Farewell, Bill

Shipp was loathed and despised by Sonny Perdue and many of Perdue's Republican associates, not to mention any number of Democrats he exposed over the years, but he was truly a fearless, hard-nosed political reporter, going back to his days as a young scribe with the Red & Black at the University of Georgia.  As a UGA student in the early 1950s, Bill was kicked off the newspaper staff by university officials because he wrote columns that strongly criticized the racist yahoos like Herman Talmadge and Roy Harris who ran the state in those days.

After college, Shipp made his mark with the Atlanta Constitution (back when there were still separate morning and afternoon newspapers). He served as city editor of the Constitution in the early 1970s before moving up to the exalted position of editorial page columnist.  Shipp left the Constitution in 1987 after a clash with Bill Kovach and the newspaper management over some of the news developments he was breaking in his editorial page column.

Cut loose by the Atlanta newspapers, Shipp went out on his own and started a print newsletter covering state politics, later moving the publication to the new-fangled technology known as the internet. He was really the forerunner of the bloggers and website operators who have since proliferated online and changed the face of political commentary.

Bill paved the way for people like me to try their hand at online journalism by showing it was possible to make a living at it. He was a pioneer in that respect - and one of the best guys I ever knew in the business.  He deserves commendations (and probably some cuss words as well) from all of us.

Bill slowed down a lot toward the end of his career as he dealt with numerous health issues and the heart-breaking death of his wife, but in his time he was as sharp an observer of the Georgia political scene as anyone.

In July 2002, when it appeared that Gov. Roy Barnes was headed for reelection against Republican challenger Perdue, Shipp wrote a column in which he used this parable to talk about Barnes' vulnerabilities:

''Once upon a time, a popular king moved into a tent with 100 subjects. One day the king did something that made 20 of his subjects very angry. So they left the tent. The king didn't care. He still had 80 loyal subjects. Then His Royal Highness did something else that made 20 more subjects very angry, and they left the tent. The king was left with 60 subjects. He tried to be more careful, but he stumbled and did something once again to make another 20 subjects mad. When they moved out, the king was left with just 40 subjects. He needed 45 to stay in power. He lost his crown and was thrown out of the tent. A Republican, of course, took his place.''

Shipp added these words of wisdom in that same column:

Barnes has made one group of voters after another angry over several specific acts.

Take the flag issue, for instance. Most Georgians did not find changing the flag particularly bothersome. But a handful of irate voters see changing the flag as an act of treason or worse -- an insult to Georgia's Confederate heritage. The flag change may have cost Barnes 10 percent of the vote. In many cases, had he refused to modify the banner, he would have won most of the current anti-flag crowd. Of course, he might have lost the entire African-American electorate by saying no to the flag change.

Then there is education reform. Why, heck, everybody is for education reform, aren't they? Row upon row of Georgia business leaders stood behind Barnes on the Capitol stairs as he rolled out his education-reform proposals. They applauded and cheered when he finished his declaration for reform. However, a seemingly small hitch developed. Many teachers read into his reform act an accusation that they were somehow to blame for Georgia's miserable schools. Acting on that one issue, those teachers joined the flag boys as hot-eyed Barnes haters.

That column appeared about four months before the November 2002 election where Perdue shocked Barnes and ended the Democrats' control of state government.  Bill nailed it absolutely on target.   That's the mark of someone who understands what's happening in politics.  Bill understood it well.