GA: State Representative Admits the "Two-Party System" is a One-Party State

In a letter published at Madison Journal Today, Rep. Alan Powell explains his recent switch from the Democratic to the Republican party by arguing that the supposed "two-party system" does not exist and that Georgia is effectively a one-party state:

During my 20 years in the House, I have always been proud of my reputation as an independent voice, representing people first over any partisan political platform, and considered one of the General Assembly’s most fiscally responsible/conservative members on either side of the aisle. While Georgia – especially rural Georgia – has changed to a solidly Republican state over the past decade, I was re-elected in contested races by 60 percent of the vote in 2002 and 66 percent in 2006, as a Democrat. But I was the last elected Democrat serving in all of rural northeast Georgia.

When I was first elected in 1990 the Democrat Party was institutionalized, the only ticket to run on in rural Georgia. That has changed with the demographic changes in our state. Georgia’s results in the recent General Election brought an effective end, at least for the foreseeable future, to the two-party system in state government.