The Miami Herald
September 1, 2010
Quality of candidates turned off voters
BY MAURICE FERRE
The 50th anniversary of the movie To Kill a Mockingbird, with Gregory Peck in the lead role, brought back to the American conscience the Atticus Finch truth: “There are times one must take a stand, even if the only reward is the chance to be on the right side of history.” After the recent Republican and Democratic primaries, Florida needs an Atticus Finch moment.
Florida turnout on primary election day was about 20 percent, the lowest in over a decade. What was surprising was that for both the governor and U.S. Senate Republican elections, there were more than 1.2 million Republican votes. The Democratic votes for governor were 863,000 and for the U.S. Senate candidates 909,000. Yet, Florida has 41 percent active registered Democrats and 36 percent active registered Republicans. What happened to the Obama Democrats on Aug. 24?
Florida ranks 46th among states in its civic health, taking into account voter participation in elections, volunteerism, charitable contributions and civic participation in solving community problems (Florida Civic Health Index — 2009, National Conference of Citizenship).
The low turnout in the Democratic races was an indication that things are getting worse.
• The unemployed in Florida number more than 1.5 million, if one takes into account those who gave up looking for work or are severely under employed.
• Fifty-four percent of working Floridians make wages and salaries at 150 percent or less of the federal standard for poverty.
• By the end of 2010, 12.4 percent of Florida mortgages are or will be in foreclosure.
• Educational funding, currently 48th out of 50 states, keeps proportionately decreasing in Florida.
To boot, Florida seems to get political candidates who are experts at gaming the system,
Rick Scott, the GOP gubernatorial candidate and multimillionaire former CEO whose company paid a whopping $1.7 billion fine for Medicare fraud, promised to hold government accountable. Miami Herald columnist Carl Hiaasen wrote, “Rick Scott, whose singular claim to fame was building Columbia/HCA into a healthcare conglomerate that perpetrated the largest Medicare fraud in the history of Medicare. Only in the rancid political swamp of Florida would a guy like Scott have the gall to run for office, bankrolling his run for the governorship with the fortune he accumulated while his empire soaked U.S. taxpayers for hundreds of millions of dollars.” Scott’s campaign mantra, slightly paraphrased, is: “Hey, lighten up! I never got indicted!”
Billionaire Jeff Greene, Democratic candidate for U.S. Senate, called his opponent U.S. Rep. Kendrick Meek every imaginable negative adjective, from “corrupt” on down. In the next breath he said he would support whichever Democratic Senate opponent who won.
Scott’s adversary in the primary, Attorney General Bill McCollum, still hasn’t cleared up his relationship with the indicted former GOP party boss, Jim Greer, in the still-brewing scandal. Gov. Charlie Crist, running for the U.S. Senate as an independent, has even more state Republican Party issues to clear up.
Interestingly, Greene lost, but Scott won. Do Republicans have more tolerance for sleaze or more hunger to win?
The GOP U.S. Senate candidate, Marco Rubio, had the longest list of accusations directed against anyone in a blast against “Crooked Candidates 2010” issued by Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington, a respected watchdog group (citizensforethics.org). Of the 12 “CREW crooks” running for Congress, five were from Florida, four were running for the U.S. Senate: Rubio, Crist, Meek and Greene. There are many unanswered questions about Rubio’s ethics. The one that he has yet to clearly explain is the misuse of the state GOP’s American Express card for multiple personal uses and the nearly $30,000 double billing (to the Florida taxpayers and to Republican donors). Rubio returned the $30,000 to the state.
The unusually low voter turnout in the Florida Democratic Party Aug. 24 was not caused by heavy rain. It was because of voter turnoff based on duplicity and the sleaze factor because so many were gaming the system. This is why in the past two years, of newly registered voters, almost as many have registered as independents as Democratic or Republican. Floridians don’t like their political parties.
Floridians need to not only look to see who is right, but who is on the right side of history. Florida and America need Atticus Finch candidates for office.
Former Miami Mayor Maurice Ferre was a candidate for the U.S. Senate in the Aug. 24 Democratic primary.