Democratic senator lashes at own party's candidate at Republican convention

As a keynote speaker at the US Republican National Convention in New York, Democratic Senator Zell Miller on Wednesday night accused John Kerry, the Democratic presidential nominee, of "outsourcing" the country's national security.

Instead, he said he wanted to trust his family's future in George W. Bush, the Republican president who was seeking reelection, as "my family is more important than my party."

In history, he said, Democrats and Republicans worked time and again in the face of danger, "but not today."

He criticized Democratic leaders for seeing "American as an occupier, not a liberator" (in Iraq), and tearing apart the country and making it weaker because of "manic obsession to bring down our commander-in-chief."

"Kerry would let Paris decide when America needs defending," and "wants to outsource our national security" when "he says he doesn't like outsourcing," Miller said.

Born in February 1932, Miller served two terms as governor of Georgia before he was elected to the US Senate in 2000. Though a lifelong Democrat, Miller has regularly crossed the aisle in the Senate to work with Republicans on a number of issues, such as taxcuts, education, and confirmation of the president's nominees.

Source: Xinhua