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Letter to the editor

After duel for leadership, Democrats need to unite

By ERNEST HOOPER
Published December 3, 2004

My first boss told me if I could learn to cover a football game, I could cover any news event.

Quite simply, he said, a football game has a winner and a loser, and so does everything from city commission meetings to elections.

But what happens when you can't determine the winner?

Officially, Hillsborough Democratic Executive Committee chairwoman Janee Murphy was re-elected Wednesday night. Yet the challenge before her is so monumental it's difficult to call her a winner.

Even friends and family wondered aloud why she would run again.

In effect, Murphy has been given another term to grapple with performing an extreme makeover on an aging mansion. And the kind of renovations it will take to repair the local Democratic party would scare away Bob Vila and Ty Pennington.

What was most evident during the contentious meeting at Valencia Gardens is that on the local level, the party is a house divided.

Murphy, who is 34 and African-American, won by garnering more votes than Rob MacKenna, the party's candidate for supervisor of elections this year, who is 33 and white.

The nominating speeches were emotionally charged. Ego, performance and even race were prominently mentioned as factors.

For race to be an issue makes me wonder: Is it '64 or '04? But lines of division came in other forms. Murphy and the party had to weather the creation of a parallel Democratic organization known as the "537 Group," so named because President Bush won Florida by 537 votes in 2004.

Publicly, Murphy and former county Commissioner Phyllis Busansky, who spearheaded 537, said the groups could co-exist and there was plenty of work to be done. Privately, observers said 537 rose from a clash of egos and may have hurt campaigns.

The bottom line is the party didn't fare nearly as well as it hoped, and you have to wonder if a more united effort would have been more effective.

Sure, fractious feelings are nothing new among local Democrats or Republicans. I'm told when the Republicans elect a new chairperson next week, it could get just as nasty.

But when you're winning races, it's a character trait. When you're losing races, it's a problem.

And the problem may be best illustrated by the super-majority Republicans gained on the County Commission after November wins by Brian Blair and Mark Sharpe. And do we need to mention the Republicans' dominance in state House races?

Despite all the problems, Murphy says she believes she has set into motion a series of initiatives that will have long-term benefits. Instead of blaming obstacles outside the party, she's ready to build from within.

To assign most or even some of the blame to Murphy would be unfair. The party's inability to win races goes back much further than the 11/2 years Murphy has been chairwoman.

Yet in that short time, she has set up a system that should help local Democrats contend for state House seats in the future. Attendance has risen at meetings, and the group is more diverse in terms of race, religion and class.

The new executive committee, a slate largely carried by Murphy, is a virtual rainbow coalition. And Murphy's re-election - she won 72-44 - has to be seen as an endorsement.

"We may not have put a Democrat in the White House or gotten more Democrats elected locally, but the sleeping giant has been awakened," Murphy said. "No one has walked away."

True enough. MacKenna hugged Murphy after the election results were announced, and while some of his supporters walked out, a larger group stayed.

Murphy may have set some people off with her feistiness, but she insists she recognizes the need to heal and unite. Reaching out is part of her plan, and failure to do so will have to be duly criticized.

Don't send me an e-mail with the "real story" about Murphy. She needs to be accepted and supported as chairwoman, and energy needs to be channeled toward building bridges, not blowing them up.

Instead of writing me, write Murphy and ask how you can help.

That's all I'm saying.

Ernest Hooper can be reached at 813 226-3406 or Hooper@sptimes.com

[Last modified December 2, 2004, 23:55:11]