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Highlands Today

Worst Political Nastiness Comes From Fanatical Supporters

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The Tampa Tribune

Published: October 12, 2008

Politics are a lot like sports, and there's not much difference between fans and political supporters. Sometimes in the zeal of supporting their team or candidate, they can be downright silly - and mean. That's going on at the national and local levels.

Anyone who claims Ron Grimming and Susan Benton are not quality individuals either has a personal vendetta against one of them or is misinformed. Both are highly qualified law enforcement professionals. There's just no getting around that. But we keep hearing the same lies spread about both of them. It's not fair and people should knock it off.

If management style is the issue, fine. That's a legitimate issue that should sway a vote. If personality is an issue, that's fine too. If there's a disagreement on decisions that have been made, well, that's exactly what we should judge candidates on. It's the character assassination that's over the line.

Both sides have fanatical supporters who will say just about anything, perpetuate any lie that either they conjured on their own or heard from someone else, and keep repeating it in hopes it will eventually be considered true. They don't let facts get in the way of their nastiness. This behavior says a lot more about them than it does any candidate.

At the national level, the same thing happens with candidates for the presidency. Sen. John McCain and Sen. Barack Obama are good Americans seeking our nation's highest office. They have dramatically different philosophies, but there's nothing wrong with that.

What's sickening, though, is that at least on one occasion someone yelled out a death threat against Obama. There's not room in a civilized world for that kind of talk. And McCain deserves nothing but respect for the service he gave his nation while serving in the military and as a U.S. senator.

McCain has made plenty of negative and even downright false charges against Obama. Obama has done the same. But we give McCain high marks for scolding his own supporters who make nasty claims against Obama that are not true, and are nothing more than racist or at the least - divisive. It says a lot about his character.

It doesn't matter whether it is the race for clerk of courts, county commission, sheriff or president, the people running for office deserve our respect for spending countless hours working for votes, being willing to put their views out there for everyone to criticize and being important parts of our democratic system.

There's plenty we can criticize candidates for, but just hold up a mirror and there are plenty of people who deserve even more criticism for the juvenile way they act during such important civic duties.

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