During Tuesday’s Gubernatorial debate, Republican incumbent Nathan Deal and Democrat Jason Carter traded barbs over Georgia’s economy.

They were met by an energized crowd at the Georgia National Fair in Perry.

Carter blasted Deal for Georgia’s unemployment rate, which according to the U.S. Department of Labor is the highest in the nation.

Deal dismissed Carter’s criticism and touted his successes in raising the household income and creating more jobs.

“Senator Carter, I know that you’re young and inexperienced, but obviously you’re trying to hold me accountable for the Great Recession,” said Governor Deal. “You are quoting numbers of ten years ago. I wasn’t responsible for the Great Recession. Why don’t you talk about what’s happened since I’ve been governor?”

Throughout the debate, Carter emphasized the need to focus on better funding for education as one way to fix the economy.

“We need a leader who can say as the governor, ‘The buck stops here. Period,’” said Senator Carter. “We’re not going to say, ‘Blame the Great Recession for what’s happening in our state.’ We are dead last for unemployment. That means every other state is doing better. Every other governor and the District of Columbia have got a jump on Georgia, and that’s not where we belong.”

Meanwhile, Libertarian candidate Andrew Hunt outlined his own plan to create jobs. He wants to lower the income tax rate and offer tax credits to businesses that offer full-time jobs that pay at least $11 dollars an hour.

“We shouldn’t be penalizing jobs. We should be incentivizing jobs.” said Hunt. “Jobs are the best thing that we can have. This program will cost about $2.5 billion dollars, and will cut out all the other programs where only large companies get it. This will be to single employers. This will be to our smallest towns here in the state.”

Ethics An Issue

Ethics issues surrounding Governor Nathan Deal were also subject for debate.

Last month, the head of the state ethics commission was fired for failing to produce documents in a whistle-blower lawsuit involving Deal’s 2010 campaign.

He was asked during the debate why voters should trust him to overhaul the state’s ethics commission, as he has promised to do in the next legislative session.

“The ethics complaints that were filed against me were heard by the five commissioners and they were dismissed as having no merit,” explained Deal. “Now, I have proposed that we re-order the makeup of the ethics commission with four members being appointed by each of the three branches of government. ”

Deal explained that when a case comes up before the panel involving a member of one of these branches, he’d want those commission members appointed by that branch to recuse themselves.

Democratic Candidate Jason Carter fired back, saying he was amazed the ethics complaints against the governor were dismissed.

“They were only dismissed after the governor’s office interfered in the investigation, and now the taxpayers are on the hook for the cover,” the State Senator said. “A little bit of what we did this week as tax payers is going to pay for the cover up that they performed and now to brag about it. I think that’s a bit much.”

The whistle-blower lawsuit involving Deal’s 2010 campaign led to a court decision requiring the state to pay $700 thousand dollars plus attorneys fees.

The state also settled for $1.8 million dollars with three former employees who claimed retaliation for work investigating the ethics complaints.

speculate that the gubernatorial race will be a close one and a runoff between Carter and Deal is predicted.

In Georgia, candidates must get at least 50 percent of the vote to avoid a runoff, and it’s widely predicted that a runoff could happen between Deal and Carter.

Contributors: Grant Blankenship, Gabrielle Ware, Rosemary Jean-Louis

Tags: Macon, Georgia National Fairgrounds, Georgia Gubernatorial debate, nathan