Elections 06: "Whoever Wins, We Lose"

(I changed the title to more fit in what my perceptions with elections in America are these days.)

To tell you the truth, I don't trust O'Malley at all:

Seven years ago, Baltimore’s black voters helped catapult Martin O’Malley to the mayor’s office. Now the question is: Can the white Democrat, after ruffling plenty of feathers, count on African-American turnout in his campaign against Republican Gov. Robert L. Ehrlich Jr.?

No one knows the answer.

‘‘People are just disgusted with O’Malley,” claims Frank M. Conaway, Baltimore’s Circuit Court clerk and a former Democratic legislator, who has endorsed Ehrlich in radio ads.

Not so, respond O’Malley supporters.

They point to an endorsement he won this week from the Interdenominational Ministerial Alliance, the most influential group of activist clergy in Baltimore. That predominantly African-American coalition has been at odds with O’Malley in the past, and showed considerable support for Douglas M. Duncan before the Montgomery county executive dropped out of the Democratic gubernatorial primary.

Yet campaign appearances suggest that African Americans are ambivalent.

At the Democratic Party’s Sept. 16 ‘‘Unity Rally” in Baltimore, where blacks form the majority of residents, only two African Americans were on the platform with O’Malley and a phalanx of white officials. They were Del. Anthony G. Brown, O’Malley’s running mate from Prince George’s County, and Aisha N. Braveboy, who won nomination for a delegate’s seat in Prince George’s.

The scene was repeated at an Oct. 9 event at Baltimore’s Federal Hill. So few black faces surrounded O’Malley and Brown before television cameras

But Ehrlich's no worse either:

GOP’s strategy?

The aim of pro-Ehrlich blacks is to ‘‘keep the [black] vote down,” says Carl O. Snowden, a Democratic workhorse who is an aide to Anne Arundel County Executive Janet S. Owens. ‘‘They are encouraging people to take a walk on O’Malley.”

The Ehrlich campaign denied any suggestion that it wants to suppress the black vote. ‘‘It’s groundless, outrageous and false,” said campaign spokeswoman Shareese N. DeLeaver. The governor’s record is clear: He ran with an African-American running mate four years ago and has several blacks in his Cabinet, she said.

OK, black Baltimorians don't trust O'Malley, yet they can't elect Ehrlich since their own people are helping the GOP with voter suppression. I'm definatly not voting for either one, as a matter of fact Here's a real governor candidate. (Note, great site, too bad it's not updated more)