By Staff
Remember those quaint days when spreading rumors about a candidate meant you got an anoymous letter tossed onto your lawn before dawn?
Welcome to elections in the new millenium.
The latest rumor - which we received here at The Brewton Standard both via e-mail and fax this past week - says that Barack Obama isn't eligible to run for office because of some sort of complicated and inaccurate arithmetic involving his mother's age.
That comes on the heels of rumors earlier this year - before he secured the Republican nomination - that John McCain was not eligible to be president because he was born in Panama when his father, a decorated Navy officer, was stationed there.
Now, think for a minute. If either of those rumors was true, don't you think someone would have figured it out before now … such as the political parties who are nominating these two gentlemen? Don't you think CNN would be reporting on it, instead of Uncle Billy sending it to you via e-mail?
Such ridiculous rumors are about as distracting as the debate last week about who was more patriotic. Obama has repeatedly been chastised because he doesn't always wear a flag pin on his lapel. If that's supposed to be a measure of patriotism, I guess none of the people I know love their country much, because I don't know anyone who regularly wears one.
Then Gen. Wesley Clark - himself once a Democratic candidate for president -told a national TV audience that John McCain's having been shot down in Vietnam didn't qualify him to serve as chief executive. Did he really want to disparade a military hero and think someone was going to be on his side?
All of the chatter and e-mail lies are just distracting us from the real issues - the failing economy, the war in Iraq, the still-rising cost of gas. We need the candidates' attention on solving the problems our country faces, not dispelling rumors.
So tell Uncle Billy to stop sending those e-mails. It's a waste of everyone's time.
Kerry Whipple Bean is publisher of The Brewton Standard. She can be reached at 867-4876 or by e-mail at kerry.bean@brewtonstandard.com.