GA Gov Offers Sweet Taxbreak How-To on Talk Radio

Oops. Something tells me that Georgia voters will be hearing a lot of this over the next two months.

Georgia Gov. Sonny Perdue (R) has recently been nagged by a trickle of muckraking stories related to his real estate deals in the Atlanta Journal & Constitution, the most damaging of which was a column two weeks ago by Jay Bookman. The piece told how in 2005, Georgia legislators “quietly smuggled language into an otherwise routine tax bill that gave one particular Georgia taxpayer a special tax deferral worth more than $100,000.” The taxpayer was, of course, Sonny Perdue, “who signed the bill into law on April 12, 2005, and shortly thereafter signed his state tax return taking advantage of that special legislation.”

Flash forward to yesterday afternoon, when Perdue was a guest on the talk show “The Right Side with Shelley Wynter.” A caller identifying himself as “Brian” gets the chance to ask a question [transcript from the AJC’s “Political Insider” column]:

Brian: “Hello, Governor, I’m a big fan of yours.”

Sonny Perdue: “Thanks, Brian.”

Brian: “I’d like to think I’m a lot like you. I just graduated from UGA [University of Georgia] and recently married my high school sweetheart.”

Sonny Perdue: “All right. I hope you make it 34 years like we have.”

Brian: “Well, that’s my goal, Governor. The one thing I haven’t been able to do is find a way to have a friend of mine write me a bill that saves me a $100,000 on my taxes. I was wondering how I might be able to get that done.”

Sonny Perdue: “Well, you get elected governor, Brian. I appreciate your question. That was really nice. I appreciate you being a fan, and i wish you well on your honeymoon.”

The most recent poll shows Democratic candidate Lt. Gov. Mark Taylor trailing by about fifteen points. I wonder if this will make a difference?

Update: Audio is available here.

Update: The AP picks it up.