Radical Georgia Moderate

Inspired by Robert’s post over at Bloglanta, I thought I’d spend some time surfing around Open Secrets to see if I found anything interesting (I met Robert at Joe Winter’s graduation party last night and we spoke briefly about the blog). I knew, for instance, that Falcons owner Arthur Blank contributed to the Denise Majette and John Edwards campaigns during the last election cycle, but I didn’t know he hedged his bet in the U.S. Senate race and threw money at Majette’s general election opponent Johnny Isakson as well. That’s not real surprising, as you’ll see from some of the other contributors on this list.

I decided to focus my attention on media moguls, since when looking to pinpoint someone’s political bias, campaign and PAC contributions are a good place to start. Let’s begin with “Citizen” Otis Brumby, owner of my town’s local rag the Marietta Daily Journal (disclosure: I used to work for one of the company’s weekly papers, and hate the company’s guts).

As you can see, all of Brumby’s donations went to Republicans. There were additional entries for other Brumbys under the 30064 zip code I’m assuming are related to him (who also donated to Republican causes), but this list will suffice. You didn’t need a list of donations to tell you Brumby was heavily slanted toward Republicans.

And you probably didn’t need the following list to tell you the AJC ownership is slanted toward Democrats. But, hey, here’s the list of donations from chairman Anne Cox Chambers anyway.

Another shocker here. Not a single Republican on the list.

“But Rusty, that’s not really fair to compare Brumby to Chambers! Chambers is head of a ginormous media empire that spans cable, local television as well as print media. Brumby owns those papers that get thrown on your lawn for free, a pair of daily papers with (at best) combined 20,000 circulation… and that’s about it. Isn’t that like comparing the merits of a 3rd grade civics project to a master’s thesis?”

Yes. Yes it is. So let’s take a look at where some other Georgia media owners/publishers/presidents/etc. sent their cash last year in hopes of evening things out somewhat.

• Atlanta Daily World publisher Alexis Scott gave $3,000 to Women Working for the Future, also known as Future PAC, a group which donates cash to African-American women running for office.
• Neely Young, editor and publisher of Georgia Trend, gave $250 to Republican Chuck Clay’s failed U.S. House District 6 campaign. Young is a former editor of the Otis Brumby-owned Cherokee Tribune.
• W.H. “Dink” NeSmith, president of Community Newspapers, Inc., donated $200 to incumbent District 12 Rep. Max Burns, a Republican who was knocked off by John Barrow. Oddly, he also contributed $1,500 to Barrow. Additionally, he threw $250 at the state Republican Party, $250 at the Republican National Committee, and $1,200 at Johnny Isakson’s campaign. CNI publishes 12 papers in Georgia including the Clayton Tribune and the Hartwell Sun.
• William Morris of Morris Communications gave:
  • $1,000 to South Dakota Republican John Thune, who took out former Senate Minority Leader Tom Daschle
  • $1,000 to Minnesota Republican Norm Coleman
  • $500 to South Carolina Republican James DeMint
  • $1,000 to Alaska Republican Lisa Murkowski
  • $2,000 to Colorado Republican Peter Coors
  • $2,000 to Georgia Republican Max Burns
  • $6,000 to Republican George W. Bush
  • $1,000 to the Outdoor Advertising Association of America

  Morris publishes the Augusta Chronicle, the Athens Banner-Herald, and the Savannah Morning News as well as at least half a dozen magazines and a couple of non-daily newspapers in the state.

• Sam Griffin, editor and publisher of the Bainbridge Post-Spotlight, gave $1,000 to Johnny Isakson.
• James C. Kennedy, chairman of Cox Enterprises, split his contributions between the two parties, favoring the GOP by more than a 3-1 ratio. He gave a total of $9,000 to Peter Coors, Saxby Chambliss, Johnny Isakson and Dylan Glenn, while dividing $2,500 between Erskine Bowles, Denise Majette and Liane Levetan.
• J. Mack Robinson, president of Gray Television, Inc. gave:
  • $2,000 to former Ga. Democratic Party chairman David Worley
  • $4,000 to Republican Johnny Isakson
  • $2,000 to Democrat Cathy Woolard
  • $1,000 to Indiana Democrat Evan Bayh
  • $1,000 to Arkansas Democrat Blanche Lincoln
  • $2,500 to the Georgia Republican Party
  • $10,000 to the Georgia Federal Elections Committee
  • $2,000 to the National Thoroughbred Racing Association

  Erick Erickson wrote that GFEC supports more Democratic candidates than not, though I don’t know that for sure, as it is supposedly independent. Gray Television is headquartered in Atlanta and owns the Albany Herald, Rockdale Citizen and Gwinnett Daily Post, among other holdings. Oddly, no television stations in this state.

• A Dick Williams from Roswell, whose profession was listed as “George Bush/Campaign Finance,” gave $1,000 to The 159 Group, a PAC co-founded by my very own Republican state Senator Judson Hill. At least, that’s what he says (scroll to the very bottom). I’m not sure if that’s the same Dick Williams who’s a commentator on the Georgia Gang and owner of Crier Newspapers or not. If someone knows one way or the other, please clear that up for me in the comments.

This list is by no means comprehensive, but I think is a pretty good representative sample spanning media outlets in most areas of the state and hitting most of the major players in print media. Without taking donations to PACs and other groups into consideration (counting only direct campaign contributions and party/committee contributions), and excluding Dick Williams since I don’t know if he’s who I think he might be, the local media publishers and moguls represented by this sample contributed $43,150 to Republicans (62.4 percent) and $26,000 (37.6 percent) to Democrats.

Since Republicans support deregulation of media, it makes sense for media companies to send money their way. The friggin’ New York Times Company, that bastion of commie thought, was lobbying for deregulation if you’ll recall. And, to that end, it makes sense for them to drum up public support for Republican candidates.

Then again, maybe that’s giving the media too much credit. Those percentages are real close to what Bush beat Kerry by in Georgia (58-41), so it’s possible contributions trend toward winners. I’d like to see some data from past years, but have already spent way, way too much time on this, so I’m stopping now.