Dartland is also the most idealistic of the Democrats — a trait good for an attorney general but ironically bad for an elected official.
As a state leader of the Common Cause effort to clean up the dirty business of campaign financing, Dartland will not accept any campaign contributions from anyone. It's idealistic, sure, but imagine it: a hard-charging attorney general who didn't owe a damn thing to anybody.
Unfortunately, Florida won't elect a candidate without money. Ask Crist, who will probably pull in a few grand in the time it takes to read this paragraph. Dartland, an ardent environmentalist, would be our attorney general in a perfect world. Unfortunately, ours isn't a perfect world.
Deputy Attorney General George Sheldon represents what the party shouldn't be. Sheldon, though an impressive man, is more of a politician than a lawyer.
In the late 1990s, Butterworth placed Sheldon in charge of his Tampa office. The move was more political than administrative.
At the time, Democrats wanted to position Sheldon as a 2000 contender for education commissioner. One man stood in his way: Charlie Crist. Asked how he would feel about going up against Crist for a second time, Sheldon responded, "I would relish it."
Indeed, another Crist-Sheldon showdown would be interesting, but there's no reason to think Sheldon can beat the legal lightweight in an electoral rematch. The Democrats should nominate a true lawyer, not a politician.
And Scott Maddox isn't that lawyer, either, though he is what the party will always be. That is to say, Maddox is young, ambitious and full of ideas.
Ten years ago, Tallahassee elected Maddox, then an FSU law student, as the city's youngest mayor. He was 24.
To his credit, Maddox, now 34, has successfully managed a city with 2,900 employees. That's no easy task. If tenacity and youthful exuberance were the only traits required of a good attorney general, Maddox would be the perfect candidate.
But the job also takes legal prowess, and Maddox doesn't have it. Elected mayor straight out of law school, Maddox hasn't practiced a day in his life. Maddox is a Democrat who should go far in politics, but his career path shouldn't include a stop in the AG's office. Not yet, anyway.
So that leaves Buddy Dyer, who represents what the party has to be to beat Republicans.
You could call Dyer a Clintonian Democrat. He calls himself a "new generation" Democrat. Either way, it means he's a centrist who can pull the churchgoing votes away from Republicans.
He's also a smart lawyer. (No, that's not an oxymoron.) A former environmental engineer, Dyer in 1987 received the highest score on the Florida Bar. Crist, for reference, had to take the exam a few times.
Dyer, a state senator, is also an aggressive campaigner, which is what Democrats will need if they want to stop Crist.
Dyer isn't the best candidate for the job. Dartland is, but he can't win. Dyer's legal career isn't any more impressive than Sheldon's, but Sheldon has already proven that he can't beat Crist in a statewide election. Maddox might be a talented lawyer if given the chance, but the attorney general's office shouldn't be the place to cut his teeth.
For Democrats, the choice isn't so much clear as it is pragmatic: Buddy Dyer.
Contact Staff Writer Francis X. Gilpin at 813-248-8888, ext. 130, or [email protected].
Anybody but Katherine
By Mitch E. Perry
In the eyes of the nation, they're nobodies. But five candidates think they can interrupt the Congressional coronation of Katherine Harris.
Voters in Florida's 13th Congressional District, encompassing Sarasota, most of Manatee, DeSoto, Hardee and a small portion of Charlotte counties, go to the polls Sept. 10 to decide which Republican and Democrat will vie in November to replace retiring Congressman Dan Miller.
The race has drawn national attention, due to the name of Katherine Harris on the Republican primary ballot.
Because of her controversial actions as secretary of state and her co-chairwomanship of George W. Bush's Florida campaign during the 2000 presidential recount, Harris is an easy and quick indicator of anybody's major-party affiliation. Heroine to GOP faithful, she has earned a special place on the dartboards of Democrats, who bitterly contend that she misinterpreted election law to favor her man.
Before her recent exodus from Tallahassee, Harris played host to a series of embarrassing breakdowns in her elections office.
