News-Record.com

You always know you're in for a good time when a Republican starts quoting John F. Kennedy or Franklin Roosevelt; ditto when Democrats start quoting Teddy Roosevelt or Ronald Reagan. There's nothing better for some political types than to use quotes from an icon of the other guy's party to support your position.

To wit: North Carolina GOP Chairman Ferrell Blount's "open letter" (read: sent to media outlets) to Democratic Party Chairman Jerry Meek. (Link is to a PDF file.)

It starts off:

Forty five years ago this month John F. Kennedy in a message to Congress stated, “The basis of effective government is public confidence, and that confidence is endangered when ethical standards falter or appear to falter.”

Hmmm...where could he be going? But wait, more Kennedy quotes:

In the same message to Congress President Kennedy stated, “The ultimate answer to ethical problems in government is honest people in a good ethical environment. No web of statute or regulation, however intricately conceived, can hope to deal with the myriad possible challenges to a man's integrity or his devotion to the public interest.”

But what could he want? You don't suppose this is about Jim Black do you?

Now I am asking you, a fellow state chairman and North Carolinian, to take the courageous step of asking a member of your own party, Jim Black, to resign. I know that this issue has not been easy for your and your silence on the issue evidences the conflict I imagine you must feel.

Yup.

I leave you with a quote from one other Democrat President, Woodrow Wilson. He said, “I love the Democrat Party; but I love America a great deal more . . . . When the Democrat Party thinks that it is an end in itself, then I rise up and dissent.”

Bonus icon quote from Woodrow Wilson! That's going pretty deep on the rhetorical bench. I was SO expecting him to lay down some Lyndon Johnson.

In case you missed the link above, click here to read Blount's whole letter, without my smart-alec remarks.

When Meek's response comes my way, I'll post it.