Any person who has his hand in all the pies terrifies these people. But a nice, honest person who does not have his hand in the pies is a dumb-A who is not qualified. Ever notice that?

I want to present some premises for you who are on the blogosphere to pontificate on, and I think this area is key, especially since Citizen Brown uses development as a keystone in his thinking and it appears many are making the House race about "developer cronyism".

1. Without a developer, 99% of all Peachtree City "citizens" wouldn't have a place to live. Otherwise you are building your house yourself, connecting it to the sewer and water system yourself, clearing the land yourself, etc. There are few examples of this in this town - most every home in Peachtree City was built by a developer, from Garden Cities to PCDC to John Weiland or Bob Adams or someone else. Should we have stopped those developers from coming in?

2. There is a five-member executive council that makes the decisions affecting zoning in Peachtree City. Decisions are not solely rested in a single mayor or single voice. Trying to insinuate otherwise belittles the value of the other members of Council. Equating that to the House race is saying that Steve Brown did anything he "did" in a vacuum, which is what he will gladly tell you (I did this, I did that).

3. As long as a development follows the regulations established by the zoning ordinances (and all other applicable laws and ordinances), any other argument is emotional and not based in either fact or reason.

4. Trying to curtail development without sound rationale will lead to legal actions and, ultimately, the development.

5. Development, in and of itself, is NOT evil. Developers, builders and other businessmen are not morons. They will not come into a market if they do not believe they can make the development economically viable. To make a development viable, you have to give people what they want and will pay for.

6. Levitt and Sons didn't leave the West Village because they didn't want it - they went bankrupt.

6. Why should governments legislate the market? In this case, I'd like to use pizza places as examples. Partners Pizza is in a "bad" location - it's not directly off the main drag (you have to go into the shopping center for it), and it's more expensive than other pizza offerings. Why does it succeed when other places (let's name WK Cafe and Calarusso's as two of the locals who haven't) don't? It could be quality, it could be service, it could be better management, and it could be the market just likes them better. Yes, location does play a role, but would Partner's NOT be as successful if it were in Braelinn? I would suggest to you it might be just as successful.

Hardware stores are also good examples. When Home Depot came in, many signaled the death knells for Ace Hardware and Gil-roy's. And yet they're both here, and will probably still both be here when Lowe's decides to come calling again. Why? Service, quality, management.

The market will determine whether or not a business will stay viable, all other things equal. As we all know, things are never always equal - some have better prices, others better quality, others better service. But the MARKET decides which of those qualities keep a business going, short of mismanagement.

I wish that people on these blogs would give the citizens at large more credit than they seem to, as it appears those who say "no development" and "cronyism" think that most folks are far more malleable then they actually are. Braelinn shopping center is not dying because of other developments specifically; it's dying because businesses in that area can't continue providing quality, price and service with good management. Why have some businesses been able to stay there for years?

Just my two cents - I'm sick of this anti-development whining. Steve Brown terrifies me because he can make the taxpayers pay more than they have to and make lawyers rich with litigation.

Calling people "idiots" is really ironic when at the same time you also repeatedly accuse them and anyone else who doesn't agree with your opinion on Steve Brown either a DirecPAC member or a developer. That's hardly what I'd call a lot of intelligence or insight.

Of course, most "idiots" who took math know that not all of the 11,000+ who didn't vote for Brown in the last election are developers or ever contributed to DirecPAC. Contrary to the foaming-at-the-mouth crowd of fervent Brown supporters, there are plenty of people who voted against Brown for the simple reason that they didn't want him to be Mayor again. No "personal gain" or "agenda," they simply didn't like the job he did as Mayor and were going to vote for anyone else not named "Steve Brown."

I have to assume you voted for Logston and not Brown.
Exactly what did Brown do that was terrible?
He didn't want to pay Peachtree National. Is that it? Are you a stockholder?
He gve developers more static than anyone else has (except for the Luthern Church idea.)
If Levitts has backed out of Centennial, will Wieland build the bridge across the railroad tracks himself? Do you know?
Do you favor all development? At any price?
We should protect citizens here, not developers.

That's pretty good......we can add stockholder to the list along with "developer" and "DirectPAC" as being the only people who didn't vote for Brown. Pretty soon, we might can manage to find the other occupations for all the rest of the vast majority who thought Anyone-But-Brown should be Mayor.

It's not real rocket-science: Brown lost in a big landslide and his record speaks for itself. Some liked that record and voted for his re-election, a whole lot of everyone else didn't. It's way beyond simplistic BS like "oh, you are a developer" or "you must have a financial interest in Brown not winning."

That there are a whole bunch of your "landslide voters" that would love the shot at a 'do-over'.

Don Quixote had his windmills.

Steve Brown has Direct PAC.

News here for you johenry: I've never been affiliated with Direct PAC people, never been one myself and never transacted business with any Direct PAC members.

As to Ramsey being Logsdon part 2, no way. Logsdon's election was a backlash against Brown for making too many waves and accusations (even if some were true!).

Little Stevie makes too many waves at the legislature and PTC/Fayette won't get jack shiite. Seriously!!!

Do you want someone to get things done behind the scenes without taking the credit? Or do you want someone who'll scream and holler and point fingers and get next to nothing done?

What exactly are Steve Brown's so-called pet Republican values anyway?

You don't understand, we simply can't elect someone again who is not approved or who is a member of the PTC Tammany Hall crowd.
There would be static, and plans would be spoiled.
There simply isn't enough money in the pot to share with everybody.

I'm going to vote for Steve anyways but I'd still like to see your reasons, my friend.