Let me thank our 500 guests that braved the driving rain and cold on Thursday night to venture to the Metropolitan Club in Alpharetta to hear the top five GOP candidates for governor engage in a substantive policy debate. I also want to thank our participating restaurant clients for providing outstanding food and our table sponsors for making the event financially possible. If you have plans to hold an event of any size in the future in North Fulton, check out the Metropolitan Club first. They do a magnificent job. Kudoos also go to our tiny but dedicated Beacon staff, which did a yeoman’s job in pulling this off without so much as a glitch. Thank you all!

And let’s not forget to thank the candidates themselves for their willingness to participate. Anyone of them could have declined our invite with the proverbial “we have a scheduling conflict” boilerplate response. If you couldn’t make the debate in person, you can catch all the action for free on beaconcast.com

SO WHO WON?

Not to sound trite, they all won. The big winners, however, were the voters, who got an in-depth feel for each of the top contenders. Going into the debate, we had heard a lot of hand wringing among Republican faithful that it’s a “weak field” or “none of them can beat Barnes.” Well, first off, none are going to beat former Governor Roy Barnes. Why? Because Barnes isn’t going to be the Democratic gubernatorial nominee, Ga. Attorney General Thurbert Baker is, so that mantra is moot.
I came away from the event convinced that the GOP slate of candidates is actually quite formidable, and undoubtedly impressive in their own right.

So can any of them beat Baker? That’s another story. Baker — if he is indeed the Democrat nominee, will be very, very tough.

DEBATE ANALYSIS

Biggest Gainer: Austin ScottAustin Scott had nothing to lose going in, and it showed. With little name recognition and less money, he had to score big to get noticed. He did that forcefully and gracefully. Young, energetic and bold, he scored well on differentiating himself from the field in terms of style and candor. No doubt Scott has an uphill — if not impossible — battle to break the ceiling of true contender status, but he established himself in this debate as a serious intellectual player.

DID WHAT THEY HAD TO DO: KAREN HANDEL AND JOHN OXENDINE

Karen Handel was in the heart of her political power base, so she had the most to lose, with little upside. She showed her supporters why she’s steadily moving up in the polls. Her responses were succinct and eloquent, and her message of change is compelling. Her faithful were out in force, cheering her on. Handel is earning vote share at the expense of Nathan Deal, and we believe the next poll will show her solidly in second place. Her one Achilles Heel is Gov. Sonny Perdue. Expected to endorse her candidacy in the coming months, Perdue will prove to be an albatross around her neck, like an old rusted anvil strapped to an elegant and grand swan. The more she distances herself from the do-nothing-no-legacy-but a silly fishing hatchery governor — the better. His endorsement, if it comes, will be fool’s gold, providing her upshot candidacy short-term gain at the expense of long-term pain. Our advice for Handel: lose Sonny’s number. You can’t get away from the guy fast enough. He’ll end up sticking to the bottom of your shoe like so much bubblegum on hot summer’s day. No matter how much you try, you’ can never really scrape it all off.As far as John Oxendine is concerned, he’s been the poll front-runner in this race for the last six months for a reason: he resonates with voters across the Republican spectrum. Yes, he’s a little quirky. Yes, he’s been the downtown liberals’ punching bag for the last year. But he is one tough candidate, and he’s got a support base that won’t go away. A formidable stump speaker, like Congressman Deal, he was very convincing at this debate. His response to the “Why don’t you support choice in buying insurance across state lines” question was the best we’ve heard in the entire health care debate from the national level on down. It’s about preserving local jobs. With the state’s unemployment at eleven percent and rising, who wants to take that risk?
Here is our take on the Ox: no one ever admits being for the commissioner, but he keeps leading the polls. It’s not necessary “chic” to be for Oxendine, but the guy wins elections. We’ve said from day one he’s going to be in the run-off, and our opinion hasn’t changed. He’s weathered more storms than a rowboat in the Caribbean basin during hurricane season. The other thing he has going for him is his 16 years as Insurance Commissioner. But it’s not what you think—it goes beyond name recognition. How many consumers and businesses has his office touched positively over that time span? Average people hate insurance companies. If his department helped them in a dispute, and they told 20 friends, how many voters is that? A lot.

MISSED OPPORTUNITY: ERIC JOHNSON AND NATHAN DEAL

We have always thought that Johnson is the dark horse in this race, the wild card that had the fire, knowledge and money to blow by a divided field by galvanizing the conservative vote in the final weeks. But he missed a huge opportunity Thursday night to gain momentum with conservative voters. His open school vouchers plan is without question the right idea for Georgia’s education woes. But it’s almost the reverse of the Oxendine anomaly. Conservatives say they support it publicly, but when they go to vote, they say, “Do I really want those inner city kids dominating my school where my $700,000 home is?” Beyond that, he lacked any hard or defining issues to differentiate himself in this debate. We’re waiting for him to call for something truly bold, like no income tax for businesses that hire 10 new people for a year, etc. Johnson missed an opportunity for something big Thursday night, and got nowhere fast as a result.Other than “experience” it’s hard to grasp why Nathan Deal is in this race. Maybe he thought it beats being in the Congressional minority, but now that Republicans could take back the House in November, Deal might be kicking himself over his decision. We’ll see. He’s certainly a great orator, but where’s the beef?

WHAT ABOUT THE TWO CANDIDATES NOT INVITED?

We ran state senator Jeff Chapman’s letter to the editor in the Beacon this week concerning his disappointment over not being included in the Big 5 Debate. Additionally, I interviewed the senator on the legitimacy of his gubernatorial candidacy for about an hour on Saturday. I’ll run the story next week. He had some very interesting insight as to the current state of the Gold Dome. Our conversation was meaningful, relevant and enlightening.

As for Ray McBerry, as long as he and some of his supporters continue to act like nut balls, the guy is  going to be forever identified with the cuckoos nest  crowd that hovers on the political fringe of luncay. I have two suggestions for Ray. One. You are a candidate. Your objective is to get votes. Offending everybody that doesn’t agree 100 percent with everything you say puts you squarely on the loony toon kook wire of society. Two. Go to the nearest bookstore and buy “How to Win Friends and Influence People.” Read it. Twice. Then spend the last $17,000 your campaign has and mail it to your "volunteers". Three. Your supporters say they number 50,000. Great! Ask each of them for $10. Then you’ll have $500,000 and you can run a legitimate campaign, instead of whining to everybody. 

NEXT BEACON DEBATE?
Why, the Democrats, of course. Stay tuned.