The arithmetically challenged Diane Harkey

June 5, 2014 Uncategorized 5

Assemblywoman Diane Harkey (R)

Something struck me as just not quite right about a celebratory email I saw that Board of Equalization candidate Diane Harkey sent out to supporters on Wednesday morning. The header proclaimed “We Won…Big!”.

Harkey Election Victory Claim

While Harkey made it into the November General election to face Democrat Nader Shahatit, she hardly won, much less, big.

BOE-Results

Harkey’s unequivocal claim to supporters reveals her obvious difficulty in understanding basic arithmetic. That’s a problem for someone who wants to manage the states tax administration agency. By no measure is coming in second place winning by a wide margin. Maybe she meant to say that she made it into the general election by a wide margin over her losing opponents, but that’s not what she said.

Whether challenged by a basic understanding of math or English, Harkey simply does not seem to be someone with the competence to as she says “turn this state around“. At best, she would send us backwards.

5 Comments

  1. In Diane’s defense, she won big against her GOP rivals.

    Given the GOP advantage in that district her Dem opponent will face an uphill battle to win in November.

    • Agreed RHackett.

      But as I stated, that is not what she said. It’s either arithmetic or English that seems to challenge her. Of course, some would argue that, through guilt by association with her husband, she has ethical challenges as well.

  2. Solorio thinks he won too: “We’re glad we won our top-two primary spot.” He actually was beaten quite soundly in this round.

  3. As several professors of linguistics have pointed out, the question is if she conveyed the information she wanted to convey to the people she wanted to convey it to. Anyone who got her email knows that the race is about who will win the Republican nomination. She did and so she won. It would be a semantic game to claim otherwise and instead of quoting from an English teacher, I would refer you to John Marshall’s ruling in Marbury vs. Madison, where he stated that substance is always more important than form in law and politics. You are trying to make a point based on form and it just doesn’t fly.

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