Wednesday’s Candidate: David Chastain

TODAY’S CANDIDATE OF THE DAY IS…

David Chastain, the Libertarian candidate for Georgia State School Superintendent.

This is part of a recent story in The Florida Times-Union that details why Chastain’s campaign might just resonate with voters this year:

Chastain makes a slightly different argument. He says things are backward at the state Department of Education. Unlike local school districts, where voters elect school board members from districts and the board hires a superintendent, the state board is appointed by the governor to work with an elected superintendent.

And that superintendent has no power to set policy or do more than administration. Even the hiring is mostly out of the superintendent’s hands.

Recently convicted Linda Schrenko helps make Chastain’s point. As the state school board lost confidence in her abilities, it stripped her of power. The General Assembly, under the advice of former Gov. Roy Barnes, removed programs such as preschool and school accountability from the Education Department completely.

Schrenko did retain one speck of authority, which she abused, and that was the ability to sign contracts up to $50,000 without specific board say-so. It was with this loophole that she stole $614,000 in federal funds entrusted to the state Education Department by signing contracts just $1,000 or so below the maximum.

One of my favorite elements of this campaign is that he doesn’t go off on totally unrelated issues as many third party candidates do.

This is not meant as a slam, but merely an observation. Lots of candidates out there running for Attorney General and Public Service Commissioner devote a third of their time to denouncing the war in Iraq. Chastain stays on message.

He’s got a pretty nice little video on his site…
http://www.davidchastain.org/video/Web_Video.wmv

He’ll also be facing two female candidates on the November ballot. Not that there are many voters left out there who won’t support women for high political office, but whatever ones there are will have only one option.

Anyway, I think this is an interesting statewide race that deserves a bit more attention. Feel free to discuss, and send your own nominations to: afcassidy@yahoo.com

The website: http://www.davidchastain.org

This entry was posted by David Franke on Wednesday, July 5th, 2006 at 12:23 am and is filed under Candidate Profile. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.

5 Responses to “Wednesday’s Candidate: David Chastain”

  1. Will Says:
    July 5th, 2006 at 4:04 am

    Great pick, Austin. I just might send this guy some money.

  2. Kyle B Says:
    July 5th, 2006 at 2:23 pm

    why was a FLA newspaper covering a race in GA

  3. Austin Cassidy Says:
    July 5th, 2006 at 3:54 pm

    It’s my local newspaper and we’re right on the border. It covers Jacksonvile and the surrounding areas… including a few small counties in Southern Georgia.

  4. Austin Cassidy Says:
    July 5th, 2006 at 3:54 pm

    It’s my local newspaper and we’re right on the border. It covers Jacksonvile and the surrounding areas… including a few small counties in Southern Georgia.

  5. Kyle B Says:
    July 6th, 2006 at 12:37 pm

    oh i see, well that makes some sense. I would guess he will get about 1-3% of the vote in the general. that is what LIbertarians usually do in statewide races in GA

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