A funny thing happened in court the other day: We were disqualified. Just the four of us non-partisans--Misty Davis, Khistina De Jean, Joseph Spatola, and yours truly. Mr. Spatola had decided that being governor was not his thing, after all; so the judge granted him clemency and by the end of the first day, there was only three of us.
Another funny part was that I was fairly confident that we were already disqualified before they took us to court. As non-partisans, without Lieutenant-Governor running mates, we should have been disqualified weeks ago. Why drag us into court now? I don't know.
I had received a sheaf of a summons almost a week earlier from a pounding, yelling man at my screen door, in the middle of my siesta, who later identified himself as the court jester, or something like that. I had to sign for it. It was an invitation to the First District Court, from the Chief Elections Officer, Scott T Nago, Tuesday, 9 AM sharp.
Wow, Nago vs. Morse. How could I refuse?
I'm really glad I went, though, because it was like starring in a John Grisham novel. To get the whole story, you really had to be there. Going completely under the radar, it was the most spectacular event of the 2014 election so far...bar none. Drama packed. Characters galore. Sorry you missed it.
The funniest part was about 4 or 5 hours into the proceedings, when we learned, in an off-handed way, that the ballots have already been printed...and OUR NAMES WERE ON THEM. Suddenly we realized why we were there. The question before the court was "Should our votes be counted or not counted?" Funny, nobody thought to mention that little detail to us before hand.
It seems that such a lapse of disclosure would have meant automatic mistrial in any decent Grisham novel, but this was real-world...not to mention, "Hawaii.' So the court, in its wisdom, and adhering to the letter of the law, firmly sided with the plaintiff in the end; and awarded us defendants with an encouraging lecture that amounted to "Better luck next time."
The courts opinion was that any one of us three quacks would make excellent governors and we should continue our pursuit in future elections. lol.
Fat chance.
Feel free to read the testimony I submitted to the Judge. Here's Part One and Part Two. When you are done with that, you might want to start seriously thinking about pulling you kids out of school. Good luck.
I will leave this website up for reference for anyone interested in why I ran in the first place. There is also the Morse4Gov WAR ROOM.
Aloha kakou,
Richard Morse--ex-candidate 4 governor of Hawaii, 2014
