Posted on 10/06/2002 11:04:01 AM PDT by summer
War & Subversion Mark the Bush Brothers' Election Strategies
Republicans Masquerading as Democrats in the Sunshine State
Florida's Independent Candidate Bob Kunst Sounds Off...
By Jack Nichols
Excerpt: ...independent gubernatorial candidate Bob Kunst continues to speak ...
Kunst has recently been quoted in a number of Florida newspapers. Following Friday's Bush-McBride debate, Central Florida's ABC News television affiliate in Orlando carried Kunst's commentary, daring the "dull" candidates to include him in their debates.
…Kunst told GayToday, "Jeb Bush now faces off against me-since I'm still on the ballot and Janet Reno isn't-and against a Faux Democrat who ought to be called McBush (i.e. instead of McBride).
"Nobody seems to wonder where this Phony McBush Democrat came from," notes Kunst warily.
"He had no name-recognition before Jeb's TV commercials gave it to him. He's a lawyer and his firm donated $100,000 to the GOP. He [McBride] also helped engineer the hijacking of Election 2000 by finding Jeb that Texas firm that was supposed to purge voter rolls properly, but expunged 57,000 legitimate voters that have yet to be replaced.
"If McBush was really a good Democrat why would he want to take the spotlight away from Janet Reno, anyway? She had, at least, name recognition. He didn't. He's also a very poor debater, as that boring, exclusive face-off they shared on Friday showed us, and he appears to be running, like Jeb, as a puppet of the corporations, instead of being somebody who incarnates a genuine commitment.
"McBush's only idea for raising more cash for the state's failing educational system is stupid. To tax Florida's cigarette smokers? What kind of 'smart politics' is that? He's just lost the smokers, that's for sure. He is planning to lose. He's just another Republican in Democrats' clothing."
Kunst offered his own remedy for raising $23 billion for Florida on ABC-TV News....
Kunst, who found himself facing very few Florida Democratic Party operatives who'd allow him to speak prior to the September 10 primary, is now being accused by them - by virtue of being on Florida's November 7 gubernatorial ballot-of drawing votes away from Democratic primary "winner" Bill McBride.
Miami Herald columnist Jim Defede wondered on September 24, however, about the entire McBride phenomenon:
"His conduct in the days immediately following the primary was disgraceful, and his belief he was being honorable by waiting two whole days before declaring himself the victor makes his behavior all the more egregious.
"When South Florida voters -- especially black voters in Miami-Dade County -- were being disenfranchised, when they were being told for the second time in two years that their votes weren't going to be counted, McBride was busy penning his victory speech."
Tyler Bridges, also representing the Miami Herald, is already proclaiming that the "Education issue keeps Bush ahead," while Peter Wallsten (Miami Herald, September 29) tells us that Bill McBride is out of sync with a major Democratic constitunency, namely African-Americans, much-needed for any Democratic win.
He cites a recent poll in the African-American community showing 25% who'd otherwise vote as Democrats plan to vote for Bush.
He writes:
"For a variety of reasons that were all perfectly avoidable, the new Democratic nominee for governor is just now introducing himself to his party's most important voters -- the voters who will have to turn out in huge numbers for him to beat Jeb Bush in six weeks.
"For a man who actually believed long ago that he would be the nominee, one would think he would have wanted to at least attempt to forge a friendship…McBride grew up in segregated Leesburg in Central Florida and admittedly didn't have a lot of contact with black folks on the other side of town."
Bob Kunst found that African-American voters in North Florida believed that McBride had stolen the September 10 primary.
Kunst fervently believes that many top Democratic Party leaders in Florida are actually willing pawns of the corporatocracy "every bit as much as are the Republicans. We need a rebirth of the Democratic Party in Florida and across the nation," he told GayToday. "We need to be the new Democrats. The old Democrats are Republicrats -rats-who'll sell us down the river. You noticed on the national level how timid they've been. They're on the take from the corporatocracy, that's why they're so damned timid." ....
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