Democrats attack president at Florida convention
Party's leaders visit state where 2000 election tipped to Bush
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Delegates hold signs for presidential candidates during the Florida Democratic convention.
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(CNN) -- The top Democratic presidential candidates gathered in Florida on Saturday to woo the party faithful in the state that three years ago delivered the presidency to George W. Bush amid a vote-counting dispute.
State and national Democratic leaders vowed that Florida would not suffer the same fate it did in 2000, when the U.S. Supreme Court by a 5-4 vote ended weeks of recounts and legal maneuvering, effectively giving Florida's 25 electoral votes and the presidency to Bush.
Sen. John Kerry of Massachusetts noted the event, saying that "Florida was the state where America's democracy was wounded."
Sen. John Edwards of North Carolina hinged much of his afternoon speech on the 2000 Florida vote, saying the problems in the previous presidential election were problems of civil rights and voting rights. Edwards said those were the issues that "we'll fight for come 2004.
"Those of us from the South, we have a special responsibility when it comes to civil rights and voting rights," he said. "We cannot follow. We must lead.
"This is not an African-American issue. This is not a Latino-American issue. I'll tell you what this is. This is an American issue."
All but two of the candidates planned to address the 4,000 delegates at the state convention.
The Rev. Al Sharpton opted out to play host to an episode of "Saturday Night Live," and former Sen. Carol Moseley Braun of Illinois skipped because of illness.
Rep. Dick Gephardt of Missouri and Kerry promised complete overhauls of the policies set into place by the Bush administration. Both candidates assailed Bush on issues including education, the environment, health care and foreign policy.
Both promised universal health care and a significant reduction in dependence on Middle Eastern oil.
Gephardt was the first speaker Saturday, telling the delegates that Bush is the "worst" of five presidents who have served since he came to Congress in 1976.
"He has the least experience, the least knowledge," the former House Minority Leader from Missouri said. "He has no curiosity. He's surrounded himself with the worst advisers. I'm nostalgic for Ronald Reagan."
Gephardt elicited a string of laughs by saying jobs, civil rights, clean air and clean water -- like Osama bin Laden and Saddam Hussein -- "are vanishing."
"There's only one way to fix the problem," he said. "We've got to make George Bush vanish."
Kerry told the delegates during an afternoon question-and-answer session that he left a snowstorm that threatened to dump two feet of snow on Boston so delegates could see that "neither sleet nor snow nor wind nor hail will stop me from my appointed rounds."
Kerry blasted Bush on foreign policy, health care, education, tax cuts and the environment and promised that his first official act as president would be to "reverse every single executive order that was issued on an ideological basis."
"We're going to stand up and make it clear that we are going to say 'No' to his cynicism, say 'No' to this abuse of power," Kerry said.
Kerry, like Gephardt, promised universal health care, saying the first piece of legislation he would send to Capitol Hill would guarantee "every single American the same health care insurance that the senators and Congressmen give themselves."
Edwards also finished his remarks with a round of complaints about the Bush administration.
"[American families] are not saving," he said. "They're going into debt. That means they're just one medical emergency away from disaster."
"This president is shifting the tax burden right on the backs of working, middle-class Americans," said Edwards, whose father was a mill worker and his mother a mail carrier. Referring to Bush, he said, "If he spent some time out here with these middle-class families, he'd understand they can't take it."
"I will end the day when millionaires sitting by their pools are getting a lower tax rate than their secretaries," he said.
Retired Gen. Wesley Clark compared his record of leadership -- a long military career beginning at West Point -- with Bush's, and found the president wanting.
He touched on the economy -- noting the Bush administration's "record deficit" and "tax cuts for the wealthy," along with broken campaign promises like a pledge to reduce carbon emissions. But the thrust of his speech was foreign policy and homeland security.
"This administration took us backward in time," the former NATO supreme commander said. "This administration has made us less safe and less secure in the world. This administration has squandered the tremendous outpouring of sympathy and affection for America, after 9-11."
GOP strategist defends Bush
According to The Associated Press, GOP strategist Ralph Reed attended the convention to defend Bush in hallway interviews.
Reed, the AP reported, said the Democrats' strategy of political vengeance will fail.
"People want their leaders to talk about the future. They don't want anger and pessimism and personal attacks. They want a positive vision from leaders looking forward," Reed told the AP.
Florida voters will not cast ballots for a presidential nominee until the state's primary March 9. By then, a candidate could be chosen. But the Florida vote went up for grabs when native son Sen. Bob Graham dropped out.
Kerry, Rep. Dennis Kucinich of Ohio and former Vermont Gov. Howard Dean were expected to address the convention delegates in the afternoon.
Sen. Joe Lieberman of Connecticut is expected to address the delegates Sunday.
Copyright 2003 CNN. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.
Associated Press contributed to this report.
