Jane Murray: Still the Queen of Denial

Madam Mayor Jane Murray survives by the skin of her teeth...based on a technicality.

On Tuesday, the Mayor's lawyers managed to convince the Scioto County Board of Elections to circumvent the legitimate expressed will of the people and to deny the citizens of Portsmouth an opportunity to vote for or against a recall of Jane Murray.

On two seperate petition sheets, Murray's lawyers identified four signatures with improper dates. (In one case, a person inadvertantly wrote his or her birth date instead of the date of signing.) Instead of throwing out the four signatures, the Board threw out both sheets that the signatures were on. By contesting  four signatures out of almost 1200, Murray's attorneys were able to convince the Elections Board to throw out 38 legitimate signatures (2 full sheets)! This was just enough to postpone Murray's Judgment Day at the ballot box.

If such a decision had been made if JIM KALB or GREG BAUER or HOWARD BAUGHMAN, or even NICK BASHAM or JOHN HAAS were the subject of a recall, can you imagine the screams and howls of protest from the CAVE People???

A Citizen would be screeching about the "good ol buoys"! Jane's pack of fossilized supporters would be calling for the boycott of the Portsmouth Times, the lynching of Clay Johnson, the defenestration of the City Clerk, and the burning of the SOGP!!!!

Harald Daub would probably have a heart attack. Jim Wilson would need an extra oxygen tank. Austin Leedom would arise from his crypt before sundown. Bob and Teresa might even leave their Wheelersburg love shack and move back to Portsmouth!

According to the Portsmouth Times (click here to read) , these were the kinds of errors Murray's lawyers were looking for:

-names that were printed
-names with the first or last name printed with the other name in cursive
-names in which initials were used instead of the first name
-petitions in which signatures were dated after the petitions had been notarized

Notice that they weren't looking for!  Were they looking for forged signatures or fraudulant signatures. Were they looking for people who were tricked into signing? WERE THEY LOOKING FOR SIGNS OF CORRUPTION?

Of course not. Murray and the CAVE People knew all along that the recall committee did not do anything improper.As we have said before...they just finally have a recall they don't like.

MERRY CHRISTMAS, CITY OF PORTSMOUTH!

The mayor told the Portsmouth Times and WSAZ, she is confident that the people of Portsmouth support her and that she will not be recalled. If that is true, then why did she fight so hard against allowing the people to vote on the issue?

By challenging these few signatures, based on a minor technicality, Murray has only postponed her recall. The recall committee is said to be re-forming. Any minor errors that occured because the group was up against a deadline (they were trying to get the measure on the November ballot to avoid the expense of special election) will not be repeated! Now because of the Mayor's obstruction, the committee will have plenty of time to make sure they don't make ANY mistakes and to get many more signatures than are needed to ENSURE the measure is on the ballot.

Thanks to the mayor's efforts, the City will have to pay out $20,000 to $30,000 for a "special election" probably in December, which could have been avoided by allowing the people to vote in November. (Of course, the Mayor has already cost the City many times that amount, and she must be removed before she can do even more damage, so it will be worth it.)

Jane Murray is still the Queen of Denial.

As we said before, Mayor. Live by the recall. Die by recall.