Tag: Elections

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If Harris is Elected, We Can Blame God

Buck Banks

Jesus is my campaign manager: Just when you thought that Katherine Harris’ campaign couldn’t get any weirder, she comes out of the closet as a Christian crusader with some real zingers. If she’s trying to distinguish herself from the other candidates, she’s succeeding — they appear to be sane.

From the South Florida Sun-Sentinel:

In an interview with the Florida Baptist Witness, the weekly journal of the Florida Baptist State Convention, Harris described her faith, saying it animates “everything I do,” including her votes in Congress.

“If you are not electing Christians, tried and true, under public scrutiny and pressure, if you’re not electing Christians, then in essence you are going to legislate sin,” she told interviewers, citing abortion and gay marriage as two examples of that sin.

‘God is the one who chooses our rulers.’
— Katherine Harris

Doing so, she said, “will take western civilization, indeed other nations because people look to our country as one nation as under God and whenever we legislate sin and we say abortion is permissible and we say gay unions are permissible, then average citizens who are not Christians, because they don’t know better, we are leading them astray and it’s wrong …”

Separating religion and politics is “so wrong because God is the one who chooses our rulers,” Harris said. “And if we are the ones not actively involved in electing those godly men and women,” then “we’re going to have a nation of secular laws. That’s not what our founding fathers intended and that’s (sic) certainly isn’t what God intended.”

BuzzFlash: Time for the Greens to Choose Up Sides

Jon Ponder

Shirley Smith saw our headline, PA Sen: GOP’s Santorum Admits Helping Green Party in Order to Split Dem Vote, and posted this editorial to BuzzFlash today:

When I first heard of this it pissed me off, mainly because all we hear from the Greens is that they don’t agree with the Democrats and they certainly are not for the GOP, but then they split votes, because they aren’t large enough to do anything else, and Republicans win by default if they haven’t rigged the count. Today, with a criminal faction in our government, it matters. Democrats may have our problems … we do have some “blue dogs” in this party, but they will eventually be leaving … why? Because, we’ve had enough. Had it with anyone who supports this treasonous Bush fascist, out-of-control, warring regime…

The fact is that this Republican party will use anybody to win elections and fight their wars for them. How many people have to die or be poverty stricken before Americans get their lights turned on? Fools. Only fools accept money from this GOP, and only fools will vote for any Republican today. A vote for the Republican party is a vote for debt, death, and destruction of this democracy.

Tom Cruise Can Always Run for Florida Senate

Trish

Links to the Church of Scientology might work out better for a candidate for the Florida Senate than they are for Tom Cruise.

State Rep. Frank Farkas, whose senate run is based on being term-limited out of the Florida House, is making an issue of the ties rival Kim Berfield has with the church, whose “spiritual headquarters” is Clearwater, Florida. He is mailing flyers to voters warning them of how Berfield is funding her campaign.

In May Gov. Jeb Bush apologized for calling Scientology “some weird little group.”

Farkas said he is not criticizing the church but revealing that a political committee with ties to Scientologists might spend big on Berfield’s behalf.

…The mailing states:

“Key leaders in the controversial Church of Scientology make up the advisory board of this group which also helps directly fund Ms. Berfield’s campaign. Ms. Berfield has a history of visiting and participating in church events and fundraisers, often praising their efforts, so expect them to return her many favors. They are counting on her as a key ally in their current ambitious expansion plans across Tampa Bay.”

Unlike in Hollywood, where Cruise was recently sacked by Paramount for allowing his religion to overshadow his acting, Scientology is gaining acceptance among its former Florida detractors.

Scientology has been a hot-button issue in Clearwater since late 1975 when the church arrived covertly and purchased a city landmark, the Fort Harrison Hotel. Two years later, church documents seized by the FBI revealed plans to “take control” of Clearwater and discredit its “enemies” – political leaders, local police, newspaper editors and reporters.

Strained relations between Scientology and the community began to thaw in recent years. A watershed moment occurred in 2002 at the church’s 75th anniversary party at the Fort Harrison Hotel in Clearwater. The guest list was a virtual who’s who of local political, civic and business leaders. Since then, politicians have grown comfortable attending church events and taking Scientologists’ political donations.

And in May Gov. Jeb Bush apologized for calling Scientology “some weird little group.”

And as Jeb goes, so goes the Florida Republican party.

Farkas, a chiropractor by trade, would have greater credibility if he hadn’t been investigated last year for accepting gifts of travel and other favors from a gambling interest trying to set up shop in Florida. Farkas and three state senators were questioned about what amounted to money laundering after the funding was run through the state Republican Party’s treasury.

Across Florida, Republican voters are facing choices like these: a known sleezebag or someone who panders to Scientologists. Win or lose, it just makes me gladder I’m a Democrat.

PA Sen: GOP’s Santorum Admits Helping Green Party in Order to Split Dem Vote

Jon Ponder

On “Hardball” Monday night, Sen. Rick Santorum (R-Pennsylvania) freely admitted — as we first reported on August 11 — that his Republican supporters are helping the Green Party candidate for the sole purpose of splitting the liberal vote in November in order to improve his own margins in his campaign for re-election:

[Hardball host CHRIS MATTHEWS: Senator Rick Santorum, you just said the enemy of my enemy is my friend. You and the Green Party of Pennsylvania. It would be helpful to you to have a large Green Party turnout to reduce the support for the Casey campaign.

Have you had any dealings or has your campaign had any dealings to get them on the ballot, to do anything to support anything for the Green Party of Pennsylvania, any role at all?

SANTORUM: Yes, absolutely. We have been absolutely up front about the fact that we want the Green Party on the ballot. We asked folks to circulate petitions for them. In fact, we even had folks who work for me and volunteer for me to go out and volunteer and work for them. We ask folks who would like to help them financially to go ahead and do it. I know members of my campaign did.

So, no, we‘ve been very up-front about the fact that I have an opponent in Bob Casey, Jr., who does not want to engage in a Senate race. He wants to engage in personal attacks and hide behind his father‘s name and not engage in any kind of substantive debate in this campaign.

And we have someone in Carl Romanelli, who‘s the Green Party candidate, who‘s at least willing to debate me. My opponent has not agreed to debate me in the commonwealth of Pennsylvania yet. And we want someone who will.

Harris Imploding as Primary Nears

Trish

If a tree fell on Katherine Harris, would anyone be around to see it?

She said a tree fell on the hangar that the rally was scheduled to be in…Airport officials, however, said no trees had fallen and that Harris was in the hangar her campaign had originally booked.

Even by Katherine Harris standards, it was a bad week. First, in her U.S. Senate campaign against Democrat Bill Nelson, she held a rally that no one attended, even the headliners. Next, the campaign worker that she tried to blame for the no-show event quit. And finally, one of Southwest Florida’s biggest newspapers announced their endorsement in the U.S. Senate Republican primary for…no one.

To begin, there was the rally. Harris expected to share the stage at the Orlando Executive Airport with a score of notables, before a teaming crowd of well-wishers. That’s not exactly how it went down.

None of the nine officials listed on her event flier appeared, leaving Harris on her own to address a group of about 40 supporters, reporters and campaign staff members.

Harris spoke in an airplane hangar that seemed to highlight the modest size of the crowd…

Harris spoke for 10 minutes…When she finished, red, white and blue balloons dropped onto an empty stage, rendered unnecessary by the sparse crowd.

Harris expected her fellow Florida Congress-people Mark Foley, Ginny Brown-Waite, Jeff Miller and Cliff Stearns to be at the airport, especially since her campaign web site boasted their support. Instead, right after the disastrous event, each spoke up to say they never endorsed Harris and their names were pulled from her site.

Then yet another campaign worker quit.

Rhyan Metzler, who had been Harris’ political director, is no longer with the campaign, according to Harris spokeswoman Jennifer Marks. Metzler is being blamed for embarrassing comments Harris made after a rally at Orlando Executive Airport.

Only 40 people showed up for the event, and Harris blamed the paltry turnout in part on a last-minute location change. She said a tree fell on the hangar that the rally was scheduled to be in, forcing her campaign to switch to another hangar.

Airport officials, however, said no trees had fallen and that Harris was in the hangar her campaign had originally booked.

Now, the Sarasota Herald-Tribune is clearly stating the Republican case in the Senate race, and it is this:

There is no one worth supporting.

U.S. Rep. Katherine Harris’ erratic behavior and her extensive contacts with defense contractor Mitchell Wade have further undermined her tenuous claim to be the Republican best able to represent Florida in the U.S. Senate.

Unfortunately, Republicans who want an alternative to Harris as the GOP nominee don’t have a good option. Harris’ opponents in the Sept. 5 primary — retired Adm. LeRoy Collins Jr., attorney William McBride and developer Peter Monroe — waited until the last possible day to file to run. They’ve done little on the campaign trail since May to dispel the appearance that they were last-minute, seat-of-the-pants candidates….

The party leadership’s misgivings have been underscored by Harris’ Senate campaign. She is incapable of keeping a cohesive congressional or campaign staff, and her behavior has frequently ranged from bizarre to inexplicable…

In light of Harris’ problems and the lack of support from party leaders, and the absence of other candidates who took this race seriously before May, we offer no recommendation in the Republican primary for U.S. senator.

Yepper.

Dems Can’t Stop Schwarzenegger – Only Conservatives Stand in His Way

Jon Ponder

No candidate for governor that I’m aware of is less deserving of a second term than Arnold Schwarzenegger, but it appears all but a dead certain he is going to get one.

After his disastrous 2005, he has stuck to his playbook this year, kowtowing to the left on the environment and education, keeping his mouth shut unless scripted (we never hear an extemporaneous word from him; and the number of public gaffes has fallen to zero), and avoiding controversial topics as much as possible.

He has almost certainly won back California independents, but in wooing the left could the governor lose the right?

To keep conservatives in line, Schwarzenegger campaign operatives have quietly launched efforts to rally support among Christian fundamentalists, gun owners and other Republicans who have long been wary of the governor and backed him only grudgingly.

His stands on illegal immigration, the state’s swelling debt, gay rights and other matters continue to rankle many of them, and his high-profile courtship of Democrats and independents risks repelling them further as the campaign intensifies.

Schwarzenegger faces no danger of a broad defection of conservatives to his Democratic challenger, state Treasurer Phil Angelides; polls show they overwhelmingly favor the governor.

The governor — who is a notorious serial adulterer — is actively courting fundamentalists Christians:

Meanwhile, to drum up support for Schwarzenegger among evangelicals, the state party has hired Ben Lopez, a lobbyist for the Rev. Lou Sheldon’s Traditional Values Coalition, a group that seeks to outlaw abortion and roll back gay rights.

Lopez and Anna Bryson, statewide coalitions director for Victory ’06, the party’s November election operation, plan to meet next week in the Sacramento area with roughly 200 conservative ministers — the first of several such gatherings to promote the governor, Bryson said.

“The governor believes strongly in family values,” she said.

Good luck with that, Gov. Plowchops.

Va. Sen: Neo-Confederate Allen Apologizes for Racial Slurs

Jon Ponder
The apology, which came hours after Allen’s campaign manager dismissed the issue with an expletive and insisted the senator has “nothing to apologize for.”

When he was in high school in the upscale Los Angeles suburb of Rancho Palos Verdes, Sen. George Allen, R-Virginia, wore a Confederate pin in a year book photo. In college, at the University of Virginia, he was famous for driving an old pickup truck with a new Confederate flag decal on the bumper. Later, as a practicing lawyer, he decorated his office with a noose hanging from a tree.

Apparently, his bigotry extends beyond blacks to people of Indian descent, as well:

Virginia Sen. George Allen (R) apologized Monday for what his opponent’s campaign said were demeaning and insensitive comments the senator made to a 20-year-old volunteer of Indian descent.

At a campaign rally in southwest Virginia on Friday, Allen repeatedly called a volunteer for Democrat James Webb “macaca.” During the speech in Breaks, near the Kentucky border, Allen began by saying that he was “going to run this campaign on positive, constructive ideas” and then pointed at S.R. Sidarth in the crowd.

“This fellow here, over here with the yellow shirt, macaca, or whatever his name is. He’s with my opponent. He’s following us around everywhere. And it’s just great,” Allen said, as his supporters began to laugh. After saying that Webb was raising money in California with a “bunch of Hollywood movie moguls,” Allen said, “Let’s give a welcome to macaca, here. Welcome to America and the real world of Virginia.” Allen then began talking about the “war on terror.”

Depending on how it is spelled, the word macaca could mean either a monkey that inhabits the Eastern Hemisphere or a town in South Africa. In some European cultures, macaca is also considered a racial slur against African immigrants, according to several Web sites that track ethnic slurs.

“The kid has a name,” Webb communications director Kristian Denny Todd said of Sidarth, a Virginia native who was born in Fairfax County. “This is trying to demean him, to minimize him as a person.”

Todd added that the use of macaca, whatever it means, and the reference welcoming Sidarth to America were clearly intended to make him uncomfortable.

Reached Monday evening, Allen said that the word had no derogatory meaning for him and that he was sorry. “I would never want to demean him as an individual. I do apologize if he’s offended by that. That was no way the point.”

Asked what macaca means, Allen said: “I don’t know what it means.” He said the word sounds similar to “mohawk,” a term that his campaign staff had nicknamed Sidarth because of his haircut. Sidarth said his hairstyle is a mullet — tight on top, long in the back.

Allen said that by the comment welcoming him to America, he meant: “Just to the real world. Get outside the Beltway and get to the real world.”

But the apology, which came hours after Allen’s campaign manager dismissed the issue with an expletive and insisted the senator has “nothing to apologize for,” did little to mollify Webb’s campaign or Sidarth, who said he suspects Allen singled him out because his was the only nonwhite face among about 100 Republican supporters.

“I think he was doing it because he could, and I was the only person of color there, and it was useful for him in inciting his audience,” said Sidarth, who videotaped the event for the Webb campaign. “I was annoyed he would use my race in a political context.”

Told of Allen’s apology, Todd added, “I hope Allen realizes that Virginians come in all colors.”

Katherine Harris Unreality Show Gets Better and Better

Jon Ponder

It is really too bad a video crew is not filming the behind the scenes antics in the U.S. Senate campaign of Rep. Katherine Harris of Florida. This
article in the St. Petersburg Times offers a comprehensive round-up of Harris’ downhill run. Here are a few of the highlights.

Emotional Volatility:

The smallest things would set her off.

Buying the wrong candy for her to toss at parades. Photographing her vertically instead of horizontally. Failing to bring her favorite Starbucks beverage extra hot venti triple latte, no fat, no foam, one Sweet’n Low.

One minute, U.S. Rep. Katherine Harris would lavish campaign staffers with praise and hugs. The next she would lose her temper, screaming “stupid” or “idiot” at a startled employee.

“You never know what you are going to get,” said Mike Miller, who left in February after serving eight months as her finance director. “Some days, it would be great. Other days, it would be ‘Oh my God.’ ”

Rampant Turnover:

Harris, the leading Republican in the U.S. Senate race this fall, has lost at least 25 campaign staffers in the past year, including three campaign managers and a slew of prominent consultants. Even in politics, a world of hard-to-please bosses and oversized egos, that’s an unheard of number for one campaign.

A few weeks ago, the core staff at her Tampa headquarters quit en masse. It was the second mass exodus.

“She just wears people down,” said Ed Rollins, a nationally known Republican consultant, who served as her top aide until he left in April.

Denial:

Harris refused to comment for this story, saying in a statement that she would not respond to “unethical leaks and malicious gossip.” But she made some brief comments about her staff after a campaign debate in Pinellas County last week.

“We are on a whole new upswing,” she said. “The new staff is good, the new staff is great. That’s the best thing that’s happened to us. …We have a staff that’s committed to me to win, not to undermine me and maybe lose, and we’re excited about that.”

…Spokeswoman Jennifer Marks said Harris had grown tired of the misperceptions about her and would refer the newspaper to other former staffers who would speak positively about her. After more than a week, her office failed to produce any names.

[…]

Poll: Dems Might Win Big in ’06, But ’08 Looks Dicey

Buck Banks

Gallery of losers: National Journal’s PollTrack notes that while Americans may favor Democrats in the 2006 midterm elections, the outlook is anything but certain for the minority party’s presidential contenders in 2008.

About a third of respondents (35 percent) to a Gallup poll released this morning said Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton, D-N.Y., would have the best chance of defeating a Republican in the 2008 presidential election. Former North Carolina Sen. John Edwards (D) was the second-highest vote-getter among the four Democrats tested with 24 percent; former Vice President Al Gore and Massachusetts Sen. John Kerry (D) received 17 percent and 13 percent, respectively.

Still, should Clinton be the nominee, a majority of respondents said she’ll make a better candidate than both Gore and Kerry

Thirty-four percent said there are Democrats other than the four named above who can prevail over the next Republican presidential nominee. But, according to Gallup’s analysis, Democratic respondents are not overly optimistic: Forty-six percent agreed and the same amount disagreed that some other Democrat can succeed. Eight percent don’t have an opinion at this point.

Still, should Clinton be the nominee, a majority of respondents said she’ll make a better candidate than both Gore and Kerry were in the last two presidential contests. Respondents didn’t think, however, that she will be a better competitor than her husband was; 58 percent said she’d make a worse contender than Bill Clinton in 1992.

Let’s review the choices again: Hillary Clinton, who voted to go to war in Iraq and who would be unlikely — as the first female candidate for U.S. president — to win; John Edwards, an empty suit who never even served a full term as senator from North Carolina (and who lost); Al Gore, who had the election stolen from and who’s “Gone Hollywood” and says he isn’t running anyway; and Kerry, who blew the last election so badly he should be disqualified from playing politics. If that’s the best the Dems can do, I guess they’ll just have to be content to control half of Congress and put up with at least four more years of Republican shenanigans until the electorate gets completely fed up with the GOP.

Incumbents Fell in Yesterday’s Primary

Jon Ponder

Three incumbent politicians lost to members of their own parties in the primary elections yesterday:

  • Sen. Joe Lieberman lost in the Democratic primary to Ned Lamont, 48 percent to 52 percent. (However Sore-loserman will run as an “independent Democrat” for the Senate against Lamont in November.)
  • Georgia Rep. Cynthia McKinney lost to Hank Johnson in a trounce, 59 percent to 41 percent. Lesson here: Don’t embarrass your constituents.
  • Michigan Republican Rep. Joe Schwarz lost to Tim Walberg 55 percent to 45 percent.