So not only is Rep. Jack "Make Poor Kids Sweep The Floor" Kingston (R. GA) an asshole, so is one of his top campaign staff people, Philip Wilheit Jr.:
http://talkingpointsmemo.com/...
One of the finance chairs for Rep. Jack Kingston's (R-GA) Senate campaign complained on Facebook about "'men' in Atlanta" who need to "drink less cosmotinis" and stop complaining about the city's response to a recent snowstorm.
Here's the initial Facebook post:
Hey Atlanta! Quit whining about how inconvenient the last few days have been. It's called earth and weather and it does what it wants. On the west coast it make the ground shake and makes buildings and bridges fall on you. On the gulf coast the oceans swallows miles of land and blows trees homes to smithereens. In the Midwest funnels pick up cars, houses and people and rip them to pieces. In the north the snow is measured in meters and the temperatures make things like ears fall off. So stop complaining about your long commute home....at least it was still there when you finally arrived.
In the comments section of the post Wilheit also wrote:
Sick of the whining. The "men" in Atlanta need to drink less cosmotinis and forget about ever getting another pedicure. Be a man like the guy who hiked 6 miles through the snow and ice to be with his daughter. Spend more time in nature and less time bitching about it. If more people had not panicked and bolted out of the office at noon we would not have gridlocked the highways and the DOT could have treated them. I left my office in Gainesville at 7:15pm. Checked traffic reports. Found a good route home and traveled 50 miles in 1.5 hours. - TPM, 1/31/14
Here's a little more info about Wilheit Jr.:
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/...
Wilheit is vice chairman of the board of directors of the Georgia Department of Natural Resources, which is one of the agencies that is responsible for the state's response to snow and ice.
He comes from a prominent family in Georgia politics. His father, Phil Wilheit, Sr., chaired Gov. Nathan Deal's (R) campaign and is now on the state Board of Regents. He also owns a company called Wilheit Packaging, where his son is a partner.
Kingston is running in a crowded field of Republicans in the 2014 primary to replace retiring Sen. Saxby Chambliss (R-Ga.). The winner of the GOP primary is expected to face Michelle Nunn, the leading contender on the Democratic side, in the general election. - Huffington Post, 1/31/14
Right, ok, here's a little more info the Atlanta snowstorm:
http://www.politico.com/...
On Tuesday, snowfall of just over 2 inches shut down metropolitan Atlanta’s roads, schools, churches, government offices and businesses. Thousands of flights were cancelled at Hartsfield-Jackson International Airport. More than 2,000 school children were separated from their parents, and spent the night in buses, police stations, or classrooms. It seemed that the only places open were Waffle House and Home Depot, the former serving hash browns and coffee and the latter opening up its stores as makeshift shelters. People who didn’t camp out in supermarket aisles and hotel lobbies were trapped in cars for 10, 16, 20 hours as they tried to make commutes that normally take just 30 minutes.
Surely to everyone else in the world, the staggering sight of one of the largest metropolitan areas in the United States brought to a standstill by a few flurries seemed comical at first. Oh, those Southerners, they don’t know how to drive in the snow! Indeed, as I tried to get home from work Tuesday evening, my tires spinning uselessly in an icy patch just yards from Peachtree Street, a trio of tourists snapped camera-phone pictures and laughed. I’m sure my Honda’s enshrined on someone’s Facebook page with a witty caption. Inevitably, people began to compare the gridlocked cars heading out of downtown Atlanta to the Walking Dead poster, Southerners trapped by a “snowpocalypse” instead of the zombie variety.
But before nightfall, the situation in Atlanta had grown more tragic than comic. A baby was delivered by her father in a car on I-285, the “Perimeter” highway that circles the city. Parents en route to pick up kids dismissed from school early were stranded on highways. The Facebook group #SnowedOutAtlanta contained desperate pleas from moms trapped in frigid minivans with toddlers and adults worried about their elderly parents—stuck without medications.
What happened in Atlanta this week is not a matter of Southerners blindsided by unpredictable weather. More than any event I’ve witnessed in two decades of living in and writing about this city, this snowstorm underscores the horrible history of suburban sprawl in the United States and the bad political decisions that drive it. It tells us something not just about what’s wrong with one city in America today but what can happen when disaster strikes many places across the country. As with famines in foreign lands, it’s important to understand: It’s not an act of nature or God—this fiasco is manmade from start to finish. - Politico, 1/29/14
And here's some more details:
http://usnews.nbcnews.com/...
Thousands of drivers were hopelessly stuck for a second day Wednesday, many without food and water, on paralyzed interstates around Atlanta after a winter storm appeared to take the city by surprise.
State and local authorities had no estimate for how many people were stuck, but they said jackknifed 18-wheelers were causing a problem on freeways that were still slick with ice. Some people abandoned their cars altogether and walked to warmth and shelter.
Georgia Gov. Nathan Deal ordered the National Guard to clear the way for school buses that were carefully delivering schoolchildren back to their homes after thousands of them were marooned overnight. All of them were "home safe and sound" by late Wednesday afternoon, Deal said.
But National Guard troops were still distributing blankets and 200 cases of military-style MREs, or meals ready to eat, to drivers along Interstate 20.
Churches, groceries and hardware superstores opened their doors to the stranded. Neighbors took in neighbors and strangers. At least one baby was born in a car, helped by a police officer. - NBC News, 1/29/14
And there's been a lot of finger-pointing about how this happened:
http://www.cnn.com/...
Both Atlanta Mayor Kasim Reed and Georgia Gov. Nathan Deal put much of the blame on the fact that everyone -- government, businesses and schools -- all tried to go home at the same time, clogging highways for hours.
"I said immediately yesterday that releasing all of these folks was not the right way to go," Reed said Wednesday. "If I had my druthers, we would have staggered the closures."
But the problem highlights how Atlanta and cities like it depend almost exclusively on cars. Atlanta does have a commuter train system, but it doesn't serve the whole metro area.
While the city has a workday population of 1 million, the metro area's population is 6 million.
And when offices and schools let out Tuesday, the masses got into their cars to head to the suburbs. An expansive public transportation system would have undoubtedly alleviated some of the ensuing traffic stress.
This week's debacle is also disturbing because if another catastrophe were to hit and roads were the only path out, Atlanta would be in the same situation again.
While a recent poll shows that many in the metro Atlanta area support expanded mass transit, the city hasn't figured out a way to pay for it.
A transportation tax proposal recently failed, with some saying it would have spent too much money on roads instead of light rail. - CNN, 1/30/14
And Wilheit's dad's buddy is even manning up and taking the blame for this:
http://usnews.nbcnews.com/...
Georgia Gov. Nathan Deal took responsibility Thursday for the state's slow response to a snowstorm that left people stranded for more than 24 hours on gridlocked interstates, and his top emergency management official said flatly: "I got this one wrong."
Deal pledged to reporters that the state would be more aggressive in responding to future weather threats.
"I'm not going to look for a scapegoat," he said. "I am the governor. The buck stops with me. I accept the responsibility for it, but I also accept the responsibility of being able to make corrective actions as they come into the future."
He added: "We will take those weather warnings more seriously." - NBC News, 1/30/14
So yeah. You have assholes working to get another asshole elected to the U.S. Senate. Kingston is the official asshole in his primary whereas the other GOP opponents are all bat shit crazy or scumbags. This is why this seat is one of our best pick opportunities. If you would like to get involved with Michelle Nunn's (D. GA) U.S. Senate campaign, you can do so here:
http://www.michellenunn.com/