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COLUMBUS, Ga. — Georgia Sen. Zell Miller (search), the Bush campaign's most famous Democratic attack dog, ripped into John Kerry (search) Saturday as an "out-of-touch, ultraliberal from Taxachusetts" in a speech before Georgia Republicans.
Miller, the lone Democratic senator publicly backing Bush, commented in remarks prepared for a Bush-Cheney grassroots event, held in conjunction with the state Republican convention.
"I'm afraid that my old Democratic 'ties that bind' have become unraveled," he said.
Miller said the nation is more secure with Bush in the White House.
"With John Kerry on national security, it's vacillate, retreat and turn over to the U.N.," he said. "With John Kerry on domestic policy, it's tax, spend and redistribute income."
He called Kerry's Senate voting record on national defense "shameful," declaring that Kerry voted "against every single major weapons system that won the Cold War."
"The man now wants to be the commander in chief of U.S. armed forces? U.S. forces armed with what, spitballs?"
Miller said Kerry's handlers are trying to soften the Democratic candidate's image and depict him as an average guy.
"Look, John Kerry couldn't find Main Street with both hands," he said. "You can't make a chicken swim and you can't make John Kerry anything but an out-of-touch ultraliberal from Taxachusetts."
Miller, a lifelong Democrat, was Georgia's governor from 1991 through 1998 and was lieutenant governor for 16 years before that. In 2000, Democratic Gov. Roy Barnes (search) chose him to succeed the late Sen. Paul Coverdell, a Republican.
Miller won election that year to the balance of Coverdell's term but announced last year he will not seek re-election.
In 1992, he was a strong, early supporter of Democratic presidential candidate Bill Clinton and delivered a nominating speech for Clinton at the party's national convention.
But he has ruffled the feathers of Democratic colleagues since his appointment to the Senate, siding with Republicans on virtually every key issue and writing a best-selling book in which he accuses his party of being out of touch with Southern voters
