After a failed bid for Saxby Chambliss's spot in the U.S. Senate, Jack Kingston, former representative of Georgia's 1st District, is following the unelected politician's well-worn path to K-Street. Per the AJC, Kingston will join the "powerhouse lobbying firm Squire Patton Boggs" to "'assist with business development and strategic counseling' in areas where Kingston specialized in Congress, including defense, health care and agriculture" (emphasis added).
Clearly, Kingston's tenure in Congress didn't wow the voters of Georgia. I know a certain few, myself included, still galled by his rider to pull the main road on Cumberland Island out of Wilderness designation. However, Kingston deserves credit for a campaign strategy that tried to grab Chambliss's base from the get-go, emphasizing South Georgia and agriculture long before those became talking points for the contestants late in the general election. His signs were the only ones displayed on the road to the 2013 Sunbelt Ag Expo that I can remember. And for a period of time, he seemed to be the only candidate speaking for residents of that huge swath of dirt from Donalsonville to Sylvania--the peanut and cotton economy.
It'll be interesting to see how visible and influential Kingston continues to be, with his political career likely at its end. But the larger questions persist. While it's not as if any newly elected senator from the Peach State will forget that agriculture is Georgia's number industry, the concentration of political power in Atlanta is alarming for a place as large and divided as Georgia. Two senators from the same city is not good for Georgians.
In a related note, David Perdue fills Georgia's customary spot on the Senate Committee of Agriculture, Nutrition and Forestry.