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Article
Courtesy of The Orlando Sentinel
By Scott Maxwell
Published
September 18, 2011
For today's political update, we visit our state capital, Havana.
Oops. I meant Tallahassee.
I've been getting the location confused ever since Florida leaders started using the public's money to try to overturn the public's vote. It's the kind of thing you'd expect in countries run by dictators or authoritarians.
Anyway, the latest out of Pyongyang has Speaker Dean Cannon trying to decide whether to continue trying to overturn your vote for Fair Districts.
A federal judge told Cannon that, no matter how much he and Democratic U.S. Rep. Corrine Brown like the gerrymandering status quo, they have no legal right to overrule the public.
What's the legal term for Duh?
The ruling sent shock waves through Damascus — sorry, Tallahassee — where legislators scrambled for answers.
Obviously, their first instinct was to blame the ruling on a liberal activist judge who was "legislating from the bench." |
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But that was hard to do when Judge Ursula Ungaro was first put on the bench by Republican Gov. Bob Martinez — and then later promoted by Republican President George
H.W. Bush.
So now everyone in Riyadh is wondering how they can justify spending even more of the people's money against them.
Said a spokeswoman for Cannon: "Speaker Cannon is in the process of reviewing the judge's order and determining whether further action is appropriate."
Allow me to help you, Mr. Speaker: It's not appropriate. It never was.
You were wrong to fight Fair Districts in the first place. You were wrong to try to overturn your constituents' vote.
And you set new standards for wrong when you decided to use taxpayer money — in a cash-strapped state, no less — to further your political goals.
You don't have to agree with the overwhelming majority — 63 percent — of Floridians who supported this ballot measure. But as long as you're a leader in this country, you should respect them.
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