It is a rare thing indeed for a mayoral election, of all the minor spectacles in the international democratic theatre, to be watched with bated breath across continents. Ordinarily, such contests are of interest only to their own municipal communities. Yet this year, even in Georgia, among people who possess no personal stake in the sanitation budgets or subway reforms of New York City, there was an uncanny attentiveness, a certain curious tension around New York City’s mayoral elections....

It is no secret that politically, Georgia is very much a divided nation. And yet what we have seen in the past few years is the absolute...