It's not been a good week for Governor Brian Kemp, relative to facts in the healthcare realm; I've 1,343 reasons to point out Kemp's failing hundreds of thousands of Georgians.

The dominos from Trump's inner circle keep falling, as Fani Willis nabs another guilty plea - and cooperative witness in the process in her bid to take down the former President.

President Biden's Oval Office address is an excellent display in "threading the needle" between staunch support for Israel and empathy for the people of Gaza. I'll dissect that.

Lastly, enough with the tired "what Muslims would do to gay people" stuff. Being empathetic to innocent Palestinian civilians is the right mindset to have, and if we're keeping tabs on inhospitable nations for the LGBTQIA+, there are plenty of U.S. (and Israeli) allies to call out, too.

Former Trump campaign attorney Sidney Powell - she of the "kraken release" that never was - suddenly and unexpectedly rolled, taking a plea deal this morning. Hear her taking the plea - admitting guilt to six charges - and join me in speculating why.

My theory? The treasure trove of recovered emails Coffee County officials appeared to try and bury under the "delete" button.

So ... will Georgia election officials finally cave and punt on using compromised election data & software, instead giving voters the option of requesting paper ballots? Uh, no.

Some ominous signs we're in for a commercial real estate swoon - and maybe a residential one with it. Mortgage interest rates are as high as they've been since 2000. My advice for buyers? Take a listen.

Hear Fani Willis tell her close friends and top donors about the crap she's having to deal with just for doing her job (in this case, prosecuting Trump's attempts to overturn Georgia's 2020 election results).

Hey, speaking of prosecuting thugs, it turns out FBI data bears out an overall drop in the violent crime Republicans want you to believe is skyrocketing since Biden took office. It's actually the opposite.

An Emory assistant professor is suspended for allegedly making antisemitic comments on social media, which is odd given she's been proactive at fostering unifying dialogue since the Hamas attack on Israel. Meanwhile, Rep. Ruwa Romman appeared on this week's "Politically Georgia" podcast to provide the perspective of a Palestinian-American, and a Tech Jewish fraternity house gets graffiti'd.

Governor Brian Kemp won't be holding a press conference bragging that Forbes Magazine sees Georgia as the worst in the nation for healthcare and another Atlanta council member comes out against an extension of the moratorium against development at the former Atlanta Medical Center.

Lastly, some semblance of finality in the Natalee Holloway disappearance.

GOP dysfunction is truly funnier in that - while they flail at getting their sh*t together - they have the gall to blame Democrats for that, too.

Georgia's racking up a helluva reserve, and while I'm pretty sure a future Senate candidate will just punt it back to us in some minor tax tweak, I've some tangible, meaningful suggestions that would better lives for hundreds of thousands, if not millions, of Georgians.

Of course, if you want to find some political clarity on the Israeli-Palestinian divide, you only need go to ... Ireland? No, really! Hear these two Irish legislators put things into a perspective too few global leaders bother to frame the conversation in. Oh, and in a not-altogether unrelated note, it's all Britain's fault, anyway.

Lastly, indulge me, if you will, while I pay tribute to an Atlanta gay sports giant.

Herschel's holding onto some serious campaign cash, and some Georgia GOPers are sweating his future Senate aspirations, but ...

Uhm, there's another Clarence Thomas "conflict of interest" situation flying under the radar. Boop. Boop.

New IN-CITY "Cop City" polling should give the mayor and Atlanta Police Foundation the sweats.

Palestinian v Hamas conflation & "is Jim Jordan the best they can do?," too.

Dan Vicuna with Common Cause joined me today to dive into the C.H.A.R.G.E. batch of report cards for each state's redistricting efforts, and - surprise - Georgia got a D. IN fact, 18 of the 20 failing states are GOP-controlled.

I'm also joined today by Chris Dowd with Athens Politics Nerd to get a better understanding as to why Deborah Gonzalez, Athens-Clarke district attorney - is the target of Georgia's new GOP-enacted law giving a state board the power to remove a locally-elected D.A. in the first place.

There's movement on a potential House Speaker (maybe) and I'm going to keep calling out willful conflation of "Hamas" and "Palestine." It's being done on purpose by many, and it needs to stop.

Georgia's only openly Jewish General Assembly representative, ⁠Esther Panitch⁠, was certainly emotional over the weekend, on the heels of Hamas' deadly and often grisly terror attack on Israel. She admitted yesterday one of her tweets, targeting "The Squad," was "beneath" her and her office. I'm pleased she came to this realization.

BREAKING NEWS that the⁠ U.S. and Qatar are freezing (again) those Iranian assets ⁠the right's been harping about. ⁠Report cards are in⁠, and ⁠Georgia gets a "D"⁠ - and this time we won't be having a governor holding a press conference over it. Georgia was one of 20 states with D or F grades on redistricting, and it joins a solid bloc of failing southern states. In fact, when you pair that with voter suppression ⁠efforts since the 2020 election⁠, the pattern is clear: red states are eager to disenfranchise voters.

My guest today is Louisiana native, now South Carolina resident, Lamar White. He's founder and writer of the ⁠Bayou Brief,⁠ and nine years ago ⁠broke the story that would-be House Speaker Steve Scalise attended a white supremacist even⁠t in suburban New Orleans. We discuss the timeline and fallout from that and pending judicial roles in SC and LA Congressional maps & more. Lamar's also working on a fascinating book about one of America's "original gangsters," a guy by the name of Carlos Marcello. More on that project here.

Then, yesterday being National "Coming Out" Day, I share my coming out story from 26 years ago.

Mayor Andre Dickens' recent appearance on a non-commercial radio station podcast warrants a little scrutiny ,and I have a little to give. :)

Of course the public safety training facility is the topic he and the three hosts focus on, but he did make some news in the wake of the Johnny Hollman death & subsequent firing of the APD officer involved, so there's that.

I was joined by Rev. James "Major" Woodall, someone I've noticed has been vocally empathetic for the people of Gaza. That alone makes him stand out, and I'm only too happy to have him on ask why empathy is lacking here.

The officer who showed up to handle a fender bender, but wound up tasing Johnny Hollman shortly before Hollman died is now out of a job. That whole situation is somehow rationale for a $90 million police campus, according to Atlanta's mayor. Kinda not digging the use of a civilian casualty by one's own police officer for that.

I'm also noticing a note of sympathy for the plight of the Palestinian among the "Stop Cop City" folks, and I've some thoughts & reasons why that tracks.

President Biden addressed the world today, in the aftermath of Hamas' deadly attack in Israel, and finally, how to get "un-stuck" in your home mortgage "rate prison" if you need to move.

In the aftermath of the despicable attack by Hamas on Israel, the right wing "spin room" opted not to waste a second mourning the dead or keeping "politics at the waters edge;" instead, they coalesced on the false "$6 billion" narrative. Facts be damned. Well, now's a good time to remind them (and ourselves) that their last President likely shared Israeli intelligence with Russia - now an ally of Iran; the Iran most presume worked with Hamas to carry out last weekend's attack.

In any event, I reached out to my friend, Coker University sociology professor Mal Hyman, for his insights. He's an American Jew who's visited Israel three times in the past fifty years. He has insights the majority of us here in the U.S. lack.

We discuss what it's like to live on either side of the partitions along Gaze & the West Bank and throughout Israel, plus Israeli sentiment towards Palestinians and the shifting American opinion on this long Middle East fight.