Joe Henderson: For Melissa Howard, truth should matter more than degree

I grew up about 40 minutes from Miami University. It is a picturesque place, tucked way off the beaten path in the rolling southwest Ohio hills and home to one of the most beautiful campuses you will ever see. I did not attend school there, but many of my friends did.

I did spend a few nights at the long-gone pubs there known as the Purity and Boar’s Head Inn, knocking back 3.2 beer. But that’s another story.

Students and alumni have been known to call it the Harvard of the Midwest.

Perhaps coincidentally, it is located in the quaint village of Oxford. If you were looking to skate through four years at No Challenge U, then Miami probably wasn’t the place to enroll. Its graduates, which it sounds like do not include Republican Florida House candidate Melissa Howard of Sarasota, are a fiercely proud lot. Earning a degree from Miami is a worthy accomplishment and something to protect.

So why would Howard apparently fib that she is a proud MU graduate, and then double-down with what a school spokesman said was a doctored photo that she posted while trying to defend the indefensible?

It’s too soon to tell if the apparent gaffe will end her political pursuits, but when you’ve got this kind of explaining to do, let’s just say it doesn’t help.

She already had strong endorsements, including Lieutenant Governor Carlos Lopez-Cantera and the Florida Chamber of Commerce. The polls had her ahead in deeply red House District 73, but who knows if that still holds after Florida News Online reported that her claim to hold a bachelor’s degree in 1994 from Miami didn’t hold up under scrutiny.

She did, indeed, attend MU from 1990-94, but the school later confirmed she did not complete requirements for her degree.

That was bad.

What followed was worse.

A picture posted on her Facebook page purported to show her degree in marketing as well as her college transcript, but that was quickly debunked when Miami general counsel Robin Parker said (paraphrasing here) “nope, she didn’t graduate.”

And, um …. Miami doesn’t offer a degree in marketing.

This is not the first time someone tried to fudge their college credentials, but the lesson to be learned by anyone eyeing public office is that this should be the last. It’s just too easy to check these things, and while newspaper staffs have shrunk and now lack the resources to do comprehensive background checks, there are new sites popping up with professional reporters to fill the void.

I mean, you’re gonna get unmasked – if not immediately, then eventually.

It’s no shame to not graduate from college, either. Stuff happens. Sometimes money runs low. Sometimes other opportunities arise. Sometimes people just need to do something besides grind through to get a degree.

And for what it’s worth, a degree isn’t required to serve in the Florida House. Common sense would be a much more important thing for a candidate to tout. After all, geeze, Howard is said to be a savvy businesswoman.

Play that up, and if anyone asks about college, just tell the truth.

You can always tell them you’re a few credits shy and plan to make it up with some online classes.

Howard’s campaign people tried the ol’ “fake news” ploy, but it is a fact that the photo of alleged degree and transcript disappeared from her Facebook page.

It won’t be a surprise if her campaign soon disappears as well. Good judgment is a critical asset for a candidate to sell to voters, and let’s just say it looks like she didn’t pass that, either.