luminaries:
Barbara Lee (CA), 100 percent
Gwen Moore (WI), 96 percent
John Lewis (GA), 95 percent
Again, my Congressman flies high above the rest. Go Big John!! Feel the progressive love in Georgia's 5th Congressional District. Go slow now...don't want to make ya'll woozy.
Hank Johnson received a score of 80%
Now here's some interesting stuff:
In the current Report Card, for the first time the CBC Monitor also rated the 29 non-Black members of Congress whose constituencies are 25 percent or more African American.
Barrow scored 60% and the wonderful conservative assclown, Marshall, scored a whopping 40%.
Oh yeah, someone please explain to me what demographic of Marshall's Middle Georgia constituents is he looking out for. It's not Black folks, sure ain't the poor babies that need health insurance, definitely not women who want a choice in their reproductive health, so I'm guessing he's just helping out his real base voters - the Republicans. Wow, I wonder how many Democratic PACs and Labor PACs will still support "I'm a Democrat, wink, wink" Jimbo. The 8th Congresssional District deserves better than Marshall.
13 Responses to “Four Worst Black Congresspersons Revealed”
Yikes, Congressman Scott, you need to be doing some serious PR/come to Jebus/get better advice/stick with Cong. Lewis more often work dude, you got hit less than 2 weeks ago by CREW.
Again, it's just not fair that you get John Lewis and I get John Linder. What did I do????? Who did I piss off??? (but obviously I must have done a fabulous job pissing someone off to get stuck with such an asshole. Punishment fitting the crime and all)
Why????? Why DOG why??????
They don't release a list of votes that went into compiling their scorecard.
Other than that, in the reality based world, how do you propose a Democrat that is not Jim Marshall get elected to Congress in a district that Sonny, Saxby and George Bush all received over 62% of the vote in?
For comparison sake, this district's political performance is worse than: the State of Georgia overall, all but about 5 Democratic held House seats in the Legislature, every Democratic held Senate seat and even notable future district targets like Dan Weber's seat, Jan Hackney, Thunder Tumlin, etc.
If you guys don't like Jim Marshall, I would just stop worrying about him if I were you. No other Democrat (certainly not any that would run) can win this seat. Meanwhile, Marshall is practically guaranteed to soak up about $2 or $3 million in Republican money that won't be spent elsewhere. So more progressive Democrats in competitive seats on net benefit from Marshall's presence as their challengers will have less funds.
Chris,
Please stop it with your well thought out rebuttals. They have no place here.
Sincerely,
MotS
Chris your comments about Marshall are alway welcomed on BfD. I think its refreshing and endearing because you don't see that type of man-boy affection in politics anymore without the Mark Foley stickiness.
MOTS, now we can't hate just cause Chris has found his hero - his wind beneath his wings.
Hey Chris - Have you read that book I sent you yet?
Whatever you say. I was practically the only person on the blogs trying to put the brakes on a Marshall for Senate race.
If Marshall represented me in the 4th district and voted this way, I'd probably vote him out. The 8th district is a different story, which is essentially what I'm trying to get through, apparently unsuccessfully.
If a Republican wins this seat, or if another Democrat defeats Marshall in a primary, the Republicans will control this seat at least through the next redistricting cycle. So for something like 14 years.
That is 14 years of essentially uncontested Republican victories, where the Republican Congressman will not only be able to raise money for other Republicans but won't drain NRCC resources trying to defend/win the seat.
Hey, if you want to give the Republicans a gift worth $30 or $40 million because you don't like a few of his votes, be my guest. I'm just thankful you don't actually live in the 8th district and that those who do (as witnessed by the story about the Bibb Democrats) are much more thoughtful on this issue.
As a progressive Democrat, tell me what Marshall votes should I like??
Marshall, Barrow, Melissa Bean, and the entire Blue Dog coalition don't speak for me. I guess that's why they call it a big tent.
Chris, you make it sound so gloom and doom if the Darth Vader of Georgia, Jim Marshall, doesn't win his primary. If Marshall doesn't win, then who's fault is that - its not the bloggers. It's his fault for never voting in favor or reaching out to his base Democratic voters. Nobody but Darth Vader himself. If you're going to complain about attacks on Marshall then tell your boy to own up to why he keeps running on the D ticket without supporting D values.
How much longer can he keep using the excuse "well my vote didn't matter, the bill was passed anyway" - it does matter to every Democrat in this Nation that keeps paying his alary and keep his kids with healthcare.
:It's his fault for never voting in favor or reaching out to his base Democratic voters"
votes like thisMAY actually be doing that, maybenot this vote but hes smart enough to know who his base is and will vote according to their wishes.
As usual, I agree with Chris on the Marshall / Barrow issue.
Smitty, I am not worried about Marshall losing a primary. I doubt a challenger will emerge and if they do I doubt they will be credible and Jim also has tremendous support in the district, so...
To Jen B, this "issue" is going to be less of a Marshall/Barrow issue and more of just a Marshall issue as the years go on. The reason? Barrow's district isn't that bad ultimately. Performance wise, it's about the same as Sanford Bishop's, but a few percentage points whiter. While it's very tough for a Democrat to initially win a district like that, it's also very tough to dislodge them once they're in.
Case in point, Barrow and Marshall (back when his district was more or less similar to the 12th) barely won their first elections in their district (Marshall '02, Barrow '04 and '06 in the new district). Now Barrow is a 2 term incumbent in a swing district - the edge has to go to the incumbent.
Meanwhile, though Marshall is an incumbent his district normally favors a Republican by 20 points or more. Even on a very favorable performance index that the party used to use (pre-2002 elections) it was only a 47% or so district. Things have gone pretty downhill, performance wise, since then.
Paula, next on my queue I promise. I will tackle it this weekend. Sorry for delay but I haven't had too much time for reading.
chris - okay, but it's directly relevant to discussions like these, so get on it.