Blame Katherine Harris! (And Put a Lid on Edwards!)

 by Isaiah Z. Sterrett  

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Four years later, the New York Times is still denigrating Katherine Harris.

As Bush's numbers increase and Kerry’s decline, all liberals can come up with is defamation.  Sometimes, after all, precedent should be followed.

Katherine Harris, Florida’s former secretary of state and now a Representative in the U.S. House, has been quietly ushered back to the national scene so that liberals can lie about her again.  Four years ago they said she was ugly — "[she] seems to have applied her makeup with a trowel," one prominent newspaper said — and now they lazily call her a crook.

“In [Harris’] official capacity,” editorialized the New York Times, “she repeatedly took actions that favored the [Bush-Cheney] campaign. This year has turned out to be more of the same.”  The 2000 presidential election in Florida, they noted, was “tainted,” a “mess,” and a “debacle.” 

As the conscientious reader will recall, Katherine Harris followed the law exactly as she should have.  She performed honorably and admirably.  This is why the people of her district, Florida’s 13th — one of the most veteran-rich districts in America — elected her, and this is why the New York Times persecutes her with such unabashed vigor.

In November 2000 Florida law required that all ballots be certified by the secretary of state by 5 p.m. seven days after the election.  This was not a guideline or a suggestion or a recommendation, it was a law.  That’s the way it was.  The Supreme Court of Florida (SCOFLA) pretended they didn’t understand the law, but, thankfully, they were quickly overruled.  Secretary Harris conducted the election exactly as she should have — despite being heckled by the serpents at SCOFLA, and despite being endlessly, maliciously mocked by the press.

The Times’ editorial is supposed to prove that because Harris still lurks somewhere in the Sunshine State, and because the president’s brother governs the state — gasp! — Bush will certainly win Florida underhandedly in November.  This is a strange point to be making now, inasmuch as Democrats have been openly pessimistic about Florida for months.

"Everybody makes the same mistake of 'Look South,'" Kerry said in New Hampshire early this year.  "Al Gore proved he could have been president of the United States without winning one Southern state, including his own."  In other words: sorry, Florida, I’m no idiot, and I’m not going to become dependent on a state in which I never had a lead anyway.   

Democrats have long admitted that Florida’s probably going to be a red state in November, but they don’t mind fussing about Ralph Nader maneuvering his way onto the ballot.  (Americans mustn’t run for president, they explained.)  Then the New York Times decided to bring up Katherine Harris, just as her campaign for reelection begins. 

I suppose when your candidate is a liberal twerp who can’t pry himself from the memories of the four months he spent in Southeast Asia over three decades ago, vilifying law-abiding public-servants is what you do.

Apparently you also shut down your vice presidential candidate.  As Democrats beg Republicans to rein in “Dark Cheney,” Democrats are silencing the erstwhile star of the Kerry campaign, the young, handsome, miraculously smart, rags-to-riches success story, John Edwards.

Remember how Edwards was going to “energize” the campaign? Remember how his snappy looks and lightning-fast mind were going to overshadow Cheney’s dour Wyoming-ness? I guess that plan failed.  Now Edwards is hiding — probably with Bill Jones somewhere.

Cheney sometimes goes to “secure locations,” but at least he comes out from time to time. Edwards has been AWOL from the Kerry campaign — and there really are documents to prove it.

Consider, for instance, oh, any major newspaper.  What has Edwards been up to lately? Does anyone know? The last I heard, he was calling Cheney-supporters “un-American” — not that that constitutes “questioning patriotism” or anything like that.

And what about Teresa? Aside from compelling frightened kids in Florida to “go naked a while,” where has she been the last few weeks?

This is the state of the Democratic Party.  This is how low they can go, or, more accurately, this is how low they’ve gone so far.  As the clock ticks toward November 2, all Americans are wondering:  what’s next?

Elections & Political Parties

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