McKenna Long & Aldridge's connections & credibility opens doors. - This law firm has both bases covered, GOP and Democrat, & great people to boot.

This morning in this space I posted an article from the Atlanta Business Chronicle about the McKenna law firm. I have been asked by the Executive Editor of the publication to please remove my post immediately in that it is against the publication's policy to allow other Web sites to post its copyrighted material.

The article I posted and have removed was entitled:

Opening doors to government
McKenna Long & Aldridge builds a powerful political practice

By Rachel Tobin Ramos
The Atlanta Business Chronicle
February 11, 2005

The article begins:

"If politics is power, then McKenna Long & Aldridge LLP is sitting at its pinnacle."

This is certainly an accurate observation. I have followed this firm for years, and visited it several times this summer to see my friend Buddy Darden and try to see Keith Mason. Keith was out of the office on UGA Foundation and Dr. Adams stuff (remember) everytime I went by.

The article discussed the followoing individuals in the firm:
-- Zell Miller;

-- Powell Moore, 67, who until the first week of February was an assistant defense secretary, operating as a liaison between the Pentagon and Congress;

-- Eric Tanenblatt, 38, the former chief of staff to Gov. Sonny Perdue;

-- Randy Evans, the general counsel to the state Republican party and lawyer to U.S. House Speaker Dennis Hastert.

-- Rosalind Rubens Newell, longtime deputy city attorney with Atlanta, who obviously has ties with Atlanta's Democratic power structure as do the next three named below;

-- Steven Labovitz and Sharon Gay, alums of former Mayor Bill Campbell's administration;

-- Hakim Hilliard, another former assistant city attorney; and

-- Gordon Giffin, 55, a McKenna partner and chairman of the international affairs practice, the U.S. ambassador to Canada from 1997 to 2001 under President Bill Clinton and who recently has been involved with the effort to make Atlanta the seat of the Free Trade Area of the Americas.