In 2020 and (in the run-off that extended into the first week of) 2021, Warnock won with the mantra to "remain the reverend" - a campaign that combined a faith-based social-justice heart with a careful prebutting of Republicans' race-laced attempts to cast Warnock as radical by calibrating a benign look and vibe. He wore a puffer vest. He was in ads showing him walking a dog (that wasn't his) on the sidewalks of identifiably suburban streets. He presented the even keel that's been a Warnock hallmark from the time he was a teen.

This time, though, according to more than 50 interviews with officials, insiders and operatives from both parties and campaigns, Warnock is doing all that and then some - running in a way that's every bit as disciplined but in a year that's considerably more difficult. After earning by two points the last two years of the late Republican Johnny Isakson's term, Warnock is a low-ranking member of an often stalemated, 50-50 Senate from a mostly riven, more-or-less 50-50 state. While continuing to push for voting rights even as Democrats' signature bills have been stopped and stalled " the franchise has been the most elementally important issue for Warnock forever - his legislative efforts and accomplishments have focused on lowering the cost of insulin and other prescription drugs, investing in infrastructure, agriculture and manufacturing, and prioritizing seniors, farmers, servicemembers and veterans and the lower- and middle-class Georgians he most conspicuously aims to serve. He talks about Covid relief in terms of "tax cuts." He talks about other spending bills in terms of "jobs, jobs and jobs." And he seldom so much as says the name Joe Biden - frustrating foes trying to tie him in ads to the deeply unpopular president. "He is a very gifted politician," Stephen Lawson, the head of a pro-Walker Super PAC, told me - a compliment not necessarily meant to be. "We fully understand," Lawson said, "that he's going to be very difficult to unseat."

Democratic Sen. Cory Booker of New Jersey told me earlier this summer when he called to talk about Warnock: "There's never been anybody like him in the United States Senate."

There are many factors differentiating the rate of success for Black immigrants vs Black Americans, but that is a whole 'nother topic.

I agree. In general most immigrants come here for something that they don't have in their homelands: Opportunity. They see America as the shining light in an otherwise dark existence.

Many of our domestic underclass - regardless of ancestry - has already been beaten down by American society - whether the problem has been with the individuals, their upbringings, their educations, or just their general misfortune in life. IOW these people perceive themselves as (and often are) beaten-down and dispirited. There is no wonder new immigrants look at America's lower end economy and literally drool for the opportunity to improve their lot in life, and many if not most do realize success and improvement.

And therein lies some of the difference between those born here and those who come here after enduring a different type of struggle.

"I came here a free man. Your people came here in chains. You are not my brother."

I've seen this anecdote before, and as a black man I find it quite ignorant and dismissive of historical fact and context. First and foremost, it matters greatly which nation the African man came from in accessing his comments. There are still slaves in Africa at this very moment, so the speaker quite frankly has no firm ground to stand upon.

Secondly, we're all brothers according to DNA. Every person living has genetic links to Mitochondrial Eve, so his comment was arrogant, faux-elitist, and substantively meaningless all at the same time. And perhaps most importantly not every living American of partial African descent had ancestors that were slaves.

#15

Understood. However, can you quantify any discernible difference in the way that this "free" African man and his Afro-American counterpart will be treated by their non-black co-workers or American society in general?

As matters of fact, they are both "free" in the now, and that is all that matters. Ancestry doesn't impact someone's ability in the present, does it? Or am I missing another point you're trying to make?

You're missing my point. You of all people have to realize that not every black individual is impacted by those factors every single second of their lives. I was talking about the moment both men were living in - at that moment, both were the same as far as American society sees them. You're making that case yourself. How can the African man escape the same factors which affect how American blacks are seen or judged by in today's society?

Can the African man escape redlining, prejudice, profiling, etc.?

In my life's experience, he can't.

At present, I am jaded to the idea that there are politicians who promise the moon and can't deliver a scoop of beach sand.

That's the point of the title - Warnock is delivering on the things he promises and is passionate about.

What Warnock's done, though, is what he can, and also what is pretty much politically necessary in a hard cycle in a purple state. He's focused most on nuts-and-bolts problems like supply chain issues and shortages of semiconductor chips and other "kitchen-table" concerns. As a member of the Agriculture Committee, the Commerce Committee, the Banking Committee, the Joint Economic Committee, and the Special Committee on Aging, he's zeroed in on gas prices and the cost of prescription drugs and has positioned himself as a champion of the recently passed CHIPS and jobs and competition bills. At times bucking the Biden administration, he's pushed for more student debt relief and teamed with Republican congressman Buddy Carter of Georgia to prevent the closure of a military facility in Savannah, with Republican Sen. Tommy Tuberville of Alabama to try to help the peanut farmers of Georgia and with Republican Sen. Marco Rubio of Florida to earn increased funding to try to reduce maternal mortality. He has been measurably one of the more bipartisan members of the Senate.

"He is clearly trying to play this moderate role," said Lawson, the head of a pro-Walker Super PAC. "But he's still sort of lockstep with Biden and is seen that way. I mean, I think his voting record with Biden is over 95 percent." It's 96.2.

"He's focusing on bread-and-butter issues," longtime Democratic Senate aide Jim Manley said. "Warnock is almost singularly responsible for just about every single person in this country getting a $2,000 check in their bank accounts," said Steve Phillips of Democracy in Color. "Is that not delivering on economic issues?"

"I've never seen a senator be so effective so quickly," said Adam Jentleson, a former Democratic Senate aide and the author of Kill Switch: The Rise of the Modern Senate and the Crippling of American Democracy.

"He's been surprisingly effective," Democratic Sen. Sherrod Brown of Ohio told me, nodding to the unusual way he was elected, resulting in a short-term window to do what is really long-term work - and the reality that Warnock's essentially been running for the Senate, first to get in, then to stay in, for two and a half years straight.

"And he's worked with Ted Cruz," Brown quipped. "I can't say I've done that."

Interstate 14 currently is only in Texas and only 25 miles long, and its completion is a long way off " but when the Cruz-Warnock amendment passed, lawmakers couldn't help but burst into applause. "Miracles happen," said Majority Leader Chuck Schumer, citing the "uncommon pairing."