So much for Bush family loyalty.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20060731/ap_on_el_se/florida_senate_harris


Florida GOP turned back on Harris

By BRENDAN FARRINGTON, Associated Press Writer

The state Republican Party bluntly told Rep. Katherine Harris (news, bio, voting record) that she couldn't win this fall's Senate election and that the party wouldn't support her campaign, a letter obtained Monday by The Associated Press shows.

Party Chairman Carole Jean Jordan made a last-ditch attempt in the confidential May 7 letter to force Harris out of the race for the nomination to challenge Democrat Sen. Bill Nelson (news, bio, voting record). But the next day, Harris turned in paperwork to get her name on the Sept. 5 Republican primary ballot.

The letter came as Gov. Jeb Bush was trying to get state House Speaker Allan Bense into the race. Bense announced later that week that he would not enter the race.

Harris rose to national prominence as Florida's secretary of state during the bitter presidential election recount in 2000 that gave the White House to George Bush. She was elected to the U.S. House in 2002.

The letter was also signed by national committeewoman Sharon Day and national committeeman Paul Senft.

Harris contended Monday that all three were pressured into signing the letter by "the party elite."

"I knew the background; I knew that pressure was applied," she said. "I knew the motivation and I knew the players, and I knew they had no choice."

The letter said: "Katherine, though it causes us much anguish, we have determined that your campaign faces irreparable damage. We feel that we have no other choice but to revoke our support.

"The polls tell us that no matter how you run this race, you will not be successful in beating Bill Nelson, who would otherwise be a vulnerable incumbent if forced to face a stronger candidate," it said.

Since the letter was written, three political newcomers have entered the race against Harris: LeRoy Collins Jr., son of a former Florida governor; Peter Monroe, a developer who helped manage the government's savings and loan bailout; and lawyer William McBride.

The state Republican Party confirmed the letter's contents Monday. In a statement, Jordan said she was "disappointed" that the private letter had been made public but added that "our concerns about the race and Congresswoman Harris' campaign still exist."

In a Quinnipiac University poll released Thursday, Harris had a comfortable lead in the GOP primary race but was behind Nelson by 37 percentage points in a general election matchup.

The letter to Harris listed major obstacles, including coverage of campaign contributions she took from a defense contractor, Mitchell Wade, who later pleaded guilty to bribing another congressman.

Harris has said that she wasn't aware of the illegal contributions and that she was only trying to bring high-wage jobs to her district when she tried to help Wade's company, MZM Inc., get a federal contract.

did this bitch honestly think she stood any chance? i wish i was there to read the letter to her. normally i can feel simpathy for pretty much anyone, but not her.

thats what you get for being a stupid, disposable pawn.

She scary lookin'

Any truth to the rumor that Catherine Harris and Marcia Clark, the prosecutor in the OJ case, are the same person?

http://www.crimelibrary.com/graphics/photos/notorious_murders/famous/simpson/9a.jpg

http://www.cnn.com/2000/ALLPOLITICS/stories/11/27/presidential.election/link.katherine.harris.ap.jpg

Ana Gasteyer did a pretty good KH on SNL.

http://img.snlarc.jt.org/arc/imp/AnGa-Katherine%20Harris.jpg

Kathy got over, which could actually be good news for the Dems.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20060906/ap_on_re_us/florida_election_27


Katherine Harris wins GOP nomination

By STEVEN WINE, Associated Press Writer
2 hours, 14 minutes ago

MIAMI - Rep. Katherine Harris (news, bio, voting record), who as secretary of state oversaw Florida's 2000 recount that gave George Bush the presidency, easily won the Republican nomination to challenge Sen. Bill Nelson (news, bio, voting record), shrugging off critics who derided her campaign as spectacularly inept.

"Tonight I say to Bill Nelson: Come home, Bill. Enough is enough," Harris said Tuesday.

Harris faces an uphill battle in her bid to unseat Nelson, though. Polls have shown the Democrat more than 30 points ahead of Harris in a general election matchup.

Harris became a darling of the Republican Party after the 2000 recount, and she parlayed her name recognition into two terms in Congress. But state GOP leaders tried to talk her out of running for Senate, citing fears she would lose to Nelson and spur a large turnout by Democrats in November that would hurt the entire Republican ticket.

In another closely watched race, U.S. Rep. Jim Davis (news, bio, voting record) won the Democratic nomination to succeed term-limited Gov. Jeb Bush, beating state Sen. Rod Smith. Davis' opponent in November will be Florida Attorney General Charlie Crist, who claimed the Republican nomination.

Harris' campaign was widely ridiculed, even by her own party. Fundraising lagged, her appearance was mocked, staff members kept quitting, and she was linked to a corrupt defense contractor.

Still, she won the primary comfortably, thanks to weak opposition and a strong base of support. Some 2 1/2 hours after the polls closed, the 49-year-old congresswoman arrived at her Tampa campaign headquarters to chants of "We want Katherine."

"It's a great victory because it shows each of us we can overcome adversity to achieve extraordinary victories," Harris said.

With 99 percent of the precincts reporting, Harris had 49 percent of the vote against three relative unknowns. Attorney Will McBride ran second at 30 percent, and retired Navy Admiral LeRoy Collins had 15 percent.

Nelson didn't address Harris' win directly but said in a statement that he looked forward to "spending the next six years continuing to fight for the people of Florida in the United States Senate." The Democrat had no primary challenger.

Despite a handful of late openings at polling places, the primary appeared to be debacle-free, with no problems reported to rival the troubled elections in 2000 and 2002. Rainy weather in South Florida and other parts of the state was expected to reduce turnout figures.

"The primary election in Florida today ran very smoothly," said state Division of Elections spokesman Sterling Ivey.

The Democratic race for governor tightened in recent days, but Smith fell short in his bid for a come-from-behind victory. Davis dogged Smith about his connections to big sugar companies, repeatedly pointing out how U.S. Sugar Corp. spent millions of dollars to fund attack ads.

Davis spoke to supporters in Tampa shortly after Smith phoned to concede.

"With all the talk of sugar in the news, let me say, how sweet it is," Davis said. "It's time to change direction, and tonight is a new beginning."

Crist campaigned as a champion of consumer causes and the governor's policies — at least when it came to crime, taxes and education. A roar went up in Crist's hotel suite in St. Petersburg when he told family and supporters he'd been declared the winner.

"All I want to be is the people's governor," Crist said, "and they should rest assured that if they elect me in November, no one will fight harder for the people."

In other results, state Sen. Skip Campbell easily won the Democratic nomination for attorney general over a little-known lawyer who did not campaign. Bill McCollum, a former congressman, was unopposed for the Republican nomination.

Senate President Tom Lee won the Republican nomination for chief financial officer, setting up a November race against Democrat Alex Sink.

In the race for Harris' House seat, auto dealer Vern Buchanan fended off four opponents for the GOP nomination to fill the 13th District seat. He will face banker Christine Jennings, who easily won the Democratic nomination.

I have two computers that I'm now having problems with. yesterday, my first computer shut down and said "RPC has been terminated". everytime I restart that computer, it gives me another 1:00 minute shut down warning. I know I need to change the settings of the RPC, but it shuts down before I can ever get to it. is there another way to fix this? The second computer messed up today. I was researching how to fix the other RPC problem and my computer shut down. when it rebooted, I now have "Internet security 2010" installed and I can't delete it. I had a similiar virus before and was able to manually delete the virus, but this one won't let me open task manager or the registry to delete it. it's even taken over my Internet and won't let me on. so I'm stuck trying to research problems on my iPhone. I read somewhere that if you can't get task manager to open that you need to wipe out your hard drive. I am wanting to do this but I can't find my reinstallation CD for this computer which is an emachines. however, I have the installation cd for the other computer with the RPC problem, but that computer is a Dell. can I install a Dell operating system on my emachines? they're both windows XP.

Hi, I'm Gnurlyik and I'm an uber douche.