The Sun Gazette has an interesting piece on the overwhelmingly response to O'Learygate:
THERE'S SOME IRONY . . . in the fact that the campaign Web sites of Democratic County Board candidates Mary Hynes and Walter Tejada both list county Treasurer Frank O'Leary as among their supporters.Interesting, because both Hynes and Tejada were in the room when the Arlington County Democratic Committee essentially drummed O'Leary out of the party (unfairly, in our view). And neither raised an objection to that action.
Yet they both list him as a campaign supporter, even though O'Leary won't be on the Democratic sample ballot with them.
What was that phrase about "strange bedfellows" again?
On the topic, we are hearing that some leading Democrats are now feeling remorseful over the O'Leary episode, feeling the party went way over the line in its censure of the treasurer.
From my perspective- Frank screwed up- Frank apologized- and then the party vastly overreacted. Whats even more incredible is that Frank has remained so loyal to the Democratic Party while his colleagues did everything short of saying he was in the Klan (to put everything in context- Frank implied the his minority opponent had the support of minority churches and that might help his opponent win in a low turnout election- which they say was not true). Yet- not one committee person wanted to censure Frank's opponent for saying outright that Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. would support his candidacy (just because he happened to be an African American) and not voting for him would be disgracing his memory (I'm sorry- but thats not the MLK I learned about in school)! You can find the definition of Hypocrisy here.
I was proud to vote for Frank in June- and after the way he has gracefully weathered this storm- I will be even prouder to vote for him this November.