Author

Jay Bookman

Jay Bookman

Jay Bookman covered Georgia and national politics for nearly 30 years for the Atlanta Journal-Constitution, earning numerous national, regional and state journalism awards. He has been awarded the National Headliner Award and the Walker Stone Award for outstanding editorial writing, and is the only two-time winner of the Pulliam Fellowship granted by the Society of Professional Journalists. He is also the author of "Caught in the Current," published by St. Martin's Press.

COMMENTARY

Bookman: Roe v. Wade’s rights guarantees not settled law after all. They lied.

By: - May 6, 2022

For almost five decades, Roe v. Wade has been established American law, guaranteeing the constitutional right of choice to all Americans. Even those Supreme Court justices now ready to toss that precedent aside have previously testified under oath during their Senate confirmation hearings that they believed Roe is established law that ought to be respected. […]

COMMENTARY

Bookman: Kemp enjoys ‘special’ access to campaign cash flowing from donors coveting state favors

By: - April 21, 2022

One of the running themes of the Stacey Abrams campaign has been her claim that Georgia Republicans are abusing their authority by undermining fair elections and tilting the playing field in their favor. It’s a claim that GOP officials dismiss as ungrounded. So let’s take a closer look at one potential example: Under Georgia law, […]

COMMENTARY

Bookman: Georgia GOP lawmakers sacrifice gun carry law at altar of the Cult of the 2nd Amendment

By: - April 7, 2022

Correction: An earlier version of this column about the 2022 state Legislature passing Senate Bill  319 incorrectly characterized some aspects of the measure’s changes to Georgia gun restrictions. The law would not change an unlicensed gun owner’s ability to legally carry loaded weapons in their vehicles. The law would not allow possession of hunting rifles in […]

COMMENTARY

Bookman: Private school vouchers provide students a better chance to excel? Prove it

By: - March 17, 2022

Bit by bit, inch by inch, year by year, Republicans in the Georgia General Assembly and in legislatures across the country have been moving toward passage of full-fledged school-voucher systems that would inevitably undermine public education. This year, at least for the moment, and at least in Georgia, that incremental advance has been stalled. Perhaps […]

COMMENTARY

Bookman: ‘We the people’ are in dangerous territory

By: - March 3, 2022

The state of our union is precarious. It is precarious not because of some outside threat – outside threats we can still handle. It is precarious because we have forgotten our way, because we find ourselves increasingly seduced by a perverted, stunted and selfish notion of freedom. It is precarious because some of us have […]

COMMENTARY

Bookman: Regents pledged to find qualified new chancellor; they fished for Sonny Perdue instead

By: - February 17, 2022

A year ago, the Board of Regents announced it would begin a search to find the best-qualified candidate in the country to serve as its chancellor and lead Georgia’s 26 institutes of higher learning and their 340,000 students into what was sure to be a bright and glorious future. What the regents sought, we were […]

COMMENTARY

Bookman: Trump continues to threaten violence against those who stand for rule of law

By: - February 3, 2022

Like his buddy Vladimir Putin, Donald Trump is a thug willing to use violence to achieve what he cannot achieve by legitimate means. He has shown a willingness to do so in the past, and because he himself has paid no price, he is threatening to do so in the future. We know all this, […]

COMMENTARY

Bookman: Crank hypocrisy alarm up as Kemp takes credit for Obamacare insurance access

By: - January 20, 2022

Based on the first few days of the Georgia General Assembly, the Republican Party’s 2022 legislative agenda is to outlaw non-citizen voting which is already outlawed, ban “critical race theory” from schools where it already doesn’t exist, bar transgender athletes from high school sports where the rules already say they can’t compete, and combat voter […]

COMMENTARY

Bookman: A case for Mike Pence as heroic in face of pro-Trump attempted coup

By: - January 6, 2022

I come to celebrate an American hero. I come to celebrate Mike Pence. That is not, to put it mildly, a widely held opinion. Not yet, at least. The Trumpian right reviles Pence as a traitor, as a Judas whose lack of courage and commitment a year ago cost them the prize that they see […]

COMMENTARY

Bookman: Naming names, former Sens. Perdue and Loeffler conspired against democracy

By: - December 20, 2021

Anyone in public life who supported, advocated, justified, participated in, financed or helped to organize the scheme to void the 2020 Electoral College vote, take away the voice of the people, and MacGyver state legislatures into keeping Donald Trump in the White House is guilty of conspiring to end American democracy. History will record that […]

COMMENTARY

Bookman: Perdue’s candidacy ‘a continuation of the coup attempt and insurrection that Trump launched’

By: - December 9, 2021

Let’s say it straight:  Every Georgia Republican who votes for former Sen. David Perdue in next year’s gubernatorial primary is voting to strangle American democracy and replace it with an arrangement in which elections can be overturned on a whim, just because somebody says so. There is no other rationale for Perdue’s candidacy, no other […]

COMMENTARY

Bookman: Guilty verdicts in Arbery killing give no pleasure, only relief

By: - November 24, 2021

There’s no pleasure to be taken from the guilty verdicts returned Wednesday by a Glynn County jury in the murder of Ahmaud Arbery; there is only relief and thanksgiving that in the end justice could be done, at least in a case in which the evidence was so well-documented and seemingly obvious. Given that they […]