Recently, Peachtree City Council Candidate Mrs. Tamara Allen Moore published an open letter on her Facebook page, which was subsequently reported in this publication.
It appears that Mrs. Moore feels that while she is right, anyone who questions or disagrees with her is wrong. Unfortunately, that is politics. Several people are mentioned by name, including the editor, former Commissioner/ Mayor Brown, as well as myself.
What was groundbreaking is that Mrs. Moore has reached a new low for Peachtree City politics where she decided to include my wife Jennifer in her rant. My wife is not involved in politics, nor participates on this page. No one can remember this ever happening before, not to a candidate nor a citizen.
When I submit my thoughts to this paper and participate in its forums under my own name, like a candidate who runs for office, families are understood to be out of bounds. Unfortunately, Mrs. Moore has decided to take this classless approach to attack loved ones attempting to intimidate me.
This is a sad throwback to mean girl teenage politics trying to disparage their opponent for homecoming court. No one has spread opposition to her candidacy on any forum other than on these pages and then shared on our personal Facebook pages, which we often do when the editor chooses to publish my thoughts.
Over the 20 years I have lived in Peachtree City I have led three ESPLOST initiatives that have provided hundreds of millions of dollars for our schools, raised awareness and led to action on issues that affect our schools, and been published on these pages, the AJC in Atlanta, and been directly quoted by the AJC education beat writer, Maureen Downey.
Further, I was awarded the Carolyn Cary “Dream Builder” award in 2018, by the Fayette County Chamber of Commerce in recognition of my public service.
Mrs. Moore correctly notes that I “failed” as a BOE candidate and that’s true. I worked hard, made my case and fell short. I am at peace with that and still choose to participate in local conversations about the future of our schools and our city as any citizen should.
I have requested a yard sign to support Laura Plauche’ Johnson who has run a great positive campaign and look forward to seeing what perspective she may bring to our city council. I do, however, pray Mrs. Moore can find the peace that I found after going through the election process.
Neil Sullivan
Peachtree City, Ga.
The phrase “without cause” is no longer valid. The long-awaited trigger to release the true nature of the human race has now been pulled. We can now sit back and watch the name-calling and derision contest be waged. Beware the wrath of a man who waves around peace and civility and acceptance and love.
Fear not Mr. Sullivan. We will never again hear from anyone currently, formerly or in the future from this radical group called, “Plan for Peachtree City.” Their only plan was to turn us into a suburb of Atlanta.
Not now, not ever.
We need to all be on the lookout for the name change of this group. Remember who these people are so they don’t try to sneak back into our politics with a retuned message.
Class answer to a classless attack Neil.
Looking at traffic pattens would indicate that PTC is already a suburb of Atlanta. Blame sprawl modeling, cost of living, or whatever else, but good luck putting the ketchup back in that particular bottle.
I saw a clear shift in attitudes and decorum within politics when “Bone Spurs Donnie” ripped one of his own political party members for being a POW. That title or distinction in his mind does not constitute being a war hero, but a loser. And for many within his party back in 2015, they were okay with it. It continued shortly there afterwards, there in the fall by mocking a NY Times reporter with an apparent physical disability.
Were voters appalled by it? Heck no, they nominated him to be their party’s presidential nominee; all the while enjoying his continued hurling of insults that followed. It’s why people actually attend his rallies. And given the demographics of these rallies, including the women, it seems they all still long for those Andrew Dice Clay performances from back in the day. It’s for the shock value that they seek despite making fun of others and the harm that it actually causes.
And now some people still wonder where this insulting, low trash-talking politics is coming from, even down to the local level now? Ok, let me cue up an ’82 movie line quote, one by the very wise teacher himself (Mr. Hand) who quipped, “What are you people, on dope?”
So you want to blame all of this on President Trump? I think it’s been well-documented to have started well before him…….I believe President Obama wasn’t afraid of passing out insults without any thought of the effects of his words…..remember Obama accusing the police of “acting stupidly”? Remember Hillary Clinton calling all those on the other side the “basket of deplorables?” So you see – blaming Trump for all your ills isn’t just inaccurate, it’s likely a form of derangement. Truth is stranger than fiction.
Obama said that specific officers in a specific case acted stupidly. Not all of them.
Hillary never said that all those on the other side were the “basket of deplorables.” She originally said half, and later apologized that she should not have said that it was half.
Truth IS stranger than fiction, but what you wrote isn’t the truth.
Hi Wing – I hope you have a happy holiday next week.
Obviously, you and I live in different universes. The 45th president (and his current acolytes) raised incivility to a magnitude not promoted by politicians of his or any other U.S. party for the last century. We did see similar hate-filled rhetoric coming out of Europe in the 1930s, but public statements by American politicians stayed within reasonable boundaries until 2016. There is no equivalent comparison in your or my lifetime, and certainly not the mild examples you noted.
It is a small step to accept the incivility on the local level that Mr. Sullivan highlights when someone ingests a steady diet of venom on the national one.
Alas, name-calling and derision, so popular with a presidential candidate, have now filtered down to the local level. Criticizing “noncombatants” (i.e., family members) has become fair game at the top, so why should it surprise us that it has trickled down? When boorish behavior is tolerated, or worse, applauded, at any level of political discourse, it only metastasizes into a cancer that eventually kills its host.
Perhaps, we will one day learn from history so we shall not be destined to repeat it.