Florida Kossacks

A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Train Station

2009-02-25T13:29:00.004-05:00

The Central Florida Commuter Rail Project, now known as SunRail may be about to get a big boost from the Federal stimulus package recently passed by Congress. No, not because of monies allocated for commuter rail projects. Strangely enough, SunRail may get its biggest boost of all because of the $8 billion in the bill for High Speed Rail.

I have written previously about the possible motivations of SunRail's biggest opponent, State Senator Paula Dockery. Yes, that Paula Dockery, the one who is married to C.C. "Doc" Dockery, the sponsor of the Florida High Speed Rail Constitutional Amendment. You remember, the constitutional amendment for high speed rail that was repealed in a campaign led by then Governor Jeb Bush. The same Jeb Bush, who in one of his last acts as Governor, signed the deal with CSX to make the SunRail project feasible.

Last legislative session, Sen. Dockery was able to team up with the Florida trial lawyers lobby to derail the last piece of legislation necessary for the SunRail project to move forward. The legislation has since been modified so that the trial lawyers have dropped their opposition. That's not enough to stop Senator Dockery. Now she is on to a laundry list of reasons for opposing the bill, most of which are nonsense, as detailed by the Orlando Sentinel.

That brings us back to the federal stimulus money for high speed rail. The Tampa Tribune is now reporting that the Florida High Speed Rail Authority (who even knew that they still existed?)

is hopeful it can get some of the $8 billion recently set aside for high-speed rail projects nationwide.

Presumably, Sen. Dockery will be supportive of her husbands efforts to secure this Federal money. Almost certainly, securing this stimulus money will ultimately require the support of Governor Charlie Crist.

Of course, Governor Crist is now a full throated supporter of SunRail. I am sure the Governor would look more kindly on the high speed rail effort if Sen. Dockery could somehow be persuaded to be supportive of one of his legislative priorities for this upcoming legislative session.

Governor Crist is a farily persuasive fellow. He should use this opportunity to persuade Senator Dockery to be for something for a change.

Meanwhile, Back at the (Florida) Ranch

2008-11-24T10:14:00.006-05:00

It has been nearly three weeks now since the election. Three weeks of basking in the glow of victory and change! Three weeks of analyzing results; discussing various Cabinet and White House staff selections, and just otherwise reveling in the thrill of victory.

However, reality has a really nasty habit of rearing its ugly head. On Friday we learned

The state's barebones budget now has a $2.1 billion hole, state economists said in a Friday forecast that all but guarantees Gov. Charlie Crist will call a special legislative session to manage the deficit and consider what was once a non-starter: tax increases.

Others, such as state CFO Alex Sink and the Florida Education Association have already called for a special session to deal with the projected budget deficit. The smart money had been on a special session in January, but on Friday

Crist laughed and said ''no'' when asked if he'll delay the call for a special session due to his Dec. 12 wedding.

Predictably, Democrats are lining up against more cuts to education and social services. Republicans are eyeing more raids on trust funds and, if they have to, raising "sin" taxes on cigarettes and possibly gambling.

We are in this predicament because the state's economy has severely tanked. We currently have six times the traditional number of unsold homes on the market (300,000 vs. 50,000) and also on Friday we learned that the state's unemployment rate hit a 15 year high of 7%.

Perhaps a special session can provide an opportunity to look at a third alternative to raising taxes or cutting spending to help fill the budget hole. There is another way to raise revenue besides raising taxes, and that is to stimulate economic activity to increase tax revenue. Gov. Crist has already taken a shot at this with his "Accelerate Florida" program,

directing all state agencies to speed up billions of dollars in approved construction and capital outlay projects

Meanwhile, the buzz is getting stronger and stronger that the Obama administration will be pushing for an economic stimulus package as large as $700 billion,

addressing neglected public infrastructure projects like roads and schools, and creating “green jobs” through business incentives for energy alternatives and environmentally friendly technologies.

One project in Florida that fits that description to a "T" is the Central Florida Commuter Rail Project. This project is all teed up and ready to go. It just got hung up in the Legislature last year over that pesky liability problem. Maybe that is something else the legislators could take a look at resolving while they are in special session looking at their budget woes?

Federal stimulus package or no, this is a project that would definitely stimulate the Florida economy. And solving the liability issue now will unlock the commuter rail puzzle for all the other regions of Florida.

Another Republican Official Racist Email - this Time in Florida

2008-10-30T16:44:00.003-04:00

The St. Petersburg Times is reporting on an email forwarded by Hillsborough County Republican Party chairman David Storck that

has critics within the party charging racism

What could be so bad that it even has Republicans criticizing one of their party officials?

According to the Times, the email ws written by Republican Party volunteer Ron Whitley and forwarded by Hillsborough County Republican Party Chairman Storck to about 400 party members. The email states, in relevant part:

I see carloads of black Obama supporters coming from the inner city to cast their votes for Obama. This is their chance to get a black president and they seem to care little that he is at minimum, socialist, and probably Marxist in his core beliefs. After all, he is black -- no experience or accomplishments -- but he is black.

Now Hillsborough is of course the largest county in the Tampa Bay area, at the western end of Florida's infamous "I-4 Corridor". The home of the swing voters in Florida. It is the battleground area of the largest battleground state.

Here is how the GOP Chairman prefaced the forwarded email:

This e-mail was sent to me from one of our Volunteers in the Temple Terrace office. If you think it can help us win this election please pass it on. This election is now in our hands everyone can make a difference.

This is putting country first? To me it is just one more desperate Republican engaging in any despicable act - any despicable act, if they felt it would help them win.

Well, there is one way to make sure that not this time. Get out and vote. Get your family out to vote. Get your neighbors out to vote. We can take our country back!

Save Sales Tax for Transportation

2008-10-29T11:43:00.004-04:00

I just read a comment on how someone was planning to vote on the Florida Constitutional amendments that are on the ballot this year. The comment suggested to vote No on 2 and yes to the rest. While I'm all for voting No on 2, the so called Gay Marriage ban amendment, yes to the rest gave me some pause.

You see, there is one other amendment that progressives should consider voting no on. As unlikely as that may seem, that one is Amendment 8, the Local Option Community College Funding amendment. While it might seem counter intuitive for progressives to vote against higher education funding, bear with me while I explain my thinking on this.

First, let me say that I am an ardent supporter of expanding higher education opportunities in Florida. I received an AA degree along my educational trail from a community college, so I understand how important they can be.

I am also an ardent supporter of mass transportation, however, and I see Amendment 8 as a possible impediment to the implementation of viable mass transit systems throughout Florida. The reasoning for this is the way that local commuter and light rail systems are typically funded.

Most rail transit systems, and the ones that are being proposed in Florida, are financed by a partnership between local, state and the federal governments. The Central Florida Commuter Rail Project and the nascent TBARTA effort in the Tampa Bay region will both require local funding sources for completion.

Both Hillsborough and Pinellas Counties are considering adding a one cent local option sales tax for mass transit funding. Pinellas already has the Penny for Pinellas local option sales tax as its seventh cent of sales tax. If a community college sales tax penny is added, that would make the transportation penny proposal the NINTH cent of sales tax. I'm very much afraid that would be a penny too far for local voters to swallow.

There are plenty of other options for state of funding community colleges. Local governments are severely limited in their funding sources fortheir portion of mass transit.

If you want to see mass transit in Florida, vote NO on amendment 8.

Bloom Off the Palin Rose in Pinellas

2008-10-06T16:00:00.005-04:00

Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin made her debut in Florida's all important I-4 Corridor today. Her morning rally was held in Clearwater's Coachman Park. The park is best known as home of the Clearwater Jazz Holiday. Given the Jazz Holiday's long history in the park, it ought to be safe to say that the Clearwater Police Department has a pretty good handle on crowd sizes in the park.

Given all the buzz about the Republican Vice Presidential nominee, it was a little bit shocking to hear that the Clearwater PD estimated today's crowd for Palin at 4,500. Interestingly, the Republican Party continues its pathetic attempt to overstate the size of Palin's crowds:

Clearwater PD estimated 4,500 people attended, though local party says it was more like 10,000.

But those claims are belied by comments like this:

My brother who was at the rally said they moved all the people over to one side so as to make it appear more full so they could take some pictures.

It made him mad because there was plenty of room to stretch out on the other side. It was completely empty (Note: The park holds 12,000 people.)

And this:

Dominic Grillo, 76, of Dunedin, saw Obama when he spoke at Knology Park two weeks ago. (Note: Barack Obama drew 11,000 just up the road in Dunedin). Curiosity caused him to ride his bike down the Pinellas Trail to Clearwater. He said he wouldn't wait in line to see Palin, but when there were no lines, he decided to join the throng.

So, what does this all mean besides some fun ticky tack back and forth stuff about crowd sizes? Pinellas is the western most county of Florida's infamous I-4 Corridor, the real swing area of the state. And Pinellas County is the swing county of the swing area of the state. Pinellas is almost evenly split in voter registrations with about 245 thousand Ds, 237 thousand Rs and 154 thousand independents. When Al Gore won Florida in 2000 he carried Pinellas by 15,000 votes. When George Bush won Florida in 2004, he carried Pinellas by the scant margin of 226 votes.

The fact that the "magnetic" Palin could only scare up 4,500 in this crucial swing area of Florida can not be a good sign for the McCain campaign.

All Aboard

2008-08-24T17:28:00.010-04:00

The Democratic National Convention has started. Barack Obama has selected Joe Biden as his running mate. The Republican National Convention follows next week. It would seem that these events would be sucking up all the oxygen available. They mostly are for us political junkies. But for the majority of Floridians, life goes on as usual.

Floridians are going about their daily business. They are engaged in their daily commutes and stuck in their normal traffic jams wishing somebody would do something to ease the traffic congestion. Or offer them a viable alternative to driving their cars. The mass transit situation in Florida is so bad that a commuter rail supporter recently included "all of Florida" among places that were "useless holes of car dependence".

Well, people all over Florida are trying to do something about it. In the Tampa Bay area, the newly created TBARTA is working on a regional transportation plan that has rail transit at its heart. TBARTA was created by the legislature in 2007, but it did not get any direct funding. Nevertheless, through funding provided for the Florida Department of Transportation, they have been engaging the community in their seven county region about the creation of a master transportation plan. With funding provided by the legislature this year, they are moving forward to hire an executive director to help them present their plan to the public early next year.

Even further along are the folks in the Orlando area. Four counties in central Florida have been working for years with the Florida Department of Transportation and the Federal government to implement the Central Florida Commuter Rail project. This plan to advance

a commuter rail transit project to run along a 61-mile stretch of existing rail freight tracks

was in the news quite a bit earlier this year. The "61-mile stretch of existing rail freight tracks" are to be purchased by the state from CSX railroad. The legislature failed to approve the deal after a major misinformation campaign centered around liability sharing arrangements between the state and CSX. This was defeated even though the proposed liability plan is essentially the same one that is currently in effect for the one existing commuter rail system in Florida, the Tri Rail system in South Florida.

Despite failing to receive approval in the Florida legislature this year, the Central Florida Commuter Rail Project is far from dead. The agreement between the Florida Department of Transportation and CSX does not expire until after next year's legislative session. Congressman John Mica, the Minority Leader of the House Transportation and Infrastructure Committee recently announced the project has been approved by the Federal Transit Authority to enter the Final Design phase. Per Mica:

This announcement brings Central Florida within grasp of a cost-effective alternative to crippling gasoline costs and growing highway congestion along I-4. The Commuter Rail project now joins an elite group of only five other major New Starts transit projects in Final Design around the country... In addition, Final Design means that Commuter Rail will get its own dedicated funding request in the next president’s budget.

At about the same time, the related CSX intermodal logistics facility in Winter Haven received approval from the Central Florida Regional Planning Council of its Development of Regional Impact application.

The commuter rail projects in the Tampa Bay Area and Central Florida are moving forward. If we want to end the days when "all of Florida" is among places that were "useless holes of car dependence", it is time for us to get All Aboard.

Kos Pumping Fundraising for Joe Garcia

2008-06-24T16:25:00.000-04:00

The lead story on DailyKos right now is by Kos on a Zogby poll showing Obama with a big lead in South Florida. But it also includes this little gem regarding raising money for Joe Garcia:

"We are almost halfway to our goal of 1,000 contributors to our new ActBlue page. But I'd like a secondary goal as we close out the fundraising quarter -- Garcia is at 160 contributors as of this writing. I'd like to get that to 250 contributors. I know lots of people want to send a message to Bush that raising money for his most loyal lieutenants will cost him. I also know there are more than 90 south Florida readers of this site, and here's your chance to give a boost to one of your locals fighting the good fight for the good of our country.

So let's get Garcia to 250 contributors and help paint South Florida a delicious shade of Blue."

Can't we help Kos and Joe Garcia out?

Full story here:

http://www.dailykos.com/storyonly/2008/6/24/134034/392/841/541230

Good News for Barack Obama in WaPo ABC News Poll

2008-06-17T15:31:00.004-04:00

There is some really great news for the Obama campaign in today's Washington Post / ABC News Poll. Yes, even despite the not so very thrilling headline in the WaPo - "Poll Finds Independent Voters Split Between McCain, Obama", the numbers inside the poll itself tell a much different story.

OK, I admit, I'm a bit of a geek. And a Pol. So what does a geek and a Pol do when we can get our hands on a poll? We dig deep to see what the thing really has to say. The horse race among all those polled has Obama up 6 at 48 to 42. Among registered voters, its closer at 49 to 45. Those numbers are certainly better for Obama than McCain, but they aren't really anything to write home about. Particularly as the WaPo notes:

At this point four years ago, Democratic Sen. John F. Kerry held identical leads over President Bush among all adults and among registered voters.

We all remember how that turned out. Polls really are just snapshots in time. And the election is still a relatively long way away.

So what's the really good news for the Obama campaign in this poll? The WaPo / ABC News poll also asked this question:

Would you definitely vote for (CANDIDATE), or is there a chance you could change your mind and vote for someone else?

For Barack Obama, fully 72% of his voters said they were definitely voting for Obama. But 69% of McCain's voters said the same about him. But here it is: Out of the 31% of McCains' voters who could possibly change their minds, 17%, nearly 1 in 5, say there is a GOOD chance of changing their mind. The comparable number for Obama is only 7%, or less than one in 10.

The reason this is such good news is that political operatives are always looking for those voters who are persuadable. That's the real point at which all that advertising money being spent is aimed. Is to find and convince those people who are persuadable to make up their mind in favor of our candidate.

That 10 point spread in persuadables in favor of Obama is a very happy place for a campaign to be.

I've Been

2008-06-16T23:22:00.002-04:00

Busy; otherwise occupied; distracted; suffering writers block; disaffected;

All of the above are true. I have been busy. Working on some local issues (it's one of the things I do.) I've also been working on some other things that have statewide impact. I may be doing that again soon.

All of that has kept me somewhat otherwise occupied. I've been distracted by some personal things going on in my life. Some of them are somewhat , but not fully, resolved now. That's all part of life, and we are all distracted by things from time to time.

I've been somewhat disaffected, which may have contributed something to the idea of writers block. The long protracted primary season did not do a lot to inspire me. This is particularly true because, even though I agree it was right to let it play out, the ultimate outcome had been a foregone conclusion for quite a while. I had written about a year ago admonishing folks "Don't Get Too Attached to Your Candidates". And I could see attitudes hardening on both sides. I still believe, in the end, we will mostly be united behind our nominee. But I did not really want to play in that game in the meanwhile.

Also, the entire flap about seating of the Florida delegation was something I believed would get worked out in the end. And it appears that it has.

With those things settled and the general election campaign now finally upon us, I am ready to get back in the game. There are some issues I am passionate about. You'll see me writing on them from time to time. The idea of electing a Democrat President, and electing more Democrats in Congress and in our state legislature is of utmost importance to me. I'll be writing about that too.

So, I've been, not writing here all that much. But I feel that's about to change.

Dems: Don't Team Up With the Forces of Ego

2008-04-09T13:54:00.003-04:00

The budget battle in the Florida Senate gave us some strange bedfellows today. We had the majority of Senate Democrats teaming up with the forces of ego.

From the Orlando Sentinel:

Republican Sens. Alex Villalobos of Miami, Charlie Dean of Inverness, and Paula Dockery of Lakeland are joining with Democrats today to try and steer away millions of dollars intended to buy the 61-mile rail line from CSX Corp. for commuter rail.

I blogged about Sen. Dockery's possible motivation to go after the Central Florida Commuter Rail Project last month:

The state portion of the funding deal was negotiated with CSX while Jeb Bush was still governor. This is the same Jeb Bush who led the charge to get the bullet train proposal repealed from the Florida Constitution. This is where the forces of ego enter. The main proponent of the bullet train initiative was C.C. "Doc" Dockery of Lakeland. Dockery is married to State Sen. Paula Dockery, R-Lakeland, an opponent of the Orlando commuter rail project and the CSX proposal.

Sens. Alex Villalobos has his own reason enough to take a shot at the deal that Jeb did:

In Florida's meanest and most expensive state Senate race, Miami Sen. Alex Villalobos was reelected Tuesday night, overcoming the millions spent by third-party attack groups and the ire of Gov. Jeb Bush, who helped run a candidate against the moderate Republican.

So while it may be great fun to help the Republicans eat their young, this was not a very good vehicle to ride. The indirect target of the forces of ego was the Central Florida Commuter Rail Project. Opponents have painted the deal as a giant corporate welfare boondoggle - an easy target in this tight budget year.

But the Central Florida Commuter Rail Project in reality is a desperately needed green transportation solution for the folks in Central Florida.

There is a lot of controversy over the Central Florida Commuter Rail Project. However, there should be no controversy whatsoever that commuter rail transit is a progressive idea.

First of all, rail transportation is actually a green industry. Even our going green Governor, Charlie Crist, gets it right on his Florida Performs scorecard when he says:

Florida is also committed to planning for the future and to conserving energy by promoting the use of public transportation.

As much fun as it is to help the Republicans tear themselves apart, it can't really be very good politics to let the Republicans get to the left of the Dems on the environment now, can it?

Rail transportation is 3 times more fuel efficient than motor vehicles. On top of the fuel efficiency advantage, the EPA and the rail transportation industry continue to work together on reducing emissions from trains. Compare this to the auto industry's ongoing efforts to fight the CAFE standards.

Speaking of autos, if we are ever going to get people out of their cars, we are going to have to give them viable public transit options. Commuter rail is just such an option.

Finally, Democrats rightfully criticized the Republicans for raiding the affordable housing and other trust funds in previous years to make up budget shortfalls. Progressives pretty much give up the moral high ground on that front teaming up with the forces of ego to rob the transportation trust fund. That's not a progressive idea.

The good news is that this budget amendment failed. But progressives need to stick to their progressive values. Commuter rail is a progressive idea whose time has long since come for Florida. Let's not blow this chance to get this commuter rail project done. If this doesn't happen, Washington may not fund another like it for a generation.

FL-24 candidate Clint Curtis endorses Responsible Plan to End the War in Iraq

2008-04-04T13:23:00.006-04:00

As you know, a full-bore effort has commenced in the Florida blogosphere to introduce Democratic politicians and candidates to the Responsible Plan to End the War in Iraq. This comprehensive plan was spearheaded by Darcy Burner, Democratic candidate for Washington State's 8th District, and has gained national praise and attention, as well as a large number of additional endorsees.

I'm very pleased to announce that Clint Curtis, Democratic candidate for FL-24, is the first in the district to add his name as an endorsee. Even better, he did it before the Florida bloggers began their campaign! I've known Clint since 2006 when he first challenged Tom Feeney for the FL-24 seat and have supported him ever since. In addition, I've done a little bit of volunteer work for his campaign, primarily writing and commenting about him on blogs and telling everyone I meet why I think he's the best candidate for this seat. A few weeks ago, I emailed Clint about the Responsible Plan and asked him to carefully review it and consider an endorsement. He responded only a few days later to express his support.

Clint is extremely busy with fundraising, attending meetings of local Democratic clubs (including mine, the Five Cities Democratic Club), attending hearings on issues of great importance to the district (such as NASA's proposed new launch pad), and numerous other campaign-related activities. Yet, he's always been extremely quick to respond to my questions and suggestions. He's very much the type of person I'd want to represent me and all the residents of FL-24.

Kudos to Clint for his smart decision! If you are able, please consider a contribution to his campaign.

Clint Curtis for Congress
Clint's blog
Clint's ActBlue page
FL-24 Race Tracker Wiki

This post approved by ClintP, unofficial campaign mascot.

Welcoming Florida Speaks

2008-03-26T05:01:00.005-04:00

This is just a very quick post to welcome Florida Speaks to the Florida blogosphere. This is Kenneth Quinell's new blog on national, international and other issues of interest to Florida Progressives.

Kenneth is the President of the Florida Democratic Party Netroots Coalition and the blogfather of the the Florida Progressive Coalition.

Welcome, Florida Speaks.

FL-24: Clint Curtis' Statement on Proposed NASA Launch Site and Merritt Island National Wildlife Refuge

2008-03-22T10:17:00.003-04:00

[Hello! pattyp here, posting on behalf of Clint Curtis, Democratic candidate for the FL-24 district. I hope you will read and comment on Clint's statement on the proposed KSC launch pad and the Merritt Island National Wildlife Refuge. Clint will check in to the Daily Kos version of this diary during the day and respond to your comments. The photos in this diary were taken by me on a kayaking excursion at Merritt Island last summer. It's a beautiful place.]

Dear Friends,

As many of you know, one of my core issues is the preservation and empowerment of NASA, which I believe is not only healthy for Florida but the nation and the world. NASA represents everything that's great about the US - the spirit of discovery, the can-do, against-all-odds spirit that put us on the moon and beyond. But I am also concerned with protecting and preserving the incredible beauty of the great state of Florida.

I recently attended the NASA public hearings concerning the new Commercial Vertical Launch Complex proposal for Kennedy Space Center (KSC.) First and foremost, I want to point out that NASA is not the enemy here. NASA should be commended for its efforts to gain public input and also for its long record of working with community leaders and environmental interests over the years. That relationship has made Florida’s Space Coast what it is today: a truly beautiful place to live and one that adds greatly to our quality of life.

The Merritt Island National Wildlife Refuge and the Canaveral National Seashore (Playalinda Beach) not only provide a significant source of revenue to the community with their ability to attract tourists, they are both premier natural preserves with unparalleled natural beauty. The Wildlife Refuge should not be placed in the debatable plan for apportioned commercial development but should remain intact in its natural state for the enjoyment of successive generations.

Many at the public hearings were community leaders, business owners, and environmentalists who voiced opposition to the site #2 proposal and I want to echo that sentiment. Possible alternatives for the site #2 proposal might be converting abandoned Air Force launch sites or the refurbishing of unused launch sites at KSC. It just makes better sense to use existing facilities and infrastructure, such as roads and rail access, as well as the consideration of costs for this proposed project.

The resolution process for this complex issue should be one where all parties - governmental, environmental, and private - are involved in a collaborative effort to find a solution that fits the needs of all. The resolution of this issue is far too important to those involved to be handled in a routine, arbitrary political manner. With the possible loss of nearly 3,000 jobs due to the shuttle conversion, timing of this proposed project and its outcome is extremely important.

I would also like to point out that this is an issue which, I feel, demands the involvement of our elected congressional leaders. I did not see either Congressmen Dave Weldon or Tom Feeney, nor any of their staffers, at this meeting. One should ask them why they were not there. How can this issue not be important enough to merit their time?

Once I am elected to the House of Representatives, I will make issues of this nature a priority to ensure that these decisions are made with the interest of Florida’s Space Coast in mind, not just those in Washington DC.

Clint Curtis

Clint Curtis for Congress
Clint's blog
Clint's ActBlue page
FL-24 2008 Race Tracker Wiki

DiMaio v. Democratic National Committee:

2008-03-18T07:12:00.000-04:00

The Democratic National Committee is violating the equal protection clause of the 14th Amendment by allowing only four states to hold caucuses or primaries before the first Tuesday in February, a Florida attorney argued March 17, 2008 before a federal appeals court.

Attorney Michael Steinberg filed suit in August on behalf of Democratic Party activist Victor DiMaio. The suit came after the DNC said it would not seat Florida delegates at the national convention because the state party defied party rules and scheduled its primary for January 29.

Rail Road Job in Tallahassee - Forces of Ego Fight Commuter Rail

2008-03-16T13:15:00.010-04:00

It's the middle of March here in Florida. That means three things are going on: Spring Break, Spring Training Baseball and the Florida Legislature is in session. Spring Training Baseball has a long and honored tradition here. Spring Break, with all its warts, also has been responsible for a lifetime of fond feelings for Florida from people all over the country. Regular sessions of the Florida Legislature, on the other hand, usually make us glad they only meet for 60 days a year. As the old saw goes, when the legislature is in session, make sure you've got your hand on your wallet.

This year is a particularly tough yearfor the Florida Legislature. After failing to actually provide for meaningful property insurance and property tax reform last year, this year they are facing an enormous budget crisis.

So, while talks of budget cuts dominate the agenda, there is another huge battle for Florida's future going on largely in the background. This is a battle over whether Florida will actually move forward with 21st Century smart economic growth initiatives that feature environmentally sound growth management principles, or whether we will continue to follow the old, tired trends that have resulted in the unchecked urban sprawl that has made for fertile ground for the Hometown Democracy initiative. This is a battle that is only lacking the sex angle to put it right up there with Sunshine State as a great candidate for a thought provoking film.

The battle is over whether or not Orlando and Central Florida will finally get a commuter rail project after a 10 year effort. On one side, you have the Florida Department of Transportation (FDOT), the federal government and local officials in four central Florida counties and the City of Orlando, who have been working together in a model of intergovernmental cooperation. On the other side you have the forces of evil and ego.

The focus of the battle is ostensibly over the $491 million the FDOT has set aside to fund the state portion of the transaction. The deal includes the transfer of 61 miles of rail freight corridor running though east central Florida from CSX Railroad. It also includes CSX building a new Integrated Logistics Center in Winter Haven. The final piece of the deal is the refurbishment of a CSX line further to the west that will pick up the rail freight shifted off the eastern line to allow for the commuter rail project.

The state portion of the funding deal was negotiated with CSX while Jeb Bush was still governor. This is the same Jeb Bush who led the charge to get the bullet train proposal repealed from the Florida Constitution. This is where the forces of ego enter. The main proponent of the bullet train initiative was C.C. "Doc" Dockery of Lakeland. Dockery is married to State Sen. Paula Dockery, R-Lakeland, an opponent of the Orlando commuter rail project and the CSX proposal.

Sen. Dockery is using the idea that more freight traffic will be moving through downtown Lakeland as a result of Orlando getting commuter rail to try to kill the deal that Jeb made with CSX . In the process, she is putting her small minded ego ahead of the environment, the economy and the future of Florida so she can extract her revenge against Jeb.

The vehicle for this revenge killing of the central Florida commuter rail deal isS1666 This is a bill to codify an arrangement for liability coverage on the CSX line in the event of an accident on the commuter rail. All kinds of hysteria has been worked up about this arrangement. Really, though, this is merely a process issue that the lawyers will eventually figure out.

Waiting in the wings are the forces of evil, um, er, the road builders and their legislative lackeys. There have already been legislative grumblings about the cost of the deal, with suggestions that in this tight budget year, the money would be better spent on roads. If this kind of thinking is successful in killing the central Florida commuter rail project, it will become even more difficult for the Tampa Bay area to move forward with their commuter rail efforts.

And there you have it. The forces of evil and the forces of ego coming together in an attempt to kill commuter rail in central Florida. Because if you are always building roads, you'll never get rail.

FDP Floating Vote by Mail Plan

2008-03-12T23:34:00.004-04:00

The St. Petersburg Times is reporting that the Florida Democratic Party:

proposed a new vote-by-mail primary overseen by an independent commission.

I can't find a lot about the actual plan yet (nothing on the FDP's web site), but here's what I do know...

forethought has this diary with USA Today reporting:

The Florida Democratic Party plans to move forward with a June 3 vote-by-mail primary to restore the state's role in the presidential race

USA Today quotes the Florida Senate Minority Leader, State Senator Steve Geller as saying the plan will be announced Thursday or Friday.

I have seen an email from Florida DNC member Jon M. Ausman to FDP Chair Karen Thurman that starts out:

Karen,

Thank you very much for the Vote-by-Mail (VBM) proposal submitted by the Florida Democratic Party (FDP) on 12 March 2008.

So apparently something is up.

I have been reading some of the comments in forethoughts' diary. Those comments are really what prompted me to write this diary. Because one thing is very clear to me. Most people commenting on this have never even laid eyes on the 2008 DNC Delegate Selection Rules. So before anybody else says something about the Rules, maybe you ought to read them first.

First, make no mistake. Florida broke the rules. The Florida Democratic Party submitted a Delegate Selection Plan under Rule 1 D. However, that plan did not comply with Rule 11 A which precluded Florida from holding its "first determining stage in the presidential nomination process" before February 5th, 2008. The FDP Delegate Selection Plan was rejected by the DNC Rules and Bylaws Committee. However, the FDP has an open invitation to submit a plan that does comply with the Rules. That is what the FDP is attempting to do here. In the eyes of the DNC, this is not legally a "do over". That is because, per the DNC, Florida has not held a legal (that is within the DNC Rules) "first determining stage in the presidential nomination process".

Second, let's talk about state election laws. Or rather, let's not. Remember what we are doing here. We are not actually electing anyone to a State or Federal office. We are talking about a Party process. Remember, the St. Petersburg Times is reporting that the FDP

proposed a new vote-by-mail primary overseen by an independent commission.

So we are talking about a party process overseen by someone other than the State of Florida. Hard to see how state election laws apply here.

Full disclosure time. I support Senator Barack Obama. But I think his campaign is taking the wrong tack here. Talk of somebody sitting down and deciding how Florida's delegates should be divided is totally dismissive of the voices of Florida's Democratic voters. It is more than OK to be concerned about the details of how this plan will be executed. And the Devil is always in the details. But to say that some back room deal should be cooked up to seat Florida and Michigan delegations is like sitting in a room figuring out who to send invitations to a party to. It is not about enfranchising the voters of Florida.

To Senator Obama I say, come on down here and campaign. Bring that great get out the vote machine with you. Let Florida's Democrats really get to know you. You'll do fine. You might even win. And you will win in the long run by supporting the right of Florida's Democratic voters to have an actual say in who the party's nominee is going to be.

It will pay off for you in the fall when you are our Party's nominee.

FloriDuh Forever!

2008-02-26T11:52:00.004-05:00

America's Wang strikes a decisive blow for "heritage":

Lawmaker wants Confederate flag specialty plate in Fla.

Princess Sparkle Pony suggests a few more realistic designs.

Truth Nipped in the Bud

2008-02-09T22:26:00.000-05:00

There is a diary by nailbender up on DailyKos right now purporting to

dispel a talking point ... that the FL Democratic Party was bound by the decision of the GOP-controlled FL legislature and Governor to a January 29th date for the selection of Democratic Delegates.

This diary is being hailed as a

Great Diary with facts and info

Well, it's not a great diary. It does have some facts and info. But it does not have all the facts and it does not have all the info.

So, let's nip this in the bud....

Here is a document I am sure most of you have never seen. This document is the DNC Delegate Selection Rules for the 2008 Democratic National Convention. It is 27 pages long. And it is augmented by this document, which is the 36 page long Regulations of the Rules and By Laws Committee for the 2008 Democratic National Convention.

Now in the DNC Delegate Selection Rules, Rule 3A states the following:

All official Party meetings and events related to the national convention delegate selection process, including caucuses, conventions, committee meetings, filing dates, and Party enrollment periods, shall be scheduled for dates, times and public places which would be most likely to encourage the participation of all Democrats, and must begin and end at reasonable hours.

Rule 11A states, in relevant part:

No meetings, caucuses, conventions or primaries which constitute the first determining stage in the presidential nomination process (the date of the primary in primary states, and the date of the first tier caucus in caucus states) may be held prior to the first Tuesday in February or after the second Tuesday in June in the calendar year of the national convention.

It goes on to provide the exemptions for the four "early states" of Iowa, Nevada, New Hampshire and South Carolina.

But here we are at the heart of the problem, at least here in Florida. We had two different rules of the DNC Delegate Selection Rules brought into direct conflict with each other by the actions of the Republican controlled state legislature. Those are the facts. There is nothing to be nipped in the bud here.

The Florida Legislature is dominated by the GOP. It also has absolute authority to set the dates for presidential preference primary elections here in Florida. And the GOP has the votes in the Legislature to do exactly that - with or without the support of the votes of our Democratic legislators. And our legislature set the date for the Presidential Preference Primary as January 29th, in advance of the dates allowed by both the Democratic Party and the Republican Party.

Now, the Florida Democratic Party did not have to elect to use the January 29th Presidential Primary as the

first determining stage in the presidential nomination process

This is true. However, if it wanted to comply with Rule 3A it did. Because no other method available to it was seen as likely to achieve the "particpation of all Democratic voters" as a primary election would. And here is Florida, Democratic leaders were determined to encourage the "participation of all Democratic voters."

The DNC Rules and By Laws Committee, however, was obviously more concerned with compliance with Rule 11A which protects the right of Iowa and New Hampshire voters to go first than it was with encouraging the "participation of all Democratic voters" in Florida.

Now that's the truth of the matter.

Let's Get Ready to Rumble - Er, Caucus

2008-02-05T06:57:00.000-05:00

One week after nearly 1.75 million Florida Democrats went to the polls to voice their Presidential preference, the question of whether Florida Democrats will have an actual voice in the selection of our Party's nominee remains unsettled. Don't get me wrong here. I have said, and I firmly believe that Florida Dems' voices were heard loud and clear on January 29th. The Florida results are in and they are also into the psyche of the Tsunami Tuesday voters today. Florida's voice was heard by all those voters.

What really didn't get heard in Florida was the candidates voices. Due to that idiotic no campaign pledge foisted upon the candidates by the Democratic Party chars in the four early states, no candidate actually got to have their voices heard by Florida's Democratic voters.

But maybe there is a way to have our cake and eat it too, Florida. Follow along and I'll explain...

I don't want to spend too much time rehashing how we got into this mess, but laying a little of the groundwork here is instructive. The Republican dominated Florida Legislature has the sole power to set election dates in Florida. The Legislature chose January 29th, knowing it was in clear violation of the delegate selection rules laid out by both parties. The parties, in turn, are in charge of their actual delegate selection process. The Florida Democratic Party looked at their options and decided to stay with the plan to select their delegates according to the early primary results. The main reason for this decision was that a primary is the method that garners the most participation from voters. Very Democratic of us, no?

This plan was the one that was rejected by the Democratic National Committee, which stripped Florida of all of its delegates to the Democratic National Convention. That's what began the mess that we currently find ourselves in. OK, that was bad enough. But, even with no delegates at stake, the candidates could not possibly ignore the largest swing state in the country, could they?

This is where it really got ugly for Florida Democrats. The Democratic Party chairs of the four early states (Iowa, Nevada, New Hampshire and South Carolina) blackmailed the candidates into signing a pledge not to campaign in any state that violated Party rules by beginning its delegate selection process before the appointed date of February 5th. The candidates, fearing a backlash in these early states which they needed to garner momentum, all complied.

Thus Florida got to hold the strangest election I have ever seen. Florida gave an election party and nobody came - no candidates that is. The Democratic Party chairs in those four early states, jealous of their non god given prerogatives to be heard before anybody else, deprived Florida's voters of the opportunity to have the candidates come to them and make their case. That was fundamentally unfair to Florida's 3 million Democrats. But here is where it starts to get really interesting.

Senator Hillary Clinton, who won the largely name recognition contest that Florida's primary became, is now calling for the Florida delegates to be seated at the convention. Smart on her part. She would get the lions share of the delegates. Senator Barack Obama, not surprisingly, takes the opposite view. Smart on his part.

In today's St. Petersburg Times, Adam Smith is reporting:

Two prominent civil rights figures, former U.S. Civil Rights Commission chairwoman Mary Frances Berry and former Justice Department official Roger Wilkins, are calling on the DNC to straighten out the matter.
"We are suggesting that the decision be made before the convention in an effort to avoid a floor fight," they wrote in a letter released Monday. "Public floor fights have served the party badly in the past. They left deep-seated ill will and preceded Democratic Party defeats in 1968 and 1972, for example. Resolution of this issue is a matter of fairness, justice and practicality."

So let's be fair to everybody - both the voters and the candidates. Let's figure out a way to allow the candidates to come here and make their pitch to Florida's voters for the right to claim Florida's convention delegates.

Let's amend our delegate selection plan to allocate our delegates based on a caucus to be held in early April. There are no Democratic delegate selection contests scheduled between Mississippi on March 11th and Pennsylvania on April 22nd. This would allow the candidates to come here and campaign for Florida's votes and delegates. It would give Florida's voters a chance to hear the candidates for themselves and to make up their mind after getting a real chance to fully evaluate the candidates in a fair and open contest.

And as it is looking more and more likely that this campaign is going down to the wire, it would make Florida the center of the political universe - again.

Who says you can't have your cake and eat it too. Florida, let's get ready to rumble - er, caucus!

Florida Democratic Primary - Early Exit Poll

2008-01-29T15:16:00.000-05:00

Well, sort of. I went down to the polling place closest to my abode when the polls opened this morning. I went equipped with my CNN=Politics reporters' notebook (a bit of swag from the GOP YouTube debate here in St. Pete last November) and stationed myself in the nicely marked exit polling area. I was wearing my FDP State Convention T-shirt and when the precinct deputy came to shoo me back to the "free speech zone" away from the poll, I told her that I was there to do exit polling for the Florida Democratic Party. Believe it or not, it worked.

My polling place is a church in an old residential area adjacent to downtown St. Pete. D's outnumber R's in this precinct by 45 to 27%. Other registrations actually beat out Rs in this precinct at 28%. In the hour or so that I was in the exit polling area this morning, the turnout was D's-58%, Rs-37, Others-5%. Who says D's won't show up to vote becasue their votes won't count?

For some strange reason, I didn't feel comfortable exit polling folks on their Presidential Preference. Instead, I focused on Amendment 1 and the Democrats most important issue in making their Presidential Preference choice.

If it were up to this precinct's early morning voters, Amendment 1 would be going down to defeat in flames. The folks I interviewed were voting NO at a rate of 59 to 41%. Sorry Charlie.

What really surprised me was the range of issues that were imprtant to the Democrats in making their choice for our nominee. Of the 10 voters I talked to in any length, I only got one repeat most important issue - The economy. That got mentioned twice. Only one Democrat indicated they were "bummed out their vote wouldn't count." And yet she came to vote anyway. The other voters I spoke to listed these as their most important determining issue:

Who's not married to a former President
Iraq
Leadership
Women's Issues
Experience
Change
Integrity

I did ask the person who stated integrity who they had voted for. Their response - Senator Obama. One person first said economy, but quickly followed up with "and the war". I asked her who she voted for and her answer was Hillary.

So, this is certainly not an attempt at a complete exit poll. But I just wanted to get a feel for the mood of the voters. I went back by that polling place earlier this afternoon. Some very stalwart Dem friends of mine were still there getting candidate petitions signed. They indicated that the turnout in our precinct had been steady and strong. That really heartens me for the mood of our Democratic voters. We just have to keep that buzz going through November's elections.

FDP Netroots Coalition: The Website!

2008-01-28T19:46:00.000-05:00

Announcing the newest website in the progressive arsenal - The Florida Democratic Party Netroots Coalition . This is:

the official web site of the Florida Democratic Party Netroots Coalition. We're trying to bring together the Democratic Party and the progressive Netroots in Florida.

We're here to assist you. If you need assistance with any online activity, contact us and we'll see what we can do help out.

We're here to support DECs, clubs, candidates, and activists who are interested in helping promote the Democratic Party agenda. Of course, we need your help as well, so if you can, help us out by joining us or donating to our cause, so we can afford to promote the online Democratic community and train people in the use of online resources.

The Florida Democratic Party Netroots Coalition, was officially born at the Florida Democratic Party State Convention last October. The mission of the FDP Netroots Coalition is:

to contribute to the growth and influence of the Democratic Party, to establish and maintain a Democratic online community, and to promote the party and all party candidates for Democratic leadership throughout the state and nation. We also seek to assist and encourage Florida Democrats, including clubs, county, and grassroots organizations to get online and establish a communication network and promote online participation among Democrats.

The FDP Netroots Coalition is ably led by our President, Kenneth Quinell.

Ted Deutch Campaigning to Get Dem Candidates Here

2008-01-22T13:50:00.000-05:00

Yesterday, I reported on State Senator Ted Deutch's letter to the four early state Democratic Party Chairs asking them to release our candidates from the Pledge not to campaign in Florida once the South Carolina Primary is over on Saturday.

Today there is word of a grassroots campaign by Senator Deutch to persuade the four early state chairs to release the candidates from the Pledge after South Carolina. This is from an email sent from Senator Deutch:

My Fellow Democrats -

Each one of you already knows how important it is for Florida Democrats to cast their votes on January 29th. The eyes of the world will be on Florida, and the national media will report that a strong Democratic turnout bodes well for our Democratic nominee here in November. But wouldn't a two-day burst of campaigning help generate even more excitement before this important primary election?...

Please ... reach out to the party officials at the addresses below to remind them that after South Carolina , the pledge should end. Their OK will give us two days of campaigning, two days to drive voter turnout in the largest and most diverse swing state, and two days to remind all Floridians how important it is to elect a Democrat in November.

Senator Deutch goes on to give the email addresses of the parties of the four early primary states. As a public service, here they are:

New Hampshire Democratic Party
office@nhdp.org
press@nhdp.org

Nevada Democratic Party
jderby9@gmail.com
tbrock@nvdems.com

Iowa Democratic Party
mmilligan@iowademoc rats.org
iadem@iowademocrats.org

South Carolina Democratic Party
jwerner@scdp.org
info@scdp.org

Senator Deutch closes his letter as follows:

Please help make this effort a grassroots success.
Your leadership in asking others to help is vital to bringing us the campaign rallies which will generate the record turnout that this election should produce!

Many thanks,

Ted Deutch

SENATOR TED DEUTCH
FLORIDA STATE SENATE
30th District
15340 Jog Road, Suite 201
Delray Beach, Florida 33446-2170

So there you have it. This is your chance to let the Democratic parties in the four early states know how you feel about the no campaign pledge. And if you want to drop Senator Ted Deutch a line to thank him for his efforts on our behalf, you can do so here:

senatorteddeutch@yahoo.com

Enjoy!

Will the Florida No Campaign Pledge Be Lifted (or Broken)?

2008-01-21T17:18:00.000-05:00

cn1044 has a diary up on DailyKos titled Florida might be getting interesting detailing how Senator Barack Obama has purchased national cable ads that are now running in Florida. Senator Hillary Clinton's campaign calls this

a clear and blatant violation of the early state pledge that Sen. Obama and the other leading Democratic candidates signed last year.

Meanwhile, Florida State Senator Ted Deutch has written a letter to the four early state Democratic Party Chairs asking them to release the leading Democratic candidates from their pledge not to campaign in Florida.

Could Florida become more relevant all of a sudden? And what can all this mean?

On Thursday, Florida State Senator Ted Deutch sent a letter to the Democratic Party Chairs of Iowa, New Hampshire, Nevada and South Carolina. The letter asks the Chairs of the four early states to release the Democratic candidates from their pledge not to campaign in Florida before February 5th. Florida's primary is scheduled for January 29th, 3 days after the last of the four early primaries in South Carolina on the 26th. Senator Deutch's letter states

On January 26th when the polls close in South Carolina, the goals you established in September when you asked the candidates to sign the Pledge will have been fully satisfied, and there will be no compelling reason for you to ask the candidates to continue to abide by the Pledge.

For five months, the candidates will have concentrated their attention on your four states. Allow Florida to have two days.

No word yet if Senator Deutch has received any responses from the four state party chairs.

Today, the St. Petersburg Times Buzz Blog is reporting here that the Clinton campaign is criticizing the Obama campaign because

CNN viewers in Florida today are seeing a Barack Obama campaign ad, which is part of a national cable TV buy.

The Clinton campaign is quoted as saying

Sen. Obama’s flagrant disregard for the pledge that he signed is disturbing and calls the integrity of the pledge into question.

Obama's campaign tell the Times:

We asked the cable channels if we could prevent the ad from airing in Florida and we were told that would be impossible.

Meanwhile, Politico.com's Ben Smith is reporting this:

“Both national cable networks told us it would be impossible for us to run advertising nationally that excluded only Florida. For that reason we consulted with the South Carolina Democratic Party Chair Carol Fowler who told us unequivocally she did not consider this to be in violation of pledge made to the early states,” said Obama spokesman Bill Burton.

So, is this a sign that the early states might look favorably upon Senator Deutch's request to release the candidates from the pledge after South Carolina's primary? Will the Clinton campaign consider the pledge broken and launch their own national cable ads that will air in Florida?

Stay tuned.

Update:

Politico is now reporting this form Clinton campaign spokesperson Mo Elleithee:

“We have honored the pledge in every way possible,” Elleithee said. “Now … we’re going to review all the options that are available to us moving forward.”

I'm Voting Today

2008-01-15T06:08:00.000-05:00

Early voting for the Florida Presidential Primary started yesterday. I am going to do what has become my tradition. I am going to vote today, on the second day of early voting. I know my friend Alonewolf would want me to change this tradition and vote by mail, and he is more than probably right. But there is just something for me about going to a polling place to cast my ballot.

And of course, here in Florida there has been all this talk back and forth about whether or not my vote will even count. Well, it counts enough for me to get myself to the Supervisor of Elections office in downtown St. Petersburg to cast my ballot for...

John Edwards, because he speaks directly to me on the kind of things our next President will need to do to take back our country and to begin to repair all the damage that has been done by Bush & Co. I want somebody who is going to fight for me. I want someone who understands that when Republicans talk about compromise and bipartisanship, what they are really talking about is you having to give in to them. These people never compromise their positions. They always expect you to compromise yours. John Edwards understands that. He speaks directly to my values and has earned my vote.

So that's me. What about you? Are you going to let some talking head pundit tell you that your vote doesn't count, so don't bother? Please do not listen to that bull. We are having an election in Florida. The results will be tallied. The winners and losers will be known. And all of this is going to happen one week before Tsunami Tuesday when all those other states vote. The Florida results will undoubtedly have an influence on the outcomes in those states. That's what going early is really all about. It is not about delegates. The candidates did not spend all those millions in New Hampshire to get 9 delegates, the number that both Sen. Clinton and Sen. Obama received there. They did it because New Hampshire goes early and its results influence the outcome in all the other states that follow. It will be the same for Florida, only more so.

And what about our independent friends? Florida does have a closed primary system, so they will not be able to vote in our Presidential Preference Primaries. However, we do have a very important state constitutional amendment on the ballot this election on which independents can vote. The so called property tax reform, Amendment 1, is a very weak attempt at reform of our property tax system. In fact, this is not so much reform as it is pandering to homestead property owners.

Homestead property owners have been very well protected by the wildly successful Save Our Homes amendment which caps increases in taxable values of homesteads at 3% per year. This has protected homesteaders from the tax impact of the rampant run up in property values in recent years. Yet almost all of the benefits of this "reform" are directed at them. Small business owners and renters do not have this protection, yet they are getting basically none of the "relief" in this amendment. And this "relief" only amounts to $240 per year for the average Florida homeowner. This amount, while small individually, is large in the aggregate and will have very damaging impacts on the ability of local governments and school boards to deliver to us the services that we want. For these reasons, I am voting No on 1. Sorry, Charlie (Crist, our Republican Governor and a big backer of Amendment 1).

Strangely enough with a property tax cutting amendment on the statewide ballot, we are asking the voters in Pinellas County to keep a tax increase on themselves. Four years ago, voters in my county approved a small increase in their school property taxes. This tax was pledged to go mainly to increased teacher salaries, to keeping arts programs in the schools and to adding technology for our students. The proposal passed overwhelmingly four years ago with well over 60% of the vote. However, our Republican legislature will only allow us to choose to tax ourselves for four years at a time. Thus the measure is back on the ballot for renewal.

This program has been wildly successful. There is an independent citizen oversight committee that ensures that this money is, in fact, going where it is supposed to go. And it is. Our teacher salaries have been able to be increased to the point that we have a regionally competitive advantage in recruiting. We have more arts and music programs than we had four years ago. And we now have computer labs in every high school in the County. I am going to vote to keep this program going. (This is also another measure on the ballot that independents can vote for.)

So, as the Florida Democratic Party has asked, I am going out today to "Make it Count!" I can't wait to put that "I Voted" sticker on. I hope all my fellow Floridians will do the same on or before January 29th. You'll be glad you did.

Nine Florida candidates among DFA's Grassroots All-Stars

2008-01-14T22:26:00.000-05:00

Democracy for America's 2008 Grassroots All-Stars vote is underway, and I was thrilled to find nine candidates from Florida in the running, including my personal favorite, Clint Curtis! You may already know Clint as the election integrity advocate who challenged Tom Feeney (R-Abramoff) for the FL-24 seat in 2006. And there's great news - Clint just received the endorsement of the local Progressive Democrats of America (PDA). Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington (CREW) regularly honors Mr. Feeney as one of the 22 most corrupt members of Congress.

Clint is taking on Feeney again this year, and in addition, must defeat two other Democratic challengers in the primary: Suzanne Kosmas, a former Florida state representative and realtor in New Smyrna Beach, and Gaurav Bhola, a business development specialist with no public service experience.

Make no mistake - Clint is the true grassroots candidate, and his success in the DFA All-Star competition will provide a tremendous boost to his campaign and help him kick "Teflon Tom" Feeney to the curb.

Therefore, I humbly ask that you vote for Clint as one of DFA's 2008 All-Stars. And I'll totally be your best friend and everything!

Our friend Christine Jennings (FL-13) is also in the running. Ms. Jennings hardly needs an introduction here, as it's impossible to forget the debacle that was the 2006 FL-13 election, in which 18,000 votes went mysteriously unregistered. Ms. Jennings is not giving up, though, and she has been endorsed by EMILY'S List. FL-13 is currently held by Vern Buchanan, who was seated by the Florida legislature despite the lack of resolution on the vote irregularity issue.

As I reviewed the other Florida candidates, I was especially pleased that two of them put the environment high up on their priorities lists. Stephen Blythe (FL-15), is a lifelong environmentalist and Sierra Club member. Florida's natural bounties are increasingly under threat from overdevelopment, poor land use planning, and climate change, and we need representatives in Congress who will fight to protect them and all of America's environmental treasures. Dr. Blythe is also a physician, and must know firsthand the struggles uninsured patients contend with; he supports a national health care plan. Dr. Blythe is challenging Republican incumbent Dave Weldon.

Next up is Corbett Kroehler for FL-08, currently held by Ric Keller. Mr. Kroehler is a member of his local Nature Conservancy chapter, as well the local Sierra Club chapter, for which he serves as Chairman of Energy Issues on the Executive Committee. He's studied climate change thoroughly and understands the dangers faced by everyone on Earth if we don't act quickly to curb it. Mr. Kroehler has also been endorsed by the Greater Orlando PDA.

Other Florida DFA All-Star candidates include:

Lawrence Byrnes in FL-14
Bill Mitchell in FL-09
Samm Simpson in FL-10
Mike Smith and Quoc Van, both in FL-08. (Lots of folks sure seem to want to get rid of Ric Keller!)

Although I didn't elaborate on some of the candidates, this in no way means I don't think they're worthy. I just wanted to focus on the particular ones who matter most to me: Clint Curtis, because I live in FL-24; Christine Jennings, because of Kossacks' outrage over the FL-13 voting problem; Dr. Blythe and Mr. Kroehler due to their strong environmental focus, which is also my top concern. I trust all of you to research the other potential All-Stars and decide which three are most deserving.

As long as you make one of them Clint Curtis! ;-)

Why Vote: To Take Our Country Back

2008-01-12T21:34:00.000-05:00

I just got done reading this diary and comments on DailyKos titled Admirers of Constitution Booted for Wearing Impeach T-shirts in DC. This diary chronicles something that happened today, something I would have thought impossible in the United States of America:

With the original First Amendment "Freedom of Speech" looking on, admirers of the U.S. Constitution in the Washington D.C. National Archives Building today were ordered to leave for wearing tee-shirts reading "Impeach Bush and Cheney."

The only thing I could think of to add to the comments was this:

This is just another reminder of why it is so important to elect a Democrat President this year. We have GOT to take our country back from those people.

But then I got to thinking, this is why we need to vote in the Florida Presidential Primary on January 29th. We do have to take our country back. Some folks being told they have to leave the National Archives building because their T-shirts bothered the rent a cops seems like a rather trivial thing. But something like this should never happen in our country.

However, many things that should never have happened in this country have happened in the past seven years. The current administration has:

Ignored the threat from Osama bin Laden and then was surprised when 9/11 happened.
Failed to finish the job against bin Laden in Afghanistan, thus allowing him to regroup and remain dangerous today.
Lied us into a war in Iraq for their own political purposes.
Wiretapped us without warrants.
Employed torture against captured enemies.
Thrown away habeas corpus.
Allowed political hacks to over rule scientists.
Robbed our national treasury with no bid contracts to their corporate cronies that are then fraught with fraud.
Allowed the creation of private armies (a la Blackwater)
All but broken our military with this endless war in Iraq.

And I'm sure you all can add many, many more items to this list.

None of the current crop of viable Republican candidates repudiates any of this. In fact, most of them fully embrace all of this list. And in a few short days, most of them will be running around all over our state spouting their own brand of nonsense. Meanwhile, our Democratic candidates will not be here. Well, maybe not until January 27th, anyway (the day after the South Carolina Democratic primary).

So we Dems have had a little intra party squabble about moving the primary up. What is that in comparison to the importance of putting an end to the atrocities listed above? We all need to get out and vote for the primary candidate of our choice. We need to show the Republicans, and more importantly, the independents in this state, that we Democrats are going to be fighting hard here in Florida.

So get out and vote, Democrats. Let's show that we are going to fight hard here in Florida to take our country back!

Mole's Focus on Florida

2008-01-05T14:22:00.000-05:00

Mole's Progressive Democrat has a Florida Focus today. Actually, it is a pretty impressive list of upcoming Democratic events in Florida. Not bad for a New Yorker.

Thanks, Mole.

Busansky Considering Supervisor Race

2008-01-05T09:14:00.000-05:00

TBO's March on Politics is reporting that Phyllis Busansky, former Hillsborough Commissioner and recent Congressional candidate is considering a run for Hillsborough County Supervisor of Elections. Windy March quotes Phyllis

“The issue is competence and integrity,” she said. “Our elections office makes me fearful. People need to have faith in our votes.”

Buddy Johnson has made misstep after misstep in that job. It is important for Hillsborough Democrats to field as strong a candidate as possible for this very important position.Having just run for Congress last cycle, Phyllis certainly has the name recognition. And her long experience in civic affairs gives her the credibility to make her a very strong candidate indeed.

This is good news for Hillsborough Dems.

The Answer to Partisan Gridlock

2007-12-31T14:45:00.000-05:00

We've been seeing a lot of crap about bipartisanship lately. There's going to be a meeting next week

challenging the major-party contenders to spell out their plans for forming a "government of national unity" to end the gridlock in Washington.

Well, I have an answer to partisan gridlock, and it ain't a "government of national unity".

Follow me below the fold for the surprisingly simple answer...

The answer to partisan gridlock is pretty simple, really. Here it is:

ELECT MORE DEMOCRATS!

It's really not any more complicated than that. The Republicans certainly have not been looking to take the bipartisan road to solving our nation's problems. Consider this from the New York Times:

Now Republicans are in the minority, and they have been using skills honed while they were in charge, throwing up procedural roadblocks, forcing vulnerable Democrats to take difficult votes and just generally harrying members of the majority

does that sound bipartisan to you?

Matt Stoller also does a good job illustrating

what this bipartisanship is really about is undermining the public's ability to participate in policy-making.

Matt uses the famous 2003 $87 billion Iraq supplemental vote to make his point. Even though the public overwhelmingly opposed this funding, Congress , in a show of bipartisanship, passed this measure with huge, bipartisan majorities. This despite the fact that the public opposed the measure by a margin of 64% to 34% - 30 points!

In March of this year, The Pew Research Center for the People and the Press released Trends in Political Values and Core Attitudes: 1987-2007. The subheading for this report:

Political Landscape More Favorable To Democrats

On issue after issue, the trend of the American electorate is more and more progressive. This caused the good folks at Pew to write:

Increased public support for the social safety net, signs of growing public concern about income inequality, and a diminished appetite for assertive national security policies have improved the political landscape for the Democrats as the 2008 presidential campaign gets underway.

Even more striking than the changes in some core political and social values is the dramatic shift in party identification that has occurred during the past five years... Today, half of the public (50%) either identifies as a Democrat or says they lean to the Democratic Party, compared with 35% who align with the GOP.

The American electorate wants the government to work to solve the problems that face our country today. And they see progressive solutions as the way to to this. In order to give the American people what they want, we need more Dems in Congress and particularly in the Senate where it has become necessary to get 60 votes to move legislation forward. And we need a Democratic President to sign progressive legislative solutions into law instead of vetoing them.

To undo the damage that George W Bush and the Roadblock Republicans have done to this country, we don't need bipartisanship. We need more Democrats.

And when we give the Democrats the ball, they are going to need to run with it!

2007-12-31T14:43:00.000-05:00

Looking Forward to 2008

2007-12-28T18:53:00.000-05:00

Since I did my look back at 2007 at Thanksgiving, as we enter this long New Year's weekend, I am looking forward to 2008. Man, am I ever!

First off, 2008 brings us the campaign to replace George W. Bush in the White House. It can't come a moment too soon for me. And it really does get out the gate right away with the Iowa Caucuses on January 3rd. Florida finally gets to weigh in when it still matters on January 29th. With all the controversy over going early, we are in a unique position to set the table for Super Duper Tuesday, one week later on February 5th. We could very well know who the nominees for both sides are going to be by the time the smoke clears that night. Or maybe not.

On the Democratic side, I think we have a much better chance of having our nominee decided on February 5th. MSNBC just showed a poll of Iowa Dems showing a literal dead heat with Edwards and Obama tied at 29% each with Clinton right behind at 28%. The winner in Iowa is likely to be propelled to victory from the momentum of an Iowa win. If it's Edwards that's a little less certain, but if it is either Obama or Clinton, my money would be that the winner there becomes the presumptive nominee on the night of February 5th.

The Republicans are much more muddled, but it really doesn't matter much. The Republican field is a slate of midgets compared to any one of the Dems, with the exception of John McCain, (who, believe it or not, is still in this thing) and he's the past, not the future.

The economy is likely to continue to go south through much of 2008 and that only helps the Dem nominee as the voters see us as much better on the bread and butter issues than the Republicans. And any kind of terrorist or other foreign policy "surprise" (October or otherwise) can easily be shown to remind people that after 8 years of Republican "leadership", their efforts have failed to make us safer. Even allowing for our Democratic propensity to screw things up, I just can't see any one of the Goper candidates actually defeating any one of our three top Dems in 2008.

In Congress, I see the same dynamics lifting Dems to big victories in both the House and the Senate. Everything that applies to the Presidential race applies to the congressional races. The lineup of open seats heavily favors the Dems. And, surprise of all surprises, the Democratic Campaign Committees in both the House and the Senate are kicking the crap out of their GOP counterparts in the money raised department.

In Florida, the only Dem who is even threatened is Tim Mahoney in FL-16. However, the Gopers are going to have a nasty primary fight and the winner will be broke coming out of that mess. Mahoney will be there waiting and sitting on north of $2 million. I just don't see him getting beat.

Christine Jennings has an excellent chance to defeat Vern Buchanan in FL-13 (again). CQ Politics has FL-8, FL-15 and FL-24 as Republican favored, but we've got a good chance to pick up one or even two of those seats as we have excellent candidates in FL-8 and FL-24. On top of that, I'm predicting a Democratic surprise victory or perhaps even two. In total, we could pick up as many as 4 House seats in Florida.

In the Florida Legislature, the rising tide is likely going to do nothing but help lift Dem candidates all up and down the ticket all over the state. Here in the Tampa Bay area, where we did so well in 2006, our best chance to pick up at least one more state House seat is with Carl Zimmerman in HD-48. Carl faces first termer Peter Nehr who he came oh so close to beating in 2006.

As far as I'm concerned, 2008 can't get here soon enough. Neither, for that matter, can January 20th, 2009.

Happy New Year!

Christmas Wish for Florida Kossacks

2007-12-22T00:15:00.000-05:00

In this season of peace and good will, I wish you peace. Peace for you and yours, and peace for our country.

Unfortunately, we will not be getting peace until January 20, 2009. And for that we must work our tails off to make sure that we elect Democrats. We need to elect a Democratic President. We need to elect as many more Democrats in the US Senate as we possibly can. And we need to elect more Democrats to the US House of Representatives.

But for this holiday season, let's just all enjoy our family and friends. And in the spirit of the season, let's all try to love our neighbor as we love ourselves.

Small Biz Likes Hillary, But

2007-11-27T18:21:00.000-05:00

Last Friday, masslib posted this diary titled "Hillary Favored by Small Business Leaders". masslib had picked up this story about MarketTools Inc.'s Zoomerang online survey of small business leaders. And the diary was quite right that Hillary Clinton was favored for President by 22% of the survey respondents with Rudy Giuliani coming in second at 17%. That diary drew quite a number of comments (90 as of this writing).

However, I found the press release on the Inc.-Zoomerang Entrepreneurial Report. And to my mind, there is much bigger news in this report than the fact that Hillary is first choice of 22% of the survey respondents.

How can that be, you say? Follow me below the jump...

Some of you of you may remember that I have advocated before that small business leaders are a constituency for the taking for Democratic candidates. In my diary last year, How to Talk to Small Business People , I wrote:

Small Business People also vote overwhelmingly Republican. They are mistaken in their understanding of what the Republican Party stands for (by its deeds, not by its words).

Well, this survey indicates that small business people are finally getting it! Here is the subtitle to the aforementioned Zoomerang press release: Independent Voters and Health Care
Put Republicans at Risk of Losing Traditionally Loyal Constituency
In fact, the survey numbers show Republicans and Democrats in a dead heat for the votes of small business leaders. Considering that a US Chamber of Commerce survey taken in the lead-up to the 2004 election found that

77% of small businesses said that re-electing President George W. Bush would have a positive impact on their businesses

running neck and neck with the Republicans at this stage is huge.

But the news for Democrats gets better yet. This constituency is there for the taking. All they need is someone to talk to them. Again from the Inc.-Zoomerang Entrepreneurial Report:

85 percent believe that the current crop of presidential candidates do not focus enough on their issues.

and

80 percent of the business leaders surveyed feel that government doesn’t do enough to help growing business and is more focused on big business.

Small business people are finally getting it. They now are starting to understand that the Republican Party is and always has been the party of big business, not small business. Here's another tidbit from the survey that is very enlightening - 71% of small business leaders surveyed believe that aggressive corporate lobbying hurts competition.

Democratic candidates need to speak directly to the concerns of these small business leaders. Look at this from the Inc.-Zoomerang press release:

In another surprising turnaround, the report shows that this traditionally anti-tax and anti-regulatory constituency today chooses health care as the number one issue impacting their vote. A majority, 57 percent, say that a regulated health care system would be good for growing businesses.

Now there's an issue that belongs to the Democrats if there ever was one.

Gators - Noles - Voter Turnout?

2007-11-24T09:06:00.000-05:00

Today is the day the Florida legislature wrought - the annual UF - FSU football game. Back in the day when FSU was recovering from its start in life as the Florida State College for Women, The University of Florida had no interest in engaging the FSU upstarts on the gridiron. It actually took the threat of a legislative mandate for the Gators to agree to play the girls school. But what a rivalry it has become!

Ok having got that out of the way, what in the heck does that have to do with voter turnout? Well, people are going to turn out in droves for the game today. Florida Field will be jammed to the rafters with well over 90,000 in the stands. The bars will be packed with Noles and Gator fans cheering for their teams. And the number of game day parties are literally too numerous to count. And all for a football game? Well, yeah.

The game will be played, one team will win and secure the bragging rights for the year. But other than that, will the game really affect your life all that much? Answer - no, not really.

But how about the impact of the next person to reside at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue? Or the next Member of Congress from the _ _ District of Florida? Or the next state legislator or Governor? How do we get people as fired up for these things that truly make a difference in our lives as they do for the big game?

That may actually be the answer - convincing potential voters that they can make a difference. You would think that it wouldn't be that hard to do in Florida, of all places. After all, just seven years ago, 537 votes made all the difference in the world. Yet we still get elections like the recent special election for the state House where only 3.5% of the registered voters in Broward County bothered to vote. Or the recent City Council elections in St. Petersburg where we got a whopping 11% voter turnout. And those are just the registered voters. Who knows what a miserable number it would be if we were measuring all potentially eligible voters?

Well, I'll tell you it doesn't help when we get quotes like this:

"She's relentless and she knows Iowa," Davis said. "She's terrific at organizing volunteers and building grass roots. In a state like Iowa, that's important. Florida is more of a TV state where field operations don't matter as much."

That was Jim Davis talking about his campaign manager, Jennifer O'Malley, who is now John Edwards State Director in Iowa. Well, you know I love ya Jim, but those kind of quotes don't help us much. Field operations always matter. And to my way of thinking, they actually matter more in Florida than they do in Iowa. That's because everybody gets it in Iowa and they go all out on their ground game. Here, the team with the better ground game stands a much better chance of winning.

Even Joe Biden, who's campaign manager used to be the Executive Director of the FDP doesn't get it:

"You can't campaign like this in Florida," said Sen. Joe Biden of Delaware. "What do you have, 17-million people? In the last two years, I will have probably met with 60,000 Iowans who plan to caucus. Only in a small state can you do that."

Well, sure you can, Joe. You just need to turn as many of those 60,000 folks as you can into volunteers for you. You don't do it because you don't try. And if you don't try, you don't win.

I assure you, those young men on the field in Gainesville today will be trying.

How to Run a Primary Campaign Without the Candidates

2007-11-22T11:56:00.000-05:00

OK, it's Thanksgiving and football games haven't started yet, so I've got a couple minutes on my hands. Let me pose this question: How do we run presidential primary campaigns here in Florida without the candidates?

Florida's presidential preference primary will be held on January 29th. That's just 67 days away. And it will be one week before Super Duper Tuesday on February 5th when so many other states are going to vote. So Florida's voice will have influence this cycle.

The question becomes, how do we begin to make this a fair contest in Florida if the candidates can't campaign here?

This diary is not about all the silliness that has brought us to this point. This diary really is about how do supporters of the various candidates actually mount campaigns without the overt presence of the campaigns and the candidates?

Since we are going to go before Super Duper Tuesday, and our results will be all over the media for that week, what are we going to do to make sure that the voters get a chance to really know the candidates before they go into the voting booth?

You will notice that so far this diary is full of questions and not any answers. I really don't purport to have the answers and I want to hear from y'all. I do have the thought that as members of the Florida blogosphere community and with our commitment to Blog Florida Blue, that we ought to be thinking about how to make that happen.

And we better do it quickly.

Giving Thanks for a Wonderful Year

2007-11-19T22:14:00.000-05:00

Yes, Thanksgiving is almost upon us. Thanksgiving is a wonderful time of year to reflect on all that we have to be thankful for. I am thankful for many things, including the past year (almost) that Florida Kossacks has been in existence. So, I thought I'd get a jump start on the New Year's look back posts and do mine now at Thanksgiving and as we approach the one year anniversary of the Florida Kossacks blog.

It all started on November 28, 2006 my __th birthday. And as the first post said:

We can blame this whole thing on Susan S. She thought a Tampa Bay Kossack email list would be a good thing to put together after the election. I thought that was such a good idea that I have been trying to expand it across Florida.

Maybe that is why Susan S was named Netroots Activist of the Year? Well, probably not the only reason.

Before November 2006 was out, we went on to blog about the FL-13 Re-Vote Rally and the word on the street about Florida moving up it's Presidential Preference Primary. Have we been talking about that for a whole year?

Tally kicked off December 2006 with a couple of extremely thoughtful posts titled The Future and The Plan. Tally, where ya been buddy? We miss ya.

December went on the bring the start of my "How to Talk to" series. (I need to get back to that.) The series in December included How to Talk to Fear Mongers, How to Talk to the Main Stream Media and How to Talk to Small Business People. More on small business people in the very near future. Stay tuned.

December ended with a couple of very silly predictions posts here and here. At least I got the things about the Florida Gators winning national championships and Al Gore winning the Oscar right.

As this year started, I blogged about taking local action. We also had the special election in HD-3, which Tally blogged here and here. We lost that special election because we did not get our vote out. This caused me to write about one of my really pet peeves in What Every So Called Political Professional Needs to Know .

In March we got a significant victory as Mary Mulhern was elected to the Tampa City Council, defeating an incumbent Republican. And if you don't do anything else, check out the video of Mitch Kates at the Mulhern victory party. If that doesn't get you fired up, I don't know what will.

And of course in the spring we also had the regular session of the Florida Legislature. There was a lot of talk, but no action, on property taxes at this session. Seems this is something else we are still talking about. We did get paper ballots and the beginning of the messy debate about moving up the presidential preference primary.

It was in early May, however, that what I feel is the most significant piece of the year was posted on this blog. Blog Florida Blue starts out like this:

Last week, representatives from the Florida Progressive Coalition , Florida Netroots and Florida Kossacks held a conference call with staff from the Florida Democratic Party. The topic of the call was upcoming opportunities for bloggers to interact with the FDP, particularly at the Jefferson Jackson dinner in June and at the FDP Convention in October.

It wasn't the post, really, that was significant as it was the meeting and what came out of it. Meowmissy had gotten a ball rolling that resulted in the Bloggers / Netroots Luncheon at the FDP's Jefferson Jackson weekend in June, the Netroots Conference at the FDP Convention in October and the formation and official induction of the FDP Netroots Coalition as an official part of the Florida Democratic Party! And of course, we came up with this wonderful logo

for good measure.

We just came off local elections here in St. Petersburg (see, we're still talking about property taxes) and we are looking intently at the polls for the Florida Presidential Preference Primary on January 29th (still talking about that too.) But I just want to say that I am really thankful for all the new great Democrats I met this year, both online and off. I am really thankful for all the great Democrats I knew before this year as well. I am thankful that , together, we have the opportunity to make a real difference in the elections next year and if we do continue to work together, we will make that difference.

Happy Thanksgiving!

Latest Florida Mason-Dixon Poll

2007-11-19T16:59:00.000-05:00

The latest Mason-Dixon poll has the top tier Republican presidential candidates beating Hillary Clinton in the Florida general ection.

Giuliani - 50
Clinton - 43

Romney - 46
Clinton - 45

Thompson - 48
Clinton - 44

The poll shows one in five voters will not vote for a Democrat because of the candidate boycott and the DNC stripping Florida of delegates. Ouch.

Capitol Idea

2007-11-15T13:17:00.000-05:00

The Republican Presidential hopefuls are going to be at the Mahaffey Theater in St. Petrsburg on Thursday, November 28th. They may alternatively make you mad, sad, glad (that this is the best the Gopers could come up with ) or sick. Who knows, they might even make you laugh.

But, if you want to be at the Mahaffey Theater in St. Petersburg and surely laugh, then the night you want to be there is December 3rd. That's when the Capitol Steps will be performing. This is the song and dance troupe made up of Capitol Hill staffers and they are a hoot! No subject is taboo for them and they take everybody and anybody on in a satirical, lyrical way.

Here's all the pertinent info:

People from Washington who actually mean to be funny!

Capitol StepsPolitical Satire at its Finest
presented by Suncoast Tiger Bay Club
Monday, December 3, 7:40 PM
Mahaffey Theater at Progress Energy Center for Performing Arts
400 First ST S, St. Petersburg
Tickets $25, $30 and $35
Charge by phone 727-898-2100, buy online at www.ticketmaster.com,
or available at the Box Office
For more info: www.tigerbay.org

Jeer on the GOP Presidential Hopefuls

2007-11-13T10:09:00.000-05:00

This just in from the Pinellas DEC:

Protest Rally in St Peterburg's Pioneer Park - If you saw the St. Pete Times yesterday you would see that the local Republican Party will be hosting a 'pep rally' outside of the UTube Debates on November 28th. However, what you did not read is that many people who oppose the Republican party and its agenda will be rallying at Pioneer Park on this same day. Unlike our Repulican counterparts, you can vote in a straw poll and it WON'T cost you a penny. Many groups will be represented at this rally.

If you are interested in joining us, please let us know. office@pinellasdemocrats.com

Local Elected Officials - Please Stand Up

2007-11-12T19:12:00.000-05:00

This past week has given us some important pieces of information about the voter mind set in Florida. I hope our local elected officials throughout the state will take a close look at the tea leaves and then do something very important. Stand up!

Municipal elections were held throughout Florida last week. In St. Petersburg, two incumbents were on the ballot. Both were reelected. One of them, Jamie Bennett, through a quirk of fate and St. Pete's wacky election code, was actually running against "New Election ". That's about as straight up a "throw the bum out" choice as you are going to get. Bennett won with 82% of the vote.

In Largo, only one incumbent was on the ballot. Largo is an interesting place because earlier this year, Largo used the super majority authority the legislature granted, and did not roll back its property taxes as much as it was otherwise required to do. The incumbent, Harriet Crozier, won with 72% of the vote.

The other interesting news came from a poll commissioned by various Florida media, including the St. Petersburg Times. This poll is not a pretty picture for the Republican run Florida Legislature. Only 53% of respondents said they would vote yes on their proposed property tax constitutional amendment. Typically this is perceived as the kiss of death.
That's because the initial polling for an amendment usually is the high water point for it's poll numbers. And remember, constitutional amendments now require a 60% super majority vote to pass.

But it gets worse for the legislators. 44% of respondents believe Florida is on the wrong track. Only 34% believe we are on the right track. A whopping 77% of respondents rated the legislature's performance on property tax relief as only fair or poor.

But here is the crux of the legislature's real problem. Fully 77% of respondents believe they will see little, if any, property insurance relief as a result of our legislature's reforms of earlier this year. In my opinion, this is something the legislators have known all along. And that is why they have been on this unending campaign to demonize local elected officials as "spending like drunken sailors." They needed to do something to take the heat off them for their failure on property insurance reform.

Now is the time for our local elected officials to stand up. Stand up and tell your constituents to let their legislators know what they really think of their cockamamie property tax reform efforts. The election results tell you that the voters like what you incumbents have been doing. The poll results tell you the legislature's credibility is in the toilet.

Stand up and push back. The voters are on your side.

One Year Out

2007-11-11T10:16:00.000-05:00

This week marked the date that put us one year out from the November 2008 elections. Much has been written on this subject already. As I have looked at some of these pieces and reflected on the election that just passed this week in my hometown of St. Petersburg, I have been thinking about what this next 12 months will bring us.

The landscape nationally seems to clearly favor November 2008 as being a very happy time for Democrats. That's because one year out polls have been pretty good at predicting presidential winners. All the polling done one year out is predicting a Democratic victory in the race for the White House. Similarly, the generic polling for Congress is giving Democrats the edge.

So, am I just a nervous nellie or is it legitimate to worry about what we could do to mess this up? Actually, I'm more interested in thinking about what we have to do to make sure that we'll be celebrating the happy results a year from now.

We must guard against complacency. While the generic polling is looking pretty good for Democrats, actual head to head polling is not nearly as pretty. Rudy Guiliani currently polls within the margin of error against all 3 leading Democratic candidates. When you get to Congressional races, the popularity of the incumbent figures prominently into the outlook for those races. That and gerrymandering make both Congressional and State legislative races much more of an open question.

Don't get me wrong. I am not all doom and gloom here. In fact I think things are looking pretty damn good for Dems in this upcoming election cycle. All I am trying to say here is that these elections will not be handed to us.

We must make sure we get out and do the work that is necessary to get our Democratic candidates elected. Precincts need to be organized. Volunteers must be courted and money must be raised. And of course, we should continue blogging away in order to

ALWAYS Follow the Money!

2007-11-02T19:10:00.000-04:00

"Follow the money" has been my mantra since childhood. My father explained that you always had to consider who benefited from any action or decision. That said, I've have failed to properly apply that time honored tradition of following the money to one of the last decade's most controversial issues. Stem cell research. I've always taken it for granted that our leaders were opposed to stem cell research because either (a) they thought it immoral or (b) because it would bring in money and votes from those who thought it immoral.

Both a and b do apply but the really big money reason eluded me until today. I was kicking back to watch Beyond Tomorrow on the Science channel (yeah, I'm that annoying guy with all the answers in their commercials) when up came a piece on a new heart treatment. Medical researchers had done a study wherein heart patients facing imminent death from heart failure were offer a one chance "If it works you live; if is doesn't..." treatment.

What was this new treatment? Stem cells that were injected directly into the heart muscle. In some cases the stem cells were used in conjunction with traditional surgical procedures but the really interesting results came when using the stem cells without the surgery. In both cases the results were dramatically improved outcomes.

Prompting Belinda Linden, Head of Medical Information, British Heart Foundation to say, "Most current treatments are aimed at relieving the symptoms; if we can actually repair the heart itself this will be a significant advancement."

The "ah ha moment" for me came when another doctor said the new stem cell treatment has the potential to eliminate the need for prescription medications to treat heart disease. There it was. While I was focused on the small change of political contributions, it was the pharmaceutical industry's huge potential losses that are the money I should have followed.

This new science doesn't just apply to the treatment of heart disease. These new stem cell therapies could provide real cures that eliminate lots of types prescription medications. For years I've been annoying my doctor friends by pointing out that they are only focused on treatment and not cures. Well, stems cells could change all that and that must scare the hell out of Big Pharma.

Don't take my word for it. Google - stem cell heart treatment.

Here endith the lesson - in this case my lesson.

Cross posted on DailyKos

Blog Focus on Florida

2007-11-02T15:40:00.000-04:00

Praxis has a post up now titled We need more attention on state politics. Here is how the Praxis post describes "state politics":

State politics involves the state legislature, cabinet, governor, and state bureaucracy.

While I don't quarrel with the sentiment, I do have a little to say about the definition and the complaint itself.

First of all, I was a little taken aback that Praxis notes that Florida Kossacks had only 5 posts in October. Wow. For a guy who just stood up and told people that to build readership, one should post early and often, that's more than a little embarrassing. However, in my defense, I have noted that I have been consulting on City Council elections in my hometown of St. Petersburg. But only 5 posts? Oh my, I'll have to start doing better than that.

But Praxis says that by its definition, none of the 5 posts were about state politics. That's where I differ a little bit. I'd say that 2 of the 5 posts are on state politics. Just not by the definition in the Praxis post. In We're Official!: Florida Democratic Party Netroots Coalition, I am blogging about the Florida Democratic Party's decision to include the Netroots coalition in the official structure of the state party. That's pretty much state level, no?

And in From the White House to the Court House , I blogged about a possible rallying cry for campaigns all over the state in 2008. Neither of these meet the definition of state level politics as outlined by Praxis. I would argue that the Praxis definition is too narrow. State party level politics are state politics. So is talking about tactics and strategy in the state. There really is more to state politics than just the government.

I would also argue that people ought to blog about what people are moved to blog about. I don't want to get into a long discourse about why people might not be blogging about the state legislature as much as we would all like. I might suggest that a lot of us are commenting on the St. Pete Times Buzz blog, which covers state politics quite extensively, for one thing. But as it says on our masthead here, Florida Kossacks is:

A gathering spot for Florida Kossacks to keep in touch with issues of primary concerns to Floridians, or whatever else Florida Kossacks might think worthwhile.

I am looking forward to having a little more time to be blogging about state issues after our elections on Tuesday, but I really think it might be on Praxis and others to go out and maybe recruit some people into the blogosphere whose main interests are state politics.

Others of us may be moved to blog about issues at all levels of government.

What a Week in the Florida Blogosphere

2007-11-01T18:14:00.001-04:00

Wow!

What a week it has been in the Florida Blogosphere! Well, if you want to start a week on Friday and end it on Thursday, that is.

This week in the Florida Blogoshpere started off in Orlando and ended up in the Wall Street Journal!

Follow me for a recap of the week that was...WOW!

On Friday, Florida Democratic Netroots activists began gathering in Orlando for the Florida Democratic Party 2007 Convention. Normally the convention in the year prior to a presidential election is all about the Democratic presidential candidates. But because of the flap over Florida's January 29th primary date, only Mike Gravel came to see us. However, the convention was far from a bust.

Included as a part of the convention was an afternoon long Netroots Conference on Saturday. This conference had a standing room audience all afternoon long. As we moved from panel to panel and as people came and went, hundreds of Florida Democrats took in some or all of the Netroots Conference.

The Conference began with a Florida Progressive Coalition blog talk radio interview with none other than one Markos Moulitsas, the founder of DailyKos. There followed the panel discussions on blogging and netroots activism. The conference proper ended up with a rousing talk from our keynote speaker, Matt Stoller of Open Left and BlogPac.

Matt was moved to say some very nice things about the Florida Blogosphere and netroots activists:

I met the most wonderful people in Florida yesterday, and though I've become immensely cynical of late, the people-powered revolution quietly sweeping through the party was clearly in evidence. ... The whole Democratic Party is actually in transition, and I was impressed with the talent I met. The Florida netroots, who are simply amazing, raved about Florida Chief Financial Officer Alex Sink as a star and a future Governor. I spent some time chatting with state Senator Dave Aronberg and candidate Michael Calderin. Both are eminently comfortable with blogs, with Facebook,and with the open form of politics that is on the ascent.

The feeling I got was one of renewal. ... The Florida netroots is growing, and you can find a list of blogs off of the Florida Progressive Coalition blogroll. I was so impressed I joined the Florida netroots caucus with a $35 contribution.

The Netroots conference was followed by the Netroots / DFA / Progressives soiree which ended up being addressed by none other than the aforesaid Mike Gravel. But the highlight for me came when the winners of the 1st Annual Florida Netroots Awards were announced.

On Sunday, The Florida Democratic Party made the FDP Netroots Coalition an officially recognized organization within the Party. The FDP Netroots Coalition is organized like an interest group caucus within the Party. Among it's purposes:

Section 1 - It shall be the policy of this coalition, in the execution of all endeavors, to contribute to the growth and influence of the Democratic Party, to establish and maintain a Democratic online community, and to promote the party and all party candidates for Democratic leadership throughout the state and nation.
Section 2 - We further resolve to assist and encourage Florida Democrats, including clubs, county, and grassroots organizations to get online and establish a communication network and promote online participation among Democrats.

Thanks again to Phillip Perry and Mark Bubriski at the FDP and to FDP Chair Karen Thurman for reaching out to embrace the Democratic netroots activists in Florida.

On Monday, it was back to the real world of working to get Democrats elected to office. But the Florida Blogosphere was a Buzz with every one's take on the FDP Convention and the Netroots conference. Florida Netroots blog has a good roundup of the MSM press coverage of the convention.

And then today (Thursday), an amazing thing happened. The Wall Street Journal linked to this Florida Kossacks blog in a Page One story online about the influence of the blogosphere on the presidential campaign. Of course, being MSM, they got it wrong. They confused our Blog Florida Blue branding effort with the FDP Netroots Coalition. But, hey, they didn't spell my name wrong! Actually, they didn't spell my name at all. The story was mainly about the Blue Hampshire blog, an influential Democratic blog in New Hampshire.

But the Florida Blogosphere is getting noticed and we are making a difference. So let's get out there and

From the White House to the Court House

2007-10-31T10:30:00.000-04:00

I just replied to a comment to my posting on DailyKos about the approval of the FDP Netroots Coalition this weekend. Here is the sequence:

Great job guys! Go kick some sunshine state ass! (2+ / 0-)

I want a blue Florida in 2008!

I'm supporting Chris Dodd, and his plan to create the Rapid Response Reserve
Corps.

by Skulnick on Wed Oct 31,
2007 at 10:22:39 AM EDT

And my reply:

We are planning on kicking a lot of ass in 2008, from the White House to the Court House, we are going to be kicking Republican ass all over this state in 2008.

So it just struck me that maybe here is an unofficial (and somewhat uncouth) rallying cry for this campaign cycle in Florida:

From the White House to the Court House,

We are going to be kicking Republican ass all over this state in 2008.

Let me know what you think.

We're Official!: Florida Democratic Party Netroots Coalition

2007-10-30T09:37:00.000-04:00

On Sunday, October 28, 2007, the Florida Democratic Party Central Committee approved the recommendation of the Committee on Clubs, Caucuses and Organizations to grant approval to the charter application of the Florida Democratic Party Netroots Coalition.

We are now an officially recognized organization within the Florida Democratic Party!!!!!

Congratulations to all those who had a hand in this achievement, especially meowmissy, Ken Quinnell, our Presidente, and everyone who worked so hard to get us to this point. I also want to extend a special thanks to Phillip Perry, Internet Technology Director, and Mark Bubriski, Communications Director of the FDP. Thanks also to FDP Chair Karen Thurman who went along with this crazy idea to embrace netroots activists within the party!

Now the real work of the FDP Netroots Coalition begins. We will soon be unveiling our website and will be meeting (online, of course) to map out our goals and objectives for 2008. So for all of you who wish to be an official part of the FDP Netroots Coalition, I have a request of you:

PLEASE PAY YOUR DUES!

We will soon have a PayPal account available, but for now, the $35 annual dues can be paid by snail mail to the FDP Netroots Coalition at the following address:

FDP Netroots Coalition

P.O. Box 1856

St. Petersburg, FL 33731

Thanks to all of you who already paid at the convention, including Matt Stoller. And yes, Matt, you do owe me an email. That's because for campaign finance reporting purposes, I need your name, and address and just in case you want to contribute more than the $35 annual dues, I also need your occupation.

We have a lot of work to do if we are going to

so I hope to see those checks start rolling in!

Down on the Hustings - More Local Politics

2007-10-21T19:13:00.000-04:00

I can't believe it has been over a month since my last post on DKos. But what a month it has been in local politics in the City of St. Petersburg. The last post was a rundown on our City Council elections, which will be on November 6th. Follow me below the jump, and I'll bring you up to date on what has been happening in our little corner of the world.

First let me do a little quick recap and a correction. St. Petersburg, Florida's 4th largest city, is a city of about 250,000 folks on the west coast of Florida. It's eastern boundary is Tampa Bay, so that puts us in the Tampa Bay area, the western terminus of Florida's infamous "I-4 Corridor". Our county, Pinellas, (pop approx 1 million) is the westernmost county in the corridor, Florida's swing area of the state. In 2000, Pinellas went for Al Gore by about 10,000 votes. In 2004, it went for George W Bush. So we are the swing county in the swing region in the swing state of the country. Just a bunch of swingers is what we are.

But St. Petersburg, which occupies the southernmost part of our county, is actually a fairly solid blue city. The map of legislative seats in the southern half of Pinellas County is almost solidly blue. The sole exception to this are the state House and Senate seats (1 each) which also include the beach communities on the barrier islands.

In St. Petersburg, we have a strong Mayor and City Council form of government. While the Mayor, Rick Baker, is a conservative Republican, 5 of the 8 seats on the officially nonpartisan city council are now held by Democrats. There is now one Independent, who most often votes with the Dems and but two Republicans remaining on the Council. To get to my count of Dems on the Council in my previous diary, I miscounted the Independent as a Dem.

This party lineup of 5 Dems, One Independent and two Rs is not likely to change after November 6th unless something (else) really strange happens. I say something else really strange because we have had several really strange happenings in this election cycle in St. Petersburg.

The first really strange thing was the sudden resignation and then suicide of the City Council Chairperson. This occurred on the Friday before the September 11th City Council primary elections. John Bryan was accused in family court of having improper physical contact with his his teen aged adopted daughter. He resigned his City Council seat and committed suicide the following day.

The vacancy in the Distrcit 2 Council seat was filled last Thursday when the City Council selected attorney James Kennedy, a Democrat, from among the five applicants for the seat. Again, although officially nonpartisan, the 4 Democrats on the council voted for Kennedy, while the two Republicans and the Independent voted for the lone Republican applicant. Thus, the District 2 seat was flipped to Democratic, as John Bryan had been a Republican (albeit of the moderate, not right wing Christian nut case type). Kennedy will serve out the remaining two years on John Bryan's term. And that's how 4 Dems got to be 5.

The other strange thing happened in the District 5 council race. Incumbent Jamie Bennett won his primary with 67% of the vote and advanced to the general election facing political newcomer Chris Kelly. In St. Petersburg, if more than two candidates file for a seat, a district only primary is held. The top two vote getters then advance to a city wide general election. But here's where things really got weird, as if they weren't weird enough already.

Chris Kelly dropped out of the race claiming exhaustion. It is tough to campaign in Florida in the summer time, but that was just very strange. What happened next is even stranger. A long forgotten provision of City Code declared that Kelly's name would be replaced on the ballot by the phrase "New Election". That's right, "New Election." Had the third person in the primary received 20% of the vote, her name would have gone on the ballot as a replacement for Kelly. But since she received only 14%, the city code dictated "New Election." What this means is if the voters decide not to retain Council Member Bennett in office, they can vote to hold a brand new election for this seat, starting from scratch with a primary.

The result of this is a pretty much straight up or down "throw the bum out" vote. You don't get to see this very often. We actually have a "retention" vote for judges in Florida, but nobody really knows much about them anyway. This is very unusual and it comes at an interesting time. In the state of Florida right now, we have the Republican dominated legislature busy demonizing local governments as tax and spend scoundrels, just wastefully spending away a bonanza in property taxes that had been provided by rising property values in Florida.

No matter that this very same legislature required local school boards to raise property taxes by $500 million this year. At the same time they required county and municipal governments to roll back their property tax rates and have been trying to get a "tax reform" state constitutional amendment on the January 29th Presidential Primary ballot.

This is our legislature's 3rd shot at property tax "reform" this year. They failed to accomplish it during the regular session in the spring. They thought they had something in a special session earlier this year. However, a state judge ruled that the ballot summary our legislature wrote about their proposed constitutional amendment was unconstitutionally vague and misleading. Now they are back at it again. Lord only knows what they will come up with. But through it all, to cover up their failure to provide meaningful property insurance relief, our Republican dominated state legislature has been painting local elected officials as tax and spend villains.

That brings us back to the city council race of Jamie Bennett vs "New Election". Council Member Bennett has been one of the more vocal critics of the legislators meddling with local governments ability to set their own millage rates to meet their communities needs as they see fit. The vilification of local electeds by our legislators did not seem to have a major impact on his primary. As mentioned above, Council Member Bennett got 67% of the vote in his district primary. Perhaps that kind of popularity is why no organized effort for "New Election" has emerged as of this date. Maybe the local voters like the job their local elected officials are doing. Maybe a big win for Jamie Bennett should be a message to our legislators that they are barking up the wrong tree in their so called "tax reform" efforts.

Now if they could only put this amount of energy into truly reforming property insurance in this state...

Full Disclosure: I am a paid fundraiser for Council Member Bennett's campaign, as well as for two other council candidate's campaigns. Part of the reason I have not been on these pages much lately.

Stupidest email yet from Tom Feeney (R-FL-Abramoff)

2007-10-13T15:07:00.000-04:00

While I certainly don't enjoy hearing from Tom Feeney in any medium, the sad fact is, he's my Congressman and I need to keep track of what he's up to. I've been subscribed to his email list for a couple years, and when I see his name in my inbox, can always count on being amused, annoyed, disgusted, angered, confused, or some combination of those emotions. Not to mention, he's been known to make factual errors and misrepresentations in these emails (shocking, I know), and I've even been compelled to write back to him with corrections on a couple of occasions. The most recent one was earlier this year when ol' Tom perpetuated the childish misnomer "Democrat Party." I gently informed him that the correct phrase is "Democratic Party" and suggested he have his staff more carefully proofread these emails before they get sent, because otherwise his constituents just might think he's ignorant.

Tom regularly rails against teh ileegul imagrintsOHN0EZ!@@!! and is proud of his anti-SCHIP vote. But this week's email really took the cake. My first reaction on seeing the subject line was, "The hell?" as it made no sense to me whatsoever. Anyway, here it is in all its glory, for your own WTF?ing pleasure:

TOM FEENEY
Member of Congress
24th District, Florida

Financial Services Committee
Judiciary Committee
Science Committee

Congress of the United States
House of Representatives
Washington, DC 20515

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
October 11, 2007

Contact: Pepper Pennington
202-225-2706
202-593-1253

Capitol Architect No Longer Censors Architect of the Universe

(Oviedo, FL) - U.S. Rep. Tom Feeney (R-Oviedo) was pleased that the Architect of the Capitol, Mr. Stephen T. Ayers is now allowing "God" on flag certificates. Earlier this week, Rep. Feeney expressed his frustration with reports that flag certificates using the word "God" were being censored by the Architect of the Capitol. Mr. Ayers had reportedly informed several congressional offices that the use of the word “God” violates the Architect’s rules prohibiting religious references on flag certificates.

"I'm pleased that the Architect of the Capitol is no longer censoring the Architect of the Universe. Fortunately, he responded to congressional pressure and public outcry and decided that 'God' may now be used in flag certificates.

"I was outraged earlier this week to learn that Americans are censored because they want to fly a flag over the Capitol and express their faith or even say something as simple as 'for the love of God, family, and Country.'

"I want to thank my colleagues for joining me to sign a letter to Speaker Pelosi that reminds the Architect of his authority and the scope of his office. The Capitol contains many religious symbols and now Speaker Pelosi needs to condemn the censorship," said Feeney.

Rep. Feeney's office offers a flag service to constituents. This is a very popular service where Central Floridians can purchase flags to be flown over the United States Capitol. The flags are also accompanied by certificates from the office of the Architect of the Capitol that details the date and the occasion that the flag was flown.

Rep. Feeney signed a letter to Speaker Pelosi asking for an immediate review of the authority under which the Architect is making these rules, as well as the reversal of this policy which censors our citizens’ right to expressions of their faith.

When I first read that subject line prior to opening his email, all that came to mind was Masters of the Universe. Now, I freely confess to never being a particular fan of the MOTU franchise, but I do at least know He-Man, She-Ra, and Skeletor. But which one was the Architect, and what powers did he possess? Could he speed-read blueprints? Mix thousands of tons of concrete with his bare hands? Keep the nation's infrastructure from collapsing? (That last one certainly would come in handy these days!)

Then I realized, of course, that Tom was talking about God. What a buzzkill, especially after momentarily thinking our crumbling infrastructure would be mysteriously repaired overnight, with the only clue as to whom accomplished this monumental task being "AotU" scrawled into the cement before it dried. (He couldn't have used just "AU," of course, lest the credit mistakenly be ascribed to Americans United.)

It never hurts to remind everyone that Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington has listed Feeney among its most corrupt Congressmen since practically the day he took office. I'm still supporting Clint Curtis for FL-24, and there's now a DCCC-recruited challenger, former FL state Representative Suzanne Kosmas.

I look forward to one of these candidates winning FL-24 in 2008 and thus relieving me of further WTF? email moments, as least as far as Tom Feeney is concerned. I get too many of those moments without his help.

Race tracker wiki: FL-24

[crossposted to my Daily Kos diary]

Presidential Primary - Adam: Our Votes WILL Count

2007-10-07T10:23:00.000-04:00

Well, Adam Smith is at it again. In a front page article in today's St. Petersburg Times, Adam again makes the assertion:

Florida Democrats stand to be the only voters in America whose votes won't count toward picking a presidential nominee.

This is just not true. Let me be perfectly clear about this, because Adam remains fixated on this. Adam is wrong. Florida's votes will count.

On January 29th, 2008, Florida Democrats will go to the polls and express their preference for the Democratic Presidential Nominee. We will do this before most of the other states have done so. After our votes are counted, and they will be counted, the rest of the country will hear and will be influenced by the Florida results.

That is exactly the goal all Floridians have had in mind when the whole discussion of moving the primary date up began. Floridians were sick and tired of having our nominees selected by small, non diverse states. We were getting stuck with candidates whose plan to win in the South was to win New Hampshire. My apologies to my friends in Massachusetts, but Democrats lost two presidential elections we might have won because these small non diverse states picked nominees who could not win in Florida. Now Floridians are going to have a real voice in who our Party's nominee is going to be.

Here is something else to keep in mind. The Presidential candidates do not go to Iowa and New Hampshire for the massive number of delegates they win by competing there. They go there because these states are first and thus have major influence on the entire process. Florida will now share in that influence.

Our voices will be heard and our votes will count.

FCAN Jib Jabs Legislators

2007-09-28T13:30:00.000-04:00

Florida Consumer Action Network has posted a Jib Jab video on You Tube that is just too funny for words. They are taking their pokes at State Senator Mike Fasano and State Representative John Legg. Actually, if you are the victim of a sink hole in Florida, it could bring you to tears. Here it is. Judge for yourself:

Working on the Basics

2007-09-22T18:37:00.000-04:00

I have not been on these pages hardly at all lately. There are two main reasons for that. The first is because I have been working at the basic building block level of elected politics - City Council elections. The second is, well, er, it is football season and the Florida Gators are 4 and 0.

But this diary is about the hard work of building a bench down on the hustings. If you want to know what life is like at the bottom of the political totem pole, about failures and successes and lessons learned, follow me below the fold...

I live in St. Petersburg, Florida. St. Petersburg is a city of about 250,000 folks smack dab on the west coast of Florida. We are the western anchor of the infamous I-4 corridor in Florida. Our county, Pinellas, (pop approx 1 million) went for Al Gore in 2000 but went for George Bush by a small margin in 2004. So, as a political scientist friend of mine likes to say, we are the swing county of the swing region of the swing state of the country. Real swingers. And we are doing all this swinging right here at Ground Zero.

St. Petersburg holds its municipal elections in November of odd numbered years. We have an eight member City Council and a strong Mayor form of city government. The Mayor and Council can serve two four year terms before being forced out by term limits. This is an "off year" for city elections, as the Mayor's seat is not up for election. The four odd numbered city council seats are up for election. Officially the Mayor and Council races are "non partisan". Having said that, we have a very conservative Republican mayor, Rick Baker, a friend of and protege of former Governor Jeb Bush. But five of our eight City Council seats are held by Democrats. There's that swing thing again.

There are two seats coming open on the St. Petersburg City Council due to term limits this cycle. One is held by a Democrat, Rene Flowers. The other is held by a Republican, Bill Foster. Both are considered likely Mayoral candidates in 2009. But by some estimates, so is half the population of St. Pete. Council members must reside in the districts they represent. St. Pete's Council districts are drawn pretty straight forwardly, i.e with a minimum of gerrymandering. However, due to the housing patterns in St. Petersburg, Rene Flowers, an African American Democrat, will be succeeded by an African American Democrat.

In fact, only two candidates filed for Rene Flowers District 7 seat. Gershom Faulkner is a 36 year old African American male. The former Marine served for six years as legislative assistant to State Representative Frank Peterman. He is currently Outreach Coordinator for Congresswoman Kathy Castor (D, FL-11). Faulkner served as Deputy Campaign Manager through Castor's primary campaign last cycle, delivering for her the hugely African American St. Petersburg portion of FL-11. He then moved on to take the position of state wide African American outreach coordinator for Jim Davis' ill fated campaign for Florida's Governor last year. By contrast, his opponent, Wingay Newton, also an African American male, is a relative political newcomer. He is, however, a neighborhood association president and his brother happens to be head of the St. Petersburg Fire Fighters Union.

Because only two candidates filed for this seat, they avoided a primary election. They will be voted on City wide in the general election on November 6th.

This was not the case in the other seat coming open this cycle. The District 3 seat held by Republican Bill Foster drew a four person crowd. This district includes some of the more affluent and more heavily Republican precincts in St. Petersburg. However, it is part of a swing State House seat most recently won by Democrat Bill Heller last year. It was hoped that this seat would provide a pick up opportunity for Democrats.

To that end, an excellent candidate was successfully urged to run. Cathy Harrelson is a single mother, a financial services professional with years of experience working for a very well known local municipal bond firm. And she was immediate past president of the 3,000 member strong Sun Coast Sierra Club. Joining Harrelson in the race for this seat were three white Republican men. Cliff Gephardt, a mortgage broker, is a political neophyte. Bill Dudley is a retired high school wrestling coach who finished second to Bill Foster for this seat four years ago. And Ed Montanari is an American Airlines pilot. However he was Bill Foster's campaign manager four years ago. To further groom him for this run, Montanari was appointed to head a prestigious task force on the future of our downtown airport in St. Petersburg. To say that Montanari is the candidate of the St. Petersburg Republican establishment is by no means an understatement.

In the only case of an incumbent Council member running for re election, Council Member Jamie Bennett drew two opponents and was also faced with a primary election. Bennett is a white male Democrat in a just over 50% African American District. District 5 covers the southern portion of St. Petersburg. He drew another white male Democrat, activist Chris Kelly and an African American private school teacher, Debra Woodard. Bennett was first elected to Council in 2001 to fill an unexpired term. In 2003, Bennett was re elected without opposition. Kelly and Woodard are making their first political runs.

Distinct 1 features the other incumbent Council member on the ballot. Democrat Herb Polson, the current Council Member was appointed to fill the seat vacated by now State Representative Rick Kriseman. Polson was a long time City employee who started his career with the city in the Police Department and wound up as the City's lobbyist, He retired from the City employment last year so that he could be appointed to fill the seat Rick Kriseman vacated to run for the Stat Legislature. So this is Polson's first election campaign. Polson is opposed by 70 something former Council Member, Republican Bob Kersteen.

Primary elections for Districts 3 and 5 were held September 11th. You would think that such a date would spark an outpouring of patriotism and every one would show up at the polls to vote. Nothing could have been further from the truth. In the District 5 race, only 8% of the registered voters cast a ballot. That's right, only 8%. Jamie Bennett, the incumbent Democrat Council Member advanced to the general election with 66% of the vote. Chris Kelly finished second with 19%.

In the District 3 race turnout was somewhat better, a whopping 14%. The results of this race were much more competitive as well. Ed Montanari, the Republican establishment candidate, was the top vote getter with 42% of the vote. finishing second and also moving on to the general election in November was Bill Dudley, the retired high school wrestling coach and driver's ed teacher. Dudley reeled in 30% of the vote. That was 206 votes more than Cathy Harrelson, the Democrat received. Harrelson gathered in 23% of the vote falling short of the top two vote getters. The District 3 seat will remain in Republican hands this cycle as both Montanari and Dudley are Republicans.

Cathy Harrelson did win a few precincts. However, the precincts she did win were both more heavily Democratic and turned out at a much lower rate than most of the the precincts won by her opponents. The precincts that went heaviest for Montanari turned out at twice to four times the turn out rate of the precincts that Harrelson won. This just points out what i have been carping about. We Dems need to do a much better job of getting our voters to the polls. It will continue to hurt us if we continue to get big percentages in heavily Democratic areas but get a low turn out rate. We need to find some way to get our voters to the polls in the same proportion the Rs get theirs. If we can do that, we will start winning a lot more elections around here.

Stay tuned. I will be coming back with some diaries about the day to day effort in a municipal election campaign. This is where it all starts. Our future state and national leaders will be groomed right here at this level of government. It is crucial that we get good people to run for these seats and to get our people elected.

Rainy Saturday Random Musings

2007-09-22T10:52:00.000-04:00

I can't believe it has been nine days since I have posted here. I have been a little busy lately. I've been doing some bench building here in St. Petersburg. Some of you may have heard, we had a primary election in St. Pete on September 11th.

Actually not many people heard here in St. Pete either. The overall turnout was a paltry 11%. But we have strange elections here. We have four of our eight City Council seats up for election in November of this year. Primary elections were held in only two of those races. That's because these seats had more than two candidates. So on September 11th, the voters in those two districts chose the top two contenders to advance to the general election on November 6th. They will then join the candidates for the other two seats in a city wide election. Everybody clear on this? Voters within a district hold a primary to determine which two candidates advance to the city wide general election in November. Weird, huh?

What actually was a bit weird was how the primaries turned out. Not the actual results. They were fairly predictable. The real shocker was how most of the people voted. The majority of votes in this election were cast by mail. That's right, we essentially had a vote by mail election here in St. Petersburg. How about that?

Incumbent Council Member Jamie Bennett easily cruised into the general election in District 5 winning a full two thirds of the vote. He will face challenger Chris Kelly who received 19%. In the District 3 Primary, Ed Montanari led the four candidate pack with 42% of the vote. He was followed by Bill Dudley who garnered 30%. The disappointment here was that Cathy Harrelson failed to get through. Cathy was our hope to put another Democrat on the St. Petersburg City Council. Harrelson did manage to get 22%, but it was not enough. Well, we are most likely to retain the five out of eight Democratic majority on this allegedly non partisan Council.

The District 3 seat is going to remain in Republican hands as both Montanari and Dudley are Republicans. The District 5 and District 7 general election candidates are all registered Dems. In District 1, we have incumbent City Council Member Herb Poslon facing off against former Council Member Bob Kersteen. Polson is raising a bunch of money, way more than Kersteen. If he keeps that up, he will have no problem keeping that seat safely in the Dem column.

I am still going to be involved in 2 of the 4 races helping raise money. So I have just a bit of a breather here. But I wanted to let y'all know I haven't fallen off the face of the earth. Far from it. Last week I held fund raising events for each of my candidates and attended a fundie for Fairness for Florida's Families. That's the coalition that has formed to defeat the anti gay marriage constitutional amendment the wingers are going to put on the ballot for 2008. Nadine Smith gave a great talk at that event.

And I can not close without giving a shout out to Michael Hussey. His Pushing Rope Blog was just named Best Local Political Blog in the Tampa Bay area by Creative Loafing.

So Congrats to fellow Florida Kossack Michael Hussey!

And now it's time to go watch the Gators!

The MSM Is Starting To Get It

2007-09-13T08:16:00.000-04:00

The St. Petersburg Times has this story today on the Florida Primary and Hillary Clinton. And while it is harder to see in the web version, the Times is finally starting to get it about the January 29th Florida Primary.

Buried several paragraphs into the story about Clinton's visit to Florida yesterday is this little gem:

Scoring well in Florida is important, even if the votes technically don't count, given the state's size.

Finally! I have been saying exactly that for quite some time now. And in the print edition, the inside headline reads like this: Even if the votes don't count, Winning Florida Important
They are still on the "votes don't count" meme, but at least they are starting to recognize the vast other benefits of winning in Florida.

So keep beating the drum, folks. You are having an impact!

This story is also on the Buzz here. Be sure to get over there and put in your 2 cents. :)

Barack Obama Music Video

2007-09-11T21:09:00.001-04:00

Now this is not something I see everyday. Meg Foster is going to shoot an Obama Barack music video.

Put on your Obama gear and come on over to participate in our first O - Train Youtube Music Video project.

We only have room for 75 Obama supporters, so RSVP ASAP!

Video rehearsal will commence immediately following our September 13, 2007 general meeting at the Marti-Maceo Club. Please wear your Obama shirts to the general meeting. We also need volunteers for the Ybor City video segments Thursday after the meeting and on Saturday morning.

If additional rehearsal time is necessary, we will ask that volunteers attend a dress rehearsal on Saturday morning on the 15th.

Here is the event information.

Name: Countdown to Change O - Train Music Video Shoot Party
Tagline: Barack Obama, Tampa Bay O -Train, Countdown to change, O - Train Music Video, Youtube
Host: Tampa Bay O - Train
Type: Music/Arts - Performance
Time and Place Date: Saturday, September 15, 2007
Time: 3:00pm - 7:00pm
City/Town: Clearwater Beach, FL

St. Peterburg Votes Today: Primary Edition

2007-09-11T05:14:00.000-04:00

Today is Primary Election day for City Council races in St. Petersburg. Unfortunately, I had one candidate ask me last night if I thought voter turn out would exceed 15%. On September 11th, what could be a more patriotic thing to do than to go out and exercise your right, and duty, to vote?

There are 2 races on the ballot today. Primaries are being held for Districts 3 and 5. Districts 1 and 7, with only 2 qualified candidates each, skip the primary and will be on the ballot for the city wide General Election in November.

Today, only voters in Districts 3 and 5 can vote to winnow down the number of candidates for the Council seat in their districts to 2 each. The top two vote getters within these districts today will go on to the city wide voting in the November General Election.

The District 5 race features one of only two incumbents on the ballot this cycle. Acting Council Chair Jamie Bennett is seeking re-election to a post he first won in 2001 in a special election to fill the seat of Larry Williams who had resigned to run for Mayor. Bennett drew no opposition in his bid for a full term in 2003. The widely held belief that Bennett will run for Mayor in two years has drawn at least one candidate to challenge him this time.

Chris Kelly, a community activist, appears to be running with 2009 in mind. Kelly is a former President of the Roser Park Neighborhood Association. He did move to Pinellas Point a few years ago, but has not been civicly active within the district. His campaign seems to be aimed at establishing himself as a viable candidate in 2009 should Bennett vacate the seat to make his Mayoral bid. Bennett's other challenger is little know school teacher Debra Woodard. Ms. Woodard has run a perfunctory campaign at best.

The much more competitive race is for the District 3 council seat. This district, encompassing Snell Isle, Shore Acres and other neighborhoods in northeastern St. Pete will see Council Member Bill Foster leave the seat due to term limits. We will probably see Foster again in a Mayoral bid in 2009.

Meanwhile, 4 candidates are vying to replace Foster. Ed Montanari is Foster's anointed heir apparent. Montanari, an America Airlines pilot, was Foster's campaign manager in 2003. Montanari was groomed for this run by being appointed Chair of the Albert Whitted Airport Advisory Board. Prior to that, Montanari, who has been heard to say that "the Mayor's the boss", had no civic involvement. Montanari's connections have enabled him to lead the pack in fund raising. However, as befits a good airline pilot, no one will mistake Montanari for Mr. Excitement.

Returning from his unsuccessful 2003 bid to unseat Foster is now retired Northeast High teacher Bill Dudley. Dudley got through a 3 way primary in 2003, but was drubbed by Foster in the citywide general election. To improve his chances this time, Dudley is President of the Snell Isle Neighborhood Association. Much like John Edwards, Dudley has been running for this seat since his defeat 4 years ago. The experience shows. Dudley is a much better candidate this time around, and has managed to raise substantial dollars as well.

The significant new face in this race belongs to Cathy Harrelson. Harrelson is a financial professional whose long civic involvement has been focused on environmental concerns. Harrelson is immediate past President of the 3,000 member strong Suncoast Sierra Club. She has also been recently appointed to the County board advising on the Booker Creek preserve. There she was elected Policy Chair by her peers.

Harrelson brings the rare combination of business acumen and enviromentalist to the race. She also has the most realistic chance of maintaining the two woman minority on the Council. With Renee Flowers leaving the District 7 seat due to term limits, Leslie Curran is the only other woman on Council. Also, in this allegedly nonpartisan race, Harrelson is the only Democrat.

Mortgage Broker Cliff Gephart rounds out the field in District 3. Gephart has not run a substantial campaign, but speaks well in forums. Hopefully Mr. Gephart will stay involved in civic affairs and try again sometime in the future.

The District 3 race is really too close to call at this time. Dudley, Montanari and Harrelson are closely bunched and each has run a vigorous campaign. Which two advance to the General Election in November could literally come down to a hand full of votes. So if you are reading this in District 3 today, be sure to get out and vote. Your vote will definitely matter in this race.

Landmark! DEM candidates on Univision; GOP Disrespects Latinos

2007-09-09T07:58:00.000-04:00

All the declared contenders for the Democratic nomination are joining in a debate sponsored by and televised on the Spanish-language network Univision.
Joe Garcia, chairman of the Miami-Dade Democratic Party, believes the telecast will be a landmark event in the Latino world, drawing millions of viewers who have felt left out of American politics: "I believe more eyeballs will be watching this one than any other so far."

It is obvious that The Republican Party's base has moved so far to the right on immigration, Latino issues, and race-related issues, in general, that the [GOP] candidates cannot be bothered for a few hours of their time to spend. For all their talk about the GOP's "big tent," Republicans conspicuously spend so little time on black, Latino, Asian, etc., issues unless to demonize them as red meat for the base.

Suzan Franks to Run Again

2007-09-06T11:03:00.000-04:00

Suzan Franks, who ran for Senate District 3 in the special election this summer, announced today that she is running for the seat in 2008. Here is an excerpt from her press release:

It was a wonderful experience running in the special election, Franks said. The voters I contacted were very receptive to my message of good government and putting the people first. In the June special election, time and money were against me. Fortunately, this time I now have fourteen months to compete. I will travel the district, running a traditional, grassroots campaign, to get my message directly to the voters. I will have the time, and I will raise enough money, to make sure the voters know they will have a better choice in the general election. As a candidate, and as your next State Senator, I pledge to conduct myself with honor and integrity, serving our community interests, not special interests.

Senate District 3 consists of Baker, Dixie, Hamilton, Lafayette, Suwannee, Taylor, and parts of Citrus, Columbia, Jefferson, Leon, Levy, Madison, and Marion counties. This sprawling district stretches from the southern Citrus County line to the Florida - Georgia border. The seat is currently held by Charles Dean of Inverness.

Franks has 23 years of public service experience, and she is looking forward to taking her message directly to the voters of Senate District 3. More from Franks statement:

The people of Senate District 3 expect a high quality of life provided in this wonderful area of our state", Franks said. "I have a proven track record of fighting every day to preserve the quality of life for the people I represent. I will fight every day for health care services and an education system that provides all of our children the opportunity to succeed. And I will fight for real property insurance and property tax relief, something this Legislature has failed to deliver.

Stay tuned. This could get interesting.

Full disclosure: I was a principal author of this press release.

Snatching Defeat From the Jaws of Victory

2007-09-02T11:48:00.000-04:00

For a long time now, I have been saying that the stars are aligned for the Democrats to win the White House in 2008. All we have to do is to avoid shooting ourselves in the foot. Right about now, I feel like I am picking some of Dick Cheney's buck shot out of my toes.

This is not what we should be focusing our attention on. In a week where the Republicans are imploding (Alberto Gonzales and Larry Craig resign, John Warner retires), Dems should be standing back and let the Republicans continue to hang themselves. Instead we are getting headlines like this:

Democrats boycott Florida race
Here I have been trying to argue that what matters most is that Floridians voices will be heard. Now the Democratic candidates have come out and said that they won't be listening. Here is what John Edwards (who I have been supporting) has to say:

"Iowa, New Hampshire, Nevada, and South Carolina need to be first because in these states ideas count, not just money. These are places where voters get to look the candidate in the eye and measure their policies, ideas, and integrity."

What we have been arguing all along is that Florida voters are hungry for a chance to:

look the candidate in the eye and measure their policies, ideas, and integrity

at a time when it still matters in the nomination process. Floridians with money have long had that opportunity. Now we were going to have the same chance to measure the candidates as Iowa and New Hampshire have had. And we think that we probably could do a better job picking the Democratic nominee that Iowa and New Hampshire have done.

Here is a "history lesson" that has been circulated among Florida's Democratic leaders:

Of the last nine Presidential elections in which the Democratic candidate was chosen by the current primary system (excluding 1996 when President Clinton faced no real opposition in the primary), our candidate has only twice been elected President. Those candidates, Jimmy Carter in 1976 and Bill Clinton in 1992, both lost the Iowa Caucuses. Clinton lost the New Hampshire primary as well.

Also, the Iowa Caucus has picked a loser every time since it came to
prominence in 1972. Since 1952, the New Hampshire Primary has only picked one Democratic President when the nomination was contested.

So what do we do now? I say it is about time to start using our influence on the candidates campaigns. Let's pick up the drumbeat to get these candidates to change their minds and reject this lunacy of boycotting Florida.

If we are ever going to Blog Florida Blue , now is the time to start.

Labor Day Picnic-September 3 Tampa

2007-09-01T08:08:00.000-04:00

Labor Day Picnic at Florida Fairgrounds in Tampa. Map.
Anyone have candidates they know are planning to attend?
Kevin Beckner (Hillsborough District #6) will be there.
Others?

The $12 Million Dog - A Pony Show for the Estate Tax

2007-09-01T05:30:00.000-04:00

Please don't get me wrong. I am, in fact, a dog lover. I am pleased that the late Leona Helmsley's dog will continue to live an opulent life, and then be buried alongside her in a mausoleum
But it occurs to me that this story should be the poster child in the fight to restore the Estate Tax to an equitable level.

What is the Republican argument in this dog fight? That Helmsley's dog deserves a $12 million trust fund? Leona Helmsley

became known as a symbol of 1980s greed and earned the nickname "the Queen of
Mean" after her 1988 indictment and subsequent conviction for tax evasion. One
employee had quoted her as snarling, "Only the little people pay taxes."

Well, the "little people" continue to pay taxes at a higher rate on their labor than the rich pay on their investments. Are the Republicans going to say that a better use could not be found for that $12 million? How about health care for the uninsured children of the "little people"?

Let's give the "death tax" rhetoric the death penalty. If anyone needs a dog and pony show to convince them, point them here.

Lee Nelson Running For Hillsborough County Super of Elections

2007-08-28T18:51:00.000-04:00

Democrat Lee Nelson will official announce his candidacy for Supervisor of Elections tomorrow.

This Wednesday, August 29th at 11:00 a.m., I will formally announce my run for Hillsborough County Supervisor of Elections. The site for this announcement is the Town 'N Country Library, 5455 W. Waters Avenue, Suite 208, Tampa 33634.

This date was selected for its historic commemoration - the day Buddy Johnson announced he lost 245 votes in early voting in 2004!

Please come - we will have an area for live blogging, should you desire to do so.

Lunch will follow at Bucca di Beppo. Maps will be given out at the library.

Hillsborough County needs a responsible SOE. Buddy Johnson. Polling stations had violations under Johnson's watch. Johnson also screwed up the petition count for the Hillsborough County Mayor ballot. The list goes on and on.

There will be an area for liveblogging at Nelson's press conference.

Good luck to Nelson.

Let's All Take a Deep Breath

2007-08-28T04:32:00.000-04:00

The recent decision by the Democratic National Committee Rules and Bylaws Committee to possibly strip Florida of all its delegates to the Democratic National Convention has certainly created a stir. The newspapers and the blogs are just a Buzz with all sorts of sky is falling articles.

I propose we just all back away from the keyboard and take a deep breath. There, doesn't that feel better? Now let's talk about what's really important in this whole primary mess. Florida's Democratic voters are going to vote in a Presidential Preference Primary on January 29th. This is going to occur before the nomination is a done deal. Florida 's Democratic voices will be heard in a significant way.

The last time Florida Dems were in a position to make a significant impact on the presidential nominee selection process was in the 1992 cycle. At the Florida Democratic Party Convention, a little known hick Governor from Arkansas won a straw poll. Straw polls are otherwise known as "officially meaningless beauty contests" in the MSM. Bill Clinton took that straw poll victory and ran all the way to the White House with it. Anybody want to ask Bill if he thought it was a "meaningless beauty contest"?

So, the good news is that Florida's Democrats will have a significant voice in the selection of the Democratic nominee for President. Delegates have nothing to do with it. The candidates do not go to Iowa and New Hampshire for the delegates. They go for the momentum that can be captured from good showings. Delegates or no, the candidates this cycle will kill for the momentum going into February 5th that an impressive showing in Florida will create. The rest of this whole fight about delegates is officially meaningless.

Let's take a closer look at exactly what happened this weekend in Washington and what it all really means - or doesn't. From the New York Times:

The Democratic National Committee ... voted Saturday to refuse to seat any Florida Democrat at the Democratic presidential convention in 2008 if the state party did not delay the date of its 2008 primary to conform to the party’s nominating calendar.

The committee gave Florida Democrats 30 days to propose a primary date that conformed with Democratic rules prohibiting all but four states from holding their primaries or caucuses before Feb. 5.

So, from the newspaper of record, that's what happened. The DNC "gave Florida Democrats 30 days" to conform to the party's nominating calendar rules. That's what happened - we got yet another 30 day extension to submit a delegate selection plan which conforms to the Party's rules. Nothing more, nothing less. So, let's make this deep breath number two.

Why is the DNC taking such a seemingly hard line? How about because the presidential primary system is a friggin' mess. The DNC spent considerable time and energy attempting to retool the primary process for this cycle. In belated recognition that perhaps Iowa and New Hampshire do not really represent America and the Democratic Party well, the DNC added Nevada caucuses and a South Carolina primary to the early state selection process. They then told everybody else they could not go before February 5th.

So what happened to all these carefully laid plans? Two things. First, this election cycle is the first since Herbert Hoover was elected that does not feature a sitting President or Vice President from one party or the other. In other words, we have a truly wide open race in both parties.

Second, the frustration with the present primary system reached the boiling point all over the country. Despite the delegate increase incentives in the Democratic Party, almost every state has moved their primary up to February 5th. OK, it only seems like it, but it is not far from the truth.

Florida's Republican dominated Legislature, with it's new Vice President possibility touted Republican Governor decided to go one better. The Florida Legislature passed a bill, and the Republican Governor signed it into law, setting January 29th as the date for the Presidential Preference Primary here in Florida. Yep, setting election dates is the job of the state legislature here in Florida, not the political parties.

Now Adam Smith is going to say that a Democrat introduced the bill moving the primary up to January 29. Ding, ding, ding. Give Adam the boobie prize. Yes, the Republican leadership in the legislature did find a dumber than a box of rocks freshman Democratic Senator to introduce the bill. I hope he got what they promised him. Adam, how about having your crack research team check out how many Democratic sponsored bills that did not have the full support of the Republican Leadership even got a Committee hearing? Let's put that red herring to rest. This was a Republican bill all the way.

But, but, but all the Dem legislators voted for this bill. Well, yeah. Included in the final bill was a provision to give the voters of Florida a voter verifiable paper ballot. This had to be about the number one priority of Democrats, to know that their votes are going to count. No Dem was going to vote against that. What, you think all Republicans are stupid? Let's make this deep breath number three.

Why is the DNC taking such a seemingly hard line on this issue? Not all the states are done tinkering with their primary dates yet. From the New York Times:

Committee members made it clear that they wanted to send a message to any state that might be looking to change its primary; the vote came as Michigan leaders are looking to move that state’s primary to Jan. 15.

The DNC action was as much about scaring Michigan off of these plans as it was about Florida. The DNC is hoping that come the end of September, Michigan will have decided it is too late to move their primary up into January.

Now for those of you who actually are worried about their delegate credentials , um , er, disfranchising the voters, there is this from the Florida Democratic Party:

(FDP Chair Karen)Thurman suggested the penalties may be meaningless because the winning presidential nominee "will make the final decision on whether there are delegates or not.''

That's right. Under DNC rules, the presumptive nominee will take control of the Democratic National Convention, including the Credentials Committee. So Florida Dems will vote on January 29th in a binding Presidential Preference Primary. At the end of the day, the presumptive nominee will have the final say on the seating of delegates.

So, get your favorite credentials holding lanyard out of moth balls. Quit bitching at each other. Take a deep breath and help us

Bill Nelson in Bradenton Today

2007-08-21T05:31:00.000-04:00

Florida Democratic Senator Bill Nelson is holding another Town Hall meeting in the Bay Area today. Nelson will be at the Bradenton City Hall at 3:30 this afternoon.

Earlier this month, Nelson held a Town Hall meeting in Pasco County. That's where he ran into Susan S. The result of that encounter was a diary by Susan atop the Rec List at DailyKos.

As Susan wrote it on DKos, that encounter went like this:

Nelson decided that since no one else had brought up the Iraq War, he would tell us his take on it. Unfortunately for him, he began his explanation with a disclaimer about how he and the Congress had been lied to about the intelligence going into the war. Well that was it for me. I yelled out to him:

"Then why, when you know they can't be trusted, when you know they lie to you, did you vote for the FISA bill that gives the incompetent Bush administration more power to spy on American citizens?"

Then, when the St. Petersburg Times mischaracterized her confrontation with Nelson, Susan wrote an excellent letter taking the Times to task for their careless reporting.

So, fellow Kossacks, anybody going to be in Bradenton today?

Leaving Money on the Table and Kids Uninsured

2007-08-14T11:19:00.000-04:00

In a story in today's Orlando Sentinel, we get the following intertwined pieces of information:

Florida ranks 43rd in the country when it comes to children's health-insurance coverage, said Dr. Edward Zissman, chief executive officer of Altamonte Pediatric Associates.

And from the same source, there is this:

Last year, Florida returned $20 million in 2005 federal matching dollars because it did not enroll enough children.

The federal grant matches 71 cents for every 29 cents the state spends, said Tara Klimek, a spokeswoman for state Chief Financial Officer Alex Sink. Since 1998 the state has returned $140 million, she said.

What can be done about this abysmal situation? State Rep. Scott Randolph, D-Orlando, has an idea. Randolph called on Gov. Charlie Crist to include KidCare reform in next month's special session.

"We've got to put this on the calendar or face losing federal matching dollars," Randolph said. "For every dollar we refuse to put in . . . we send $3 back to Washington."

The US House of Representatives recently passed an expansion of the SCHIP program. However, Florida's Republican Representatives voted against this bill. The DCCC responded by launching radio ads targeting these Roadblock Republicans. At least one of the targets, Old Bill Young, did not take kindly to being targeted. Bill Young

angrily pointed to a new radio ad campaign this week by Democrats accusing him of opposing increased benefits in Medicare for seniors.

Maybe Charlie Crist will have a more temperate response to the health care needs of Florida's children?

The Face(s) of the Democratic Party

2007-08-13T17:49:00.000-04:00

I purposely did not embed this as a YouTube link. That's because I just want you to focus on this picture.

What is remarkable about it? Is it the words that were said on this program? Follow me below the fold...

On Sunday, August 11, 2007, Markos Moulitsas and Harold Ford Jr. faced off on Meet the Press to talk about the future of the Democratic Party. The words that were spoken on this program have sparked dozens of diaries and probably thousands of comments by now.

That a conversation between the founder of DailyKos and the Chairman of the DLC would even be on Meet the Press is remarkable enough in and of itself. But take another look at this image. What do you see? I see a 37 year old black man (Harold Ford, Jr) and a 36 year old Hispanic / Greek man (Markos Moulitsas). I see the future (and the present) of the Democratic Party. This is the Democratic Party whose contenders for the Presidential nomination this cycle include a woman, an African American and an Hispanic.

This is the Democratic Party that always has and still does look more like America than the other guys. The values of the Democratic Party are the values of the vast majority of Americans. This is the Democratic Party that proudly displays its diversity. This is the Democratic Party that shares the values of The Progressive Majority in this country.

So take another look at that picture. While you are doing so, remember that the values that unite us are greater than the issues that divide us. If we can remember that, we will retake the White House in 2008 and expand our majorities in Congress.

Hispanics Up for Grabs

2007-08-13T11:55:00.000-04:00

From Progressive America at Daily Kos comes this diary based on a Miami Herald article:

http://www.dailykos.com/story/2007/8/13/105055/065

The Democrats need to find and support good state and local candidates in 2008, but we also have to build our image as a party. I hope all of us are working with our DECs to make that happen.

Susan S - On the Money Again

2007-08-12T09:47:00.000-04:00

Susan S, whose courage to stand up for the truth translated into a Top of The Rec List Diary on DailyKos, has done it again. After the St. Petersburg Times mischaracterized her confrontation with Sen. Bill Nelson on FISA at Nelson's Pasco County Town Hall Meeting on Monday, Susan did not take it sitting down.

Susan wrote this excellent letter to the editor of the Times. The Times article characterized Susan's challenge to Nelson this way:

Why did he vote for a bill that allows expanded secret eavesdropping of foreign terrorists' phone calls?

Susan, in her letter, points out that her actual questions was:

why did he trust the Bush administration with expanded power to spy on American citizens without a warrant?

Susan's letter goes on to what, for me, is the money quote:

My outrage and that being expressed in editorials around the country is not about spying on foreign terrorists, it's about spying on American citizens.

This type of inaccurate reporting by the mainstream media (on the meaning of the FISA vote) is exactly the reason that an embarrassing number of American citizens still think Saddam was involved in the planning of 9/11. It might also explain why the public hasn't taken to the streets with pitchforks over the decimation of our Constitution by the Bush administration and its enablers in Congress.

I stopped writing this post to watch Kos and Harold Ford on Meet The Press. One of the points that stuck me in that "debate" was Markos saying that his biggest accomplishment was providing a forum where politicians and citizens could could converse without the mainstream "media filter". After MTP, I watched Harold Troxler on Brendan McLaughlin's excellent show, Flashpoint. At the end of their discussion McLuaghlin asked Troxler about the future of the printed newspaper. Troxler was quite right in describing the need amongst the public for good journalistic information. Maybe the newspaper poohbahs ought to be thinking more about the filters they put on that information.

Thank you, Susan, for exposing that MSM filter. I also want to thank you for giving credit where credit is due. You rightly pointed out that Congresswoman Kathy Castor voted against the FISA bill, as did the vast majority of the Democrats in Congress. Now we just need to keep working on our recalcitrant minority Dems.

The Day Conservatism Died

2007-08-10T17:44:00.000-04:00

I was reading this comment in Vyan's excellent diary: Gitmo Lawyers Challenge FISA Bill in Court :

Right-wing could mean libertarian. (3+ / 0-)

Genuine libertarians are appalled by the administration's assault on civil liberties.

It struck me that true Conservatives would be as appalled by the Bush Administration's behavior as true Progressives. So where is the outrage from the conservative side? When was the day that Conservatism died?

To try to find out, follow me...

To begin my search for the day Conservatism died, I went looking for what a live conservative would look like. I came across this 50 year old document, The Essence of Conservatism, written by Russell Kirk in 1957:

Conservative principles shelter the hopes of everyone in society. And conservatism is a social concept important to everyone who desires equal justice and personal freedom and all the lovable old ways of humanity.

Look again at these words used to define conservatism by the man who:

gave shape to the amorphous post-World War II conservative movement

These words bear repeating:

conservatism is a social concept important to everyone who desires equal justice and personal freedom

Does anybody believe that really describes the so called conservatives of today? And if not, who killed those conservatives?

So called "social" or "family values" conservatives seem to rule the political right today. What are their values and how do they compare to Russell Kirk? It didn't take a lot of digging to find out. From About.com - Conservative Politics: US we get first What Conservatives Are Not :

A little look at some misrepresentations of conservatives and conservative views - to dispel the myths and smear efforts and to set things straight.

Interesting that today's "conservatives" start off by defining themselves as what they are not as opposed to Kirk's:

conservatism is a social concept important to everyone who desires equal justice and personal freedom and all the lovable old ways of humanity

Pressing on, we get again from About.com - Conservative Politics: US, Conservative Values Part 1: Social Issues:

Social conservatives are concerned about maintaining a social order where the family can stay strong and healthy.

Interesting again that today's conservatives are:

concerned about maintaining ... order

and not about equal justice and personal freedom of Kirk's conservatives of 50 years ago.

But there is more. We also have a discussion about today's fiscal conservatives:

Fiscal conservatives want to encourage low taxes, free trade, and small government.

Really? Let's look at this a little more closely.

On Business and the Economy we get:

The government should avoid meddling in business. ... Class warfare should be avoided and unions should remain accountable to the workers they represent.

There's freedom - for business. But be sure to avoid that class warfare thing and definitely hold unions accountable. Conservative?

It gets better. On Energy and Environment:

The United States government should enact policies that would encourage smart energy use and an increased supply of clean, efficient energy sources. ...The government should open access to domestic oil sources and thus reduce America's dependence on foreign oil. It should eliminate policies that place undue restrictions on companies with little benefit to the environment.

Well, that started off pretty good, but quickly deteriorated into that don't mess with them oil drillin' fellers conservatism. Apparently alternative, renewable energy is not on the agenda of today's conservative values.

And finally on Spending, we get:

government spending should be limited to activities that are are outlined by the Constitution

they then go on to quote Thomas Jefferson about government spending. The same Thomas Jefferson who executed the Louisiana Purchase, the authority for which can be found nowhere in the Constitution.

The conservatism of the post World War II conservatives is dead in this country. The social conservatives and the Grover Norquists' of today have killed it. In place of the:

equal justice and personal freedom

of the old, dead conservatives, we have today's conservatives who value:

maintaining ... order

low taxes, free trade, and small government

The government should avoid meddling in business

The government should open access to domestic oil sources

government spending should be limited to activities that are are outlined by the Constitution

Nowhere in today's lists of conservative values and principles do we see the concept of equal justice and personal freedom.

I don't know what day conservatism died in America. But it is most assuredly dead.

Budget Balancing on the Backs of the Needy

2007-08-08T17:03:00.000-04:00

Poor pregnant women; hospitals and poor immigrants; missing children; and law abiding citizens. What do all these groups have in common? They are all about to bear the brunt of the state budget balancing measures. Maybe.

The Miami Herald has a story today about various proposals being floated for balancing the budget when the legislature meets for its special session in September. Cost-cutting recommendations from more than two dozen state agencies are due to Gov. Charlie Crist and legislative leaders today. These measures are needed help close a more than $1 billion budget shortfall, due to a sluggish economy that has sapped tax collections. Legislators will meet to decide what to cut on Sept. 18 when they convene for a three-week special session.

Lets repeat what is causing all this scrooge like activity:

a sluggish economy that has sapped tax collections.

Make that sales tax collections. This tax revenue fluctuates notoriously in line with the Florida economy. With the slowness in the housing market spilling over into other parts of the economy, state services are facing the budget cutting axe. And still we have certain state legislators who think replacing the property tax with a much higher state sales tax is a good idea.

Here's what would be a good idea: Legislators who think this is a good idea should be turned out of office to find another line of work. Another good idea? Get in touch with your state legislators to make sure they know you do not want the most needy in the state to bear the largest burden in this special session of service cutting.

Majority of the Majority

2007-08-07T22:55:00.000-04:00

Progressives have been mightily unhappy with the performance of the newly elected Democratic Congress. While there have been some successes such as the minimum wage increase, ethics reform and the expansion of SCHIP, the children's health care program, there have been some notable failures and setbacks.

The failure to change course in Iraq and the miserable kneel down to Bush on warrantless wiretapping are two of the biggest failures. And yet these things happened with majorities of Democrats voting against them.

When Dennis Hastert was Speaker of the House, he had a rule. He called it the Majority of the Majority. What was this rule and how could it help the Democrats legislate as Democrats? Follow me below the fold...

In a little noticed speech in 2003 Hastert said:

The job of speaker is not to expedite legislation that runs counter to the wishes of the majority of his majority.

What is the significance of this rule? How did Hastert use it? The rule first gained wide spread notice in late 2004. That is when the House scuttled a vote on a Conference Report on the Intelligence Reform Bill. Here is what the Washington Post had to say:

Hastert elected to keep it from reaching a vote, even though his aides said it could have passed with a minority of GOP members and strong support from the chamber's 206 Democrats.

Hastert was, of course, roundly criticized by House Democrats back then. Then Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi:

(Republicans) like to talk about bipartisanship. But when the opportunity came to pass a truly bipartisan bill -- one that would have passed both the House and Senate overwhelmingly and would have made the American people safer -- they failed to do it.

Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi has apparently not changed her opinion of the Majority of the Majority rule. After the Iraq supplemental funding bill was passed without withdrawal time lines in May, despite 61 percent of House Democrats voting against it, Pelosi said:

I’m the Speaker of the House. I have to take into consideration something broader than the majority of the majority.

Something broader than the majority of the majority? Suppose the Democrats enforced the majority of the majority rule back in May? No supplemental Iraq funding bill without time lines would have been brought to the House floor for a vote. This would have necessitated a decrease in troop levels or a complete withdrawal, something 66 % of Americans support.

Something broader than the majority of the majority? How about the Constitution of the United States? 77% of Democrats opposed the so called Protect America Act giving the Bush administration more warrantless wiretapping powers. Under the majority of the majority rule, this bill would not have even come up for a vote.

Democrats have it within their power to make change in America. They were elected to the majority in 2006 to make change in America. If they would use the majority of the majority rule, we would have change in America.

Shield Law a Step Closer

2007-08-07T15:37:00.001-04:00

I posted a diary on Kos some time ago about the Bush administration attacking a proposed shield law that would also cover bloggers. It attracted very little attention from the Kos community - the ones I expected to be most interested in this new law.

The so called "Shield" has not been codified at the federal level and has always been a gray area with many journalists suffering the consequences when refusing to give up their sources.

The fact that this real Federal Shield Law might be extended to cover the blogging community should have, IMNSHO, been of great interest to the blogisphere. Well I've been wrong before and I was wrong yet again. Now that the law is a step closer to becoming a reality I hope the blogisphere will become more interested and who knows maybe even provide some support for the Law.

We have lost some ground already in that the afore mentioned Bush administration attack has resulted in limiting the shield to "ad supported" bloggers. I fear that if we do not become more actively and vocally involved, bloggers will be dropped from the Shield Law altogether.

WASHINGTON--A congressional panel on Wednesday voted, against the Bush administration's wishes, to shield journalists including advertising-supported bloggers from having to reveal their confidential sources in many situations.

Come on folks there has never been a real federal shield law much less one that recognizes bloggers as JOURNALISTS.

In response to concerns raised by the Bush administration and other politicians, the revised bill attempts to exclude the "casual blogger" from reaping those benefits by stipulating the protections apply only to those who derive "financial gain or livelihood" from the journalistic activity, Boucher said Wednesday. That broad rule could, however, include part-time writers who receive even a trickle of revenue from Google Ads or Blogads.com.

LINK to the full story by ZDnet News.

LINK to the house bill H.R. 2102

(cross posted on Kos)

Kevin Beckner: Candidate For HCC District 6

2007-08-06T19:45:00.000-04:00

Democrat Kevin Beckner is running for the Hillsborough County Commission. He is attempting to unseat Brian Blair. Breckner is a former law enforcement officer and President of Leadership Tampa Bay. He is running on a platform of growth management and environmental protection. Although, his form of environmentalism is very business-friendly.

Listen to him on the wetlands issue: "The wetlands serve this environment in ways we may not understand. If we can streamline this [development approval] process and make it easier for developers, I'm for that. But everybody needs to come to the table" to ensure that wetlands aren't harmed as a result.

Here is his environmental position from his web site.

Our environmental resources are one of our most precious commodities. Once damaged or destroyed, they can rarely be replenished or restored. Each of us are charged with being good stewards of our environmental resources. As a community, we must thoughtfully balance future land use with respect to our environment, develop and implement prudent plans for cleaner air and water conservation, and protect our beaches, rivers, and streams from potentially harmful and toxic waste.

As County Commissioner, I will support economically feasible "green" initiatives that both enhance the quality and preservation of our environment and provide the community with short and long term economic benefits.

"Feasible" means Beckner will view how green initiatives affect corporations.

Beckner is gay and a member of Equality Florida. He participated in a March Gay Pride parade.

Tampa Bay Democrat has a post on Beckner's candidacy.

Beckner is asking supporters to sign the petition to get his name on the ballot. He needs 6,634 signatures.

Susan S Tops The List

2007-08-06T19:13:00.000-04:00

Our own Florida Kossack, Susan S has a diary atop the Rec List right now at DailyKos. Susan attended the Pasco County Town Hall meeting of Senator Bill Nelson today. She was all prepared to ask him about his vote on the FISA bill last Friday. He didn't call on her. He did talk about how he was lied to to get him to vote for the Iraq war.

That was it for Susan. She did what any good citizen is supposed to do. She called Nelson to account. You need to read her diary, if you haven't already. As Susan was posting her diary, I was writing one here about Nelson's prior town hall meeting that morning in Pinellas. I was styling my meager effort as a (mostly) straight up news story. That's pretty much how I attended the town hall, just as a reporter. Susan attended the Pasco town hall as a citizen. Susan had the better idea.

Ironically, I ended my story on the Pinellas town hall with this:

Nelson continued his vacation with another Town Hall meeting later in the day in Pasco County. Enjoy your "vacation", Senator Nelson.

I wondered how much he enjoyed it when Susan was done with him.

Susan, you rock!

Bill Nelson Pinellas Town Hall

2007-08-06T14:00:00.000-04:00

Bill Nelson started off his August Congressional "vacation" by holding a Town Hall meeting in Pinellas County today. Nelson answered questions for one hour from the over 150 in attendance. One remarkable thing about this event? Nobody asked about Iraq.

The first question Nelson fielded did allude to the Bush administrations trampling of civil rights in the guise of the global war on terror. Nelson professed not to know about a controversial classified Executive Order recently issued by Bush. He did talk about this weekend's FISA vote however. He stressed that what was done was a temporary measure that sunsets in six months. Nelson went on to say that the legislation was meant to protect the warrant requirement for US Persons, but not for foreign sources. Nelson lambasted the "mishandling" of the Terrorist Surveillance Program for the last five years. There was also the chance to bash embattled Attorney General Alberto Gonzales. Nelson related that one of the biggest sticking points in the bill was the administrations' insistence that the Attorney General be in charge of certifying compliance for this program. Nelson said this was unacceptable to a bipartisan group of Senators. The solution? Having the Director of National Intelligence share this responsibility.

OK, now we have a man that nobody believes and the man in charge of spying certifying compliance for this spy program. Some compromise. And as the 2008 election will be all that much closer in 6 months, does anybody expect that the Congress will show more backbone then?

The questions next turned to domestic issues. Nelson said that a wholesale reform of health insurance delivery would be coming "down the road". Nelson, a former Florida Insurance Commissioner explained that the principle of insurance - spreading risk over large pools of people - was just not working in health insurance. The reason - health insurance pools are too fragmented. The current system only seems to work, if at all, for very large employers. Nelson did tout the recent passage of the children's health care program (SCHIP). Nelson also said that legislation would be introduced soon to induce health insurers to provide more mental health benefits. In response to a question about support for a breast cancer research program, Nelson related how on his space shuttle flight, his primary experiment was for cancer research. He did this shortly after a very dear friend had died from breast cancer.

Nelson got a couple of questions from local elected officials, who were well represented in the audience. The first came from a Gulfport City Commissioner who asked for help regarding changes in the rules for Community Development Block Grants. Nelson responded that his office would be happy to assist in helping communities obtain the grants, but seemed to miss the impact of the change in rules on these communities. He did take the opportunity to point out how the property tax "reform" in the Florida Legislature has impacted his office. He is now getting deluged with requests for Federal funding from local governments. Seems the local governments are turning to the Federal government for funding projects and programs that were once funded by their own property tax revenues or by the state.

The other question was from St. Petersburg City Council Member Renee Flowers, who also is the President of the Florida League of Cities this year. Flowers asked for Nelson's help in securing adequate funds for affordable housing, including the re-authorization of Hope VI grants. Nelson said that the prospects were grim for passage due to the requirement in the Senate to get 60 votes to move a bill. Nelson said that as long as the administration opposed a funding level, Bush's Republican enablers in the Senate would make sure that the 60 votes would not be forthcoming.

Nelson was asked about the upcoming re authorization of No Child Left Behind. His initial response was that he was in favor of fully funding NCLB, something the Bush Administration has not done. As he continued to talk about NCLB, however, he seemed to be talking himself into some major modifications to the program, if he was to vote for re authorization at all.

When asked about outsourcing of jobs, Nelson responded that there were no simple answers in this complicated, interconnected world. He did say he favored changing the tax code to remove rewards for companies off shoring jobs. He went on to say that in order to remain competitive in a global economy, America's advantage would be its intellectual capital, which all comes back to education.

The final question came from Linda Osmundson, Director of CASA (Community Actions Stops Abuse). She asked for help in increasing the availability of FHA Section 8 vouchers. The availability of these vouchers has all but dried up. CASA has used these vouchers to place battered women in temporary housing as a way stop in helping these dislocated victims find permanent housing. Nelson failed to see the particular significance of this question and referred back to his previous answer about affordable housing funding and the 60 vote roadblock. Seems to me the answer is to elect a bigger Democratic majority and get a Democrat in the White House in 2008.

Nelson closed the meeting by noting that no one had asked him about Iraq. He then proceeded to explain his position on Iraq. Mainly, he supports the Iraq Study Group conclusions that the US should have begun a phased withdrawal of troops from Iraq and a change in the mission of the remaining troops. That changed mission would be to provide training for Iraqi forces; to provide border security and force protection and targeted missions against Al Qaeda in Iraq. Nelson also pointed out the ISG's call for increased diplomatic activity to create a regional solution for Iraq. This allowed him to point out his earlier visit to Syria and the criticism he had received. However, he is getting the last laugh as the administration now seems to be talking more to the Syrians, and they are even talking to the Iranian Ambassador in Baghdad.

Overall, this was a good performance for Nelson. He has been doing Town Hall meetings for 35 years and is very comfortable in this format. Despite my nitpicking above, he answered all questions put to him. He talked about what a privilege it was for him to serve. You got the feeling that he meant it. While I do not always agree with Bill Nelsons' votes on specific issues, he is a trustworthy man of his convictions. As Ronald Reagan said, someone who votes with you 80% of the time is your friend, not your enemy.

Nelson continued his vacation with another Town Hall meeting later in the day in Pasco County. Enjoy your "vacation", Senator Nelson.

Yearly Kos

2007-08-04T17:22:00.001-04:00

Howard Dean speaks at Yearly Kos and asks the netroots to lobby to improve voting machines.

Dean: “This is not a one day or one election struggle. This is something we have to do every single day for the rest of our lives… And when we get knocked down, we’re going to stand up again for the core principles of America, because America was knocked down by the far-right wing of the Republican Party in the last eight years. And by God, we’re going to get up and recover and stand up for what we used to stand up for. We are going to regain the moral leadership that made America a great country. And we are going to live again in America and stand up and lead the world to the promised land.”

Dean gets the crowd going talking about forcing Republicans to vote on Iraq.

Update: Jill Filipovic is liveblogging a Q and A session with Democratic presidential candidates at YK.

Update: Jill reports that Mike Gravel's tax plan bombed with the crowd.

Sen. Gravel was just asked about his tax structure, which would eliminate the IRS and institute a 23 percent sales and service tax. Joan asks him how low-income people are going to survive waiting for their rebate check every month.

Gravel responds that “you need to know how politics works.” Everyone hisses. He says not to worry about the Fair Tax, because it will never pass Congress. He discusses the corruption and the structural flaws in Congress. “The answer is with you, the American people, to acquire law-making power. That is where the power lies.”

Gravel's national sales tax program is horrible.

Update: Amanda Marcotte reports that Hillary Clinton got slammed by Edwards and Obama.

Jill and I were sitting together at the Presidential forum, and she liveblogged the whole thing. Check it out. Hillary Clinton got the worst of it, I think, because Edwards and Obama tagged her for taking money from Washington lobbyists and she couldn’t squirm out of it. That said, I felt that her first attempt to answer accusations about taking lobbyist money was honest and reasonable—she feels the system puts you in this situation and that it’s hardly a singular, personal failing. Fair enough, but in the end, she had a hard time convincing the admittedly tough crowd at Yearly Kos that she was sincere in wishing that it could be different. Then she blew it completely by denying that the money lobbyists spend has the amount of influence that it does, giving Edwards and Obama a chance to pounce and point out what’s obvious—lobbyists would not spend billions of dollars if they weren’t buying influence.

It's amazing how Hillary always tries to say something to please everyone and ends up alienating all.

Update: It gets better. Ezra Klein has a great take on the crowd's reaction to Hillary's lobbying money defense. This is comical.

Hillary Clinton on Edwards' challenge to stop taking lobbyist money: "I certainly think thats a position Sen, Edwards has taken." Yes, indeed it is. She then says that "I've been in politics for 35-years, and I think it's silly for anyone to think that money impacts my positions." The crowd laughs at her then boos.

Hillary's a horrible candidate. Having a great campaign staff and famous last name doesn't hide it. There are so many women in the Democratic Party more worthy of the attention Hillary is receiving.

RoadBlock Republicans Vote AGAINST Health Care for Children

2007-08-02T11:20:00.000-04:00

Tampa Bay's Roadblock Republicans showed their true colors once again yesterday. How did they do it this time? They voted against Hr 3162 a bill

to extend and improve the children's health insurance program, to improve beneficiary protections under the Medicare, Medicaid, and the CHIP program

Here is the list of Tampa Bay's Roadblock Republicans who voted against health care for children:

Gus Bilirakis
Ginny Brown-Waite
Vern Buchanan
Adam Putnam
Bill Young

What is the matter with these people? Why would they vote against expanding health care for children? Here is the red herring that Ginny Browne-Waite threw out responding to a letter from Charlie Crist supporting this initiative:

"I am disappointed that your letter fails to mention that SCHIP funding should not come at the expense of Florida's seniors."

Where is Ginny Brown-Waite getting this idea? Here is what the far right Human Events Magazine reports:

cutting $157 billion from the Medicare Advantage ... This scenario could result in seniors losing their current health care provider or being subjected to increased costs and decreased services.

But what is Congress really doing? They are cutting subsidies to Medicare Advantage HMO's. These are the insurance industry darlings who pushed through the Republican controlled Congress the hare brained scheme that they should be paid more than traditional Medicare benefits for denying more services.

So these Roadblock Republicans are not really standing up for seniors. They are standing up for insurance companies instead of providing more health care for children.

Isn't it time to get rid of these people?

Sick Joke Part 2

2007-07-27T16:15:00.001-04:00

An update on my previous post about Tim Fasano's candidacy. He has not filed to run for the district 11 seat. That means he is breaking the law by having a campaign website. Good work, Tim. Below is a list of canidates that have filed.

Hat tip to Gene Smith.

Representative District Candidate Status Primary General

001 Roberts, Joe (DEM) Active

002 Boyd, Allen (DEM) *Incumbent Active
Flowers, Mark (REP) Active
Ortiz, Robert (REP) Active

004 Crenshaw, Ander (REP) *Incumbent Active

005 Brown-Waite, Ginny (REP) *Incumbent Active

006 Stearns, Clifford (REP) *Incumbent Active

007 Tart, Louis Jack (CPF) Active

008 Kroehler, Corbett M. (DEM) Active
Van, Quoc (DEM) Active

009 Mitchell, Bill (DEM) Active

010 Simpson, Samm (DEM) Active

012 Putnam, Adam H. (REP) *Incumbent Active

013 LaFevers, Michael S. (DEM) Active

014 George, Jeff (NPA) Active

015 Blythe, Stephen Lee (DEM) Active
Rancatore, Paul (DEM) Active

016 Harrell, Gayle (REP) Active
Rooney, Thomas Joseph (REP) Active
Valeche, Hal R. (REP) Active

021 Diaz-Balard, Lincoln (REP) *Incumbent Active
Santoro, Dean (REP) Active

022 Flagg, Marc (REP) Active

023 Hastings, Alcee L. (DEM) *Incumbent Active
Sanchez, Ray Torres (DEM) Active
Thorpe Jr., Marion D. (REP) Active

024 Curtis, Clint (DEM) Active

025 Diaz-Balard, Mario (REP) *Incumbent Active

Not the Vern Buchanan We Know

2007-07-26T17:24:00.000-04:00

The Bradenton Herald printed an editorial puff piece on Vern Buchanan July 24, 2007. This editorial is so contrary to the facts it makes us want to shout out:

Earth to Bradenton Herald: this is not the Vern Buchanan we know.

Let's take a look at some quotes from the Bradenton Herald and then just the facts ma'am.

Bradenton Herald:

Buchanan has proven to be a strong force for bipartisanship in a Congress polarized by partisan feuding.

Fact:

Buchanan votes 92.6% of the time with Republicans. Buchanan was not even in the top 20 Republicans to break with the Republican Party on significant votes according to CQ's Party Unity Score .

Bradenton Herald:

So far, Buchanan is sticking by President Bush on the biggest issue, the Iraq War, but that support is not open-ended

The Facts:

He has continually and consistently supported the President's failed Iraq War policies with no signs of stopping. As recently as July 12th, Buchanan voted against setting a timeline for responsible redeployment of our troops. In May, he voted against setting benchmarks that would force the Iraqi people to take responsibility for their own security. Both of these votes came after visiting Iraq and witnessing the problems firsthand, he called it "mission impossible" and said he was "doubtful" we could succeed.

What is not open ended about that?

Bradenton Herald:

high on Buchanan's radar is funding for veterans' care

The facts:

Buchanan voted against a historic and much-needed $6.6 billion increase in funding for veterans' health care programs. He didn't even show up to vote for the largest increase in veterans' health care funding in the 77-year history of the Veterans Administration. He also missed the vote that allotted the long awaited national cemetery its funding. So much for his top priority. Just what were you doing that was so important you missed that vote, Vern?

Bradenton Herald:

His campaign to balance the federal budget

Fact:

Buchanan voted against requiring the House to follow pay-as-you-go rules so that the budget can stay balanced.

So much for that campaign, eh Vern?

So, Bradenton Herald, who was this guy you wrote about? It is certainly not the Vern Buchanan that we know.

City Council Money Race

2007-07-26T10:30:00.000-04:00

Now that the match ups have been settled for the St. Petersburg City Council elections this year, it is time to take a look at how the fund raising race is going. Money does not always equate success in local elections (see John McQueen in 2003, or Darden Rice in 2005), but it can provide some clues.

Leading the money race at this point is Gershom Faulkner running for Renee Flowers seat, District 7. Faulkner has raised an astounding $9,933 in the reporting period ending June 30th. Faulkner started raising money in earnest in April when he garnered over $2,000. Much of this money was raised from connections he had made in Tallahassee during his tenure as legislative assistant to State Rep. Frank Peterman. This money can also be viewed as the high regard Faulkner is held in by his Tallahassee contacts.

In May and June, Faulkner turned to his fund raising ability in St. Petersburg. Supporters such as State Senator Charlie Justice, and State Reps. Bill Heller and Rick Kriseman helped him raise the balance of the $ 9,900. The good news for Faulkner, he has yet to tap the fundraising assistance from many more of his high profile supporters including County Commissioners Ken Welch and Calvin Harris. Also, Rep. Frank Peterman has yet to tap his fundraising base for Faulkner.

The bad news for Gershom Faulkner? He spent $8,700 this past quarter. Much of this money went to his high profile Campaign Manager, Mitch Kates. However, a substantial portion also went into campaign literature most of which is still in inventory.

Wengay Newton, Faulkners' opponent in the general election in November has raised only $2,300 to date. Like Faulkner, he has already spent most of it. Newton has spent over $1,600 to date. This doesn't leave him with a lot of cash on hand either.

The other big money raiser is Ed Montanari. Montanari will be facing a September primary in the race for the Distrcit 3 seat being vacated by Bill Foster. Montanari raised $6,400, the vast majority of it in June alone. Unlike his counterparts in District 7, Montanari has spent only a paltry $743 to date. Most of that ($500) went for consulting fees to the Mallard Group in Clearwater. Montanari better hope Mallard will break out of the losing streak they went on in 2006.

In contrast, Montanaris' opponents have raised only $2,300 combined. Bill Dudley, who lost this race to Bill Foster in 2003 has raised only $819 to date. This despite the fact that he has been running for this seat for the past 4 years. Cathy Harrelson contributed the $500 that her campaign reported raising this period. She did not officially get into the race until June. The fourth person in this race, Cliff Gephart, has yet to file a campaign finance report.

In the District 1 race, Herb Poslon, appointed to the Council to replace Rick Kriseman, raised $2,625 this period. $1,000 came from the Polson family. Herb's wife wrote a $500 check to the campaign and Herb loaned $500. Polson spent a considerable amount already on campaign start up costs, but still had $1,300 cash remaining at the end of the reporting period. Polson's opponent, former Council Member Bob Kersteen, loaned his campaign $100. This is the total extent of Kersteen's fundraising so far.

In District 5, incumbent Jamie Bennett was waiting to see if he was going to draw an opponent. He has only loaned his campaign $500 so far. He wound up drawing two last minute opponents, Chris Kelly and Debra Woodard. Neither of the challengers have had to file a finance report as of yet.

Hillarys Achilles Heel

2007-07-24T22:22:00.000-04:00

Hillary Clinton leads all her rivals in the preseason polls for the Democratic Presidential nomination. She has been holding a double digit national lead for the last eight months. But before we hold the coronation, there is something that is worth taking a look at. It just might not be all over yet. And at least one candidate seems to be getting it.

What might Hillary's Achilles Heel be? And who is going after it? All this and more, below the fold...

Last month the Washington Post had this headline: Clinton Owes Lead in Poll To Support From Women . The lead for the story reads like this:

The consistent lead that Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton of New York has maintained over Sen. Barack Obama of Illinois and others in the race for the 2008 Democratic presidential nomination is due largely to one factor: her support from women.

The story goes on to say:

Her 15-point lead in the poll is entirely attributable to that margin.

Entirely attributable to women. Remarkable. Or is it?

A Newsweek poll earlier this year found

86% say they would vote for a qualified woman candidate for president if their party nominated one. But when they were asked whether America is ready to elect a woman president, only 55% say yes.

Interestingly, Newsweek said

men are more likely than women to say the country is ready for a woman president.

To get only 55% support for the ready for a woman president question with men more likely than women to say yes, a majority of women polled must have said no.

And there is this little tidbit from the Washington Post again:

In a Post-ABC News poll conducted in April, 43 percent of female independents said they definitely will not vote for her if she is the Democratic nominee

So in a strange twist of fate, it seems that women are the Achilles Heel of Hillary Clintons' Presidential aspirations. A majority of women don't believe that the country is yet ready for a woman president. And a very significant number of independent women are definitely not ready for Hillary Clinton.

So, do any of the other campaigns seem to understand this about Clinton? Again from the Post:

Harrison Hickman, a pollster for Edwards, said he believes there is potential for Clinton's early bond with these voters to falter. "When you talk to women in more detail, they express doubts," Hickman said. Only when rival campaigns start trying to exploit those doubts, and when Clinton's camp starts addressing them, will the polls start to paint a more meaningful portrait of the race, he said.

So what is the Edwards camp doing about it? They are rolling out their not so secret weapon, Elizabeth Edwards:

The wife of the Democratic presidential hopeful from North Carolina, John Edwards, is taking the starring role in a new campaign commercial for her husband.

“You’re not going to outsmart him. He works harder than any human being that I know, always has, “ says Edwards, in the television ad now playing in the crucial early primary state of New Hampshire.

Elizabeth Edwards is also going directly after Hillary:

she fired away at Hillary Clinton, telling the on-line magazine Salon that “sometimes you feel you have to behave as a man and not talk about women’s issues. I’m sympathetic; she wants to be commander in chief. But she’s just not as vocal a women’s advocate as I want to see. John is.”

Here is something else from John Edwards about his wife speaking her own mind:

it appears he’s just fine with his wife speaking her mind, telling us that “nothing about Elizabeth surprises me. You can’t control what she says, nor would I ever want to, that’s one of the great things about her.”

Seems to me that is the kind of thing women voters would want to hear from a male candidate about his attitude towards women.

St. Pete Council Races Set

2007-07-24T16:56:00.000-04:00

Yesterday was the close of qualifying for St. Pete City Council races. There will be two primaries in September. In District 3 where Bill Foster is term limited out and in District 5, where Jamie Bennett is running for reelection.

District 3 is the only seat up this cycle that is currently held by a Republican. The Democrats only chance to pick up this seat rests on the shoulders of Cathy Harrelson. Harrelson is an investment advisor and financial professional. She is also a past President of the Sierra Club, although that is not prominently featured on her web site. Also, her campaign is being run by Darden Rice, another Sierra Club leader. Rice ran and lost against Ernest Williams in 2005. This despite raising $50,000.

There are two Republicans running to keep this seat on their side of the ledger. Bill Dudley, a retired high school wrestling coach is running again after losing to Bill Foster in the general election in 2003. Ed Montanari is the remaining candidate. He ran Bill Foster's campaign in 2003. Ed is a commerical airline pilot and was Chair of the Albert Whitted Advisory Task Force. This is going to be the toughest race in the City this cycle.

Jamie Bennett has drawn 2 opponents in his bid to retain the City Council seat he first won in 2001. Bennett was unopposed in 2003 and was hoping to get a campaign this time. Bennett has aspirations to run for Mayor in 2009 and wants a platform to start that campaign. Well, he certainly got one. Chris Kelly, another Democrat has filed to run. Kelly is co-founder of Pinellas Heritage and is a former President of the Historic Roser Park Neighborhood Association. Also running is Debra Woodard. Woodard is a 55 year old African American Democrat. Unfortunately not much else is know about Ms. Woodard at this point. The Republicans apparently were unable to come up with a challenger despite the rantings of Dave the Appraiser. Well, better luck next time Dave (not). One would have to give the early edge to Jamie Bennett right now. However, one would also be careful about what you ask for. Jamie may have gotten more than he bargained for.

In District 1 Herb Polson, who was newly appointed to fill the seat vacated by State Rep. Rick Kriseman, will face off against former City Council Member Bob Kersteen. Kersteen is a 70 year old Republican who last served on the City Council in 2000. Polson is one of the most qualified people ever to run for a City Council seat. He retired from the City of St. Petersburg last year in hopes of being appointed to fill Krisemans seat as Rick ran for the state House. Herb's hope was fulfilled when the Council appointed him over, you guessed it, Bob Kersteen. Because elections are about the future and Herb is superbly qualified, I'd have to say that this will be a laugher.

That brings us to District 7 where Rene Flowers can not run again due to term limits. There will be no primary here as only 2 candidates qualified. In November Wengay Newton will square off against Gershom Faulkner. Wengay Newton is president of the Westminster Heights Neighborhood Association. His brother Winnie also happens to be president of the local fire fighters union. Faulkner was the long term aide to state Rep. Frank Peterman and is currently Outreach Director for Congresswoman Kathy Castor. Faulkner certainly has the inside track on endorsements from elected officials. This starts with the Dems in the Pinellas legislative delegation, runs through the Dems on the County Commission, includes Mary Brown on the School board and several other local elected officials. Faulkner was also Deputy campaign manager for Kathy Castor's successful primary election for the Congressional seat vacated by Jim Davis. He knows what it takes to win elections and seems to be doing most things right. This should be a big win for Faulkner who is a real up and comer in the Democratic Party.

Turnout is likely to be extremely low in the primary elections. It will be only slightly better for the general election in November. It is pretty safe to say the Dems will at least hold on to their 5-3 majority on the council. It is also possible that they might gain a 6th seat, although that is looking like a pretty tough proposition right now.

We'll have something on 2nd quarter fund raising soon. So stay tuned. This could be interesting.

YouTube Debate Impressions

2007-07-24T01:13:00.000-04:00

The big winner tonight was the format. Questions coming from real people. Yeah, the media (CNN) ultimately picked the ones shown, the universe they picked from was questions submitted by real people.

I went down to a local sports bar to watch the debate. I was told that a bunch of people were going to be there. The bunch turned out to be about 15 folks, and it was a pretty progressive 15 folks at that. Lots of Kucinich fans.

To my mind, John Edwards was the clear winner among the serious candidates tonight. I actually thought Joe Biden did pretty well, but it is hard to take his candidacy seriously. But Edwards was superb most of the night. He talked about taking power away from the special interests as the only way to get big change. He noted that we wouldn't get big change by trading our insiders for theirs. And his answers on Universal Health Care blew the top off the response meters.

Hillary Clinton abandoned the tag liberal, choosing progressive instead. John Edwards rejected reparations for slavery, but noted that there was a lot we could do to make up for the unequal treatment still occurring in our country today. He specifically mentioned predatory lending to blacks. Barack Obama also demurred on reparations, but suggested too that there were investments that could be made, particularly in education, to ease the disparities among the races.

Obama and Clinton got asked the race / gender question. They both tried to shrug it off with humor. Obama suggested that he proves his African American credentials trying to catch a cab in Manhattan. Clinton said she "had no choice" but to run as a woman. But John Edwards still came up with the best answer here. He told folks who were thinking about not voting for Obama because he is black, or for Hillary because she is a woman that "I don't want your vote".

Edwards again led in his answer to a question about who would be a better advocate for women. Edwards pointed out that the issues he stresses in his campaign, poverty and health care have a disproportionate impact on women. He stated that his issues were women's issues. Clinton pointed to her trip to China where she stated that women's rights are human rights.

Edwards got the gay marriage question and promptly fumbled it. He did say that it would be wrong for anyone to use their faith to deny rights to others. However, this was his weal est moment in the debate. Obama hit it on the head by stating that everyone should be equal under the law. As for marriage, that should be left up to the churches. Ding, ding, ding, ding, ding.

Edwards shone again on the health care issue. He has the only plan that mandates universal health care coverage. Hillary has the scars from trying in the early 90s. Obama tried to say his plan provides for universal coverage, but it does not mandate it. Round to Edwards.

I still think there are too many people on the stage. Biden, Dodd, Gravel and Kucinich have no chance to win the nomination. What are they doing up there? All they are doing is taking time away from letting us hear from the candidates who have a chance to actually win some delegates.

Floridians are going to have a real voice in the nomination process this time around. Our late January primary is early enough in the process for our votes to count in selecting the nominee. A new Quinnipiac poll has Hillary Clinton with a 22 point lead at 36% over Barack Obama and Al Gore who were tied at 14%. John Edwards registered only 9%.

Here are two things I don't know. I don't know if enough people are paying attention to these debates for them to make much of a difference in anybodies minds. And I don't know enough people who support Hillary Clinton to get her to 36% in a poll of people I know.

George Bush: Democrats + Politics = Bad

2007-07-21T19:49:00.001-04:00

You really have to hand it to these guys sometimes. After all this is the administration that has politicized everything from the CIA, to the Department of Justice to the Drug Czar. You think this might keep them from throwing rocks called politics. But no, it seems that it hasn't slowed them down one little teeny tiny bit.

So what does the Bush administration do when the Democrats are trying to move policy in a direction that Herr Bush doesn't want it to go? Why he accuses the Democrats of playing politics with (fill in the blank) serious issue.

How often have they done this? Why do they do it? And is it working? The answers to these and other questions are below the fold...

How often does the Bush administration accuse the Dems of playing politics with an issue? A Google search of

george bush democrats playing politics

produced 1,950,000 hits. That's right. Nearly two million hits. George Bush has accused the Democrats of playing politics with Iraq, Social Security, homeland security, supporting our troops, trade, terrorism, the federal budget and just about anything else you can imagine. 1,950,000 is a lot of Google hits, particularly for just a 6 1/2 year span. That's roughly 300,000 hits per year of the Bush Administration.

Why do they do this? Is there a method to this madness? The Pew Research Center has been polling on Trends in Political Attitudes and Core Values for 20 years. Over that time period, when Republicans have been in the White House, the number of people agreeing that when something is run by the government it is usually inefficient and wasteful went up. When Bill Clinton was President that number went down. When Bush 41 finished the 12 year Republican run in the White House in 1992, 69% of respondents agreed about government run deals being inefficient and wasteful. By the time Bill Clinton left the White House, that number was down to 53%.

That number is now back up to 62%. Republicans create the self fulfilling prophecy about government being inherently bad. They run government into the ground when they are in charge (See Iraq and Katrina) and then they go

see, we told you government was bad.

They also equate government with politics. So whenever the Dems are trying to do something they don't want to happen, they accuse the Dems of just "playing politics", which is bad.

Who is their target audience for this continuous ranting that Dems are "just playing politics"? Not suprisingly, it is the independent voter. The quintessential "persuadable" voter. Again from Pew:

Republicans, Democrats and independents are all more likely today than five years ago to see the government as wasteful, and less likely to say that elected officials care about what regular people think.

61% of Independents now agree with the proposition that government is inefficient and wasteful (remember - government is run by people playing politics). Less than 1/3 of Independents agree with the proposition

Most elected officials care what people like me think

Elected officials. You know those nasty people who "play politics".

How is all this working for the Republicans? Finally, some good news for us, bad news for the Gopers. Here's what Pew has to say:

the Republican Party ... has rapidly lost public support, particularly among political independents. Faced with an unpopular president who is waging an increasingly unpopular war, the proportion of Americans who hold a favorable view of the Republican Party stands at 41%, down 15 points since January 2001.

And who is leading the charge in this change in attitude towards the GOP? Pew has this to say:

perceptions of the GOP have fallen dramatically among political independents: Among voters with no firm ties to either party, favorable views of the GOP have declined from 55% in 2001, to 46% in 2004, to 40% in the current survey.

Despite the Bushco's desperate attempt to paint the Dems as "bad politicians", the independent voters are just not buying it. Good spin can not make up for bad policy forever.

There is a danger here for the Dems however, and Pew spells it out quite clearly:

ratings of the Democratic Party have remained relatively stable. Despite their significant electoral gains in the 2006 midterms, public ratings of the Democratic Party are nearly identical to where they were in 1994, when they lost 52 House seats to the Republicans. And the GOP’s deteriorating image since Bush’s reelection – down 11 points since December 2004 – has not been mirrored by an improved image of the Democratic Party. The 54% favorability rating Democrats receive today is virtually identical to their 53% rating in December 2004.

If the Democrats want to maintain this advantage that the Gopers have handed to us, it is time to stand and deliver.

Congressman Opie - Wingnut Hero

2007-07-21T07:27:00.000-04:00

Adam Putnam, in his new role as Chairman of the House Republican Conference, has become the hero of the wingnut crowd. Republicans in Congress introduced a "John Doe" Amendment to protect Americans from frivolous lawsuits who report suspicious activity. Consider this from the Cassy Fiano Blog:

Florida Rep. Adam Putnam, chairman of the House Republican Conference, said failure to enact the provision will hold "the threat of endless litigation over the heads of the American people.""Democrats are discouraging citizens from reporting suspicious behavior. And that, simply, leaves America vulnerable to terrorist attacks," Mr. Putnam said.
Nancy Pelosi is promising a safer America while simultaneously refusing to protect Americans for speaking up?!If Dems had their way, United 93 would have been successfully hijacked. Richard Reid would have blown up that plane midflight over the Atlantic. People will be much less willing to speak up or act against suspicious behavior when the threat of litigation is hanging over their heads! And for actual terrorists, they know that if their act is foiled, they can just sue us and claim innocence. And they wonder why we question their patriotism, despite their siding with the enemy time and time again.

Florida really doesn't need a Congressman who is the hero of wingnut extremists. It's about time we sent Congressman Opie on to his next career, isn't it?

No One They Won't Manipulate

2007-07-18T16:15:00.000-04:00

The apparently insatiable Bush Political juggernaut is at it again, or has been at it since day one. Who could possibly tell anymore? It appears that Rove & Co. wrangled very senior Executive Branch appointees to do their political campaign work in 2006. I guess that's not actually a surprise, but God Almighty, shouldn't it be?

This is a fairly complex story, and to my great sadness I doubt it'll get much play, but my hope is that someone will pay attention, for a couple of reasons. One, it is (yet another) perfect, sickening example of how this abjectly political administration will cynically manipulate anyone and anything for gain, and two, I used to work in the Drug Czar's office under the Clinton Administration, so it hits home for me.

What makes it all the worse is that -- at least according to the quote of their spokesman in today's Post -- they will just go ahead and "shrug off" the Hatch Act.

According to the Washington Post:

White House officials arranged for top officials at the Office of National Drug Control Policy to help as many as 18 vulnerable Republican congressmen by making appearances and sometimes announcing new federal grants in the lawmakers' districts in the months leading up to the November 2006 elections, a Democratic lawmaker said yesterday.

Well, I guess we can at least say it's not surprising, right? I understand Chairman Waxman is looking into this, and I applaud his efforts. I would also applaud Swampland at Time.com for pinging the story as well.

Something is still missing for me, though. Sara Taylor and Harriet Miers and of course Karl Rove should all be run out of town at best, no question. And probably more of them. But where were our high-ranking Executive Branch officials on this (at the USDA, Transportation, and Commerce Department, too, apparently)? Look, I get that they're all Bush appointees, I know how the process works. But do any of these people harbor any sense that they're public servants? Or are they really just the GOP's servants? Or, God help us, George Bush's servants?

The White House and drug policy officials, however, shrugged that off as a consequence of political reality.

No big shocker there, I guess. But don't you think they could bother to at least try to cover it up? At least a little?

"I don't think it is that surprising that during a campaign season when you're talking about events touting White House programs that Republicans are going to be more likely to appear with us than Democrats," said Tom Riley, a spokesman for the drug policy office. "Teen drug use is down. There has been a lot of progress. We're very happy and eager to do events with anyone. But it is more likely that Republicans are going to stand up with White House officials to talk about those successes."

Bold is mine.

So, okay, Tom Riley, you're admitting that the Bush Administration has essentially transformed non-political offices into overt GOP campaign tools.

I worked for ONDCP Director Lee Brown, and then later Barry McCaffrey in administrative capacities from 1993 through 1998, through the 1996 Clinton re-election campaign. And I didn't lift a finger to help him get re-elected. Neither did Brown or McCaffrey. I was a member of the Arlington (VA) Young Democrats, and aside from attending a few meetings, I didn't do anything else. I had a good job, a Schedule C political appointment in the government and I was putting myself through school at night. I didn't want to jeopardize that, not even with the appearance of impropriety.

The current Director of the Office of National Drug Control Policy, Mr. Walters, a previous Deputy Director of that office under the first George Bush, is a well known political hack. And this proves it, as if proof were somehow needed. Somebody ought to start by asking the careless (at best) Tom Riley to resign, and work their way up to Walters from there.

cross posted at dailykos

Roadblock Republicans

2007-07-15T13:44:00.000-04:00

At the behest of the DCCC, I sent this letter to the editor of the St. Petersburg Times:

This week the Roadblock Republicans in the Tampa Bay Area, Gus Bilirakis,Ginny Brown-Waite, Adam Putnam and Bill Young, all voted against the House Democrats plan to begin redeploying our troops from the civil war in Iraq. That puts them at odds with 71% of the American people according to a USA Today/Gallup Poll taken last weekend.

These Roadblock Republicans are standing shoulder to shoulder with President Bush on Iraq. According to a recent Newsweek poll, that puts them at odds with 68% of the American people who disapprove of the way Bush is handling the situation in Iraq.

According to other recent polls, the public view of Congress is at an all time low. I suggest to you that the way to improve your opinion of Congress is to get rid of these Roadblock Republicans who stand in the way of what you want, getting our troops out Iraq. Apparently until we get these Roadblock Republicans out of Congress, our troops will be stuck in the civil war in Iraq.

Please add your voice to mine. Let's see if these Roadblock Republicans are really impervious to the wishes of 71% of the American public.

Hillsborough County GOP Corruption: Edna Walters Gets Personal SeaWall While Services Cut for the People.

2007-07-15T08:46:00.001-04:00

In Hillsborough County the GOP works in a circle. Donors give to one campaign then get another GOP Commissioner to do the favors. Next time around one hand washes the other. This is one of those follow the dots stories..initially not a headline grabber, but when we think of vital county services like parks, fire stations, libraries and bus service being cut while a connected GOP woman [donor to Al Higginbottham] who throws her weight around gets Brian Blair to use tax-payer money for a donor's friend.....well, it is important to realize who pulls Blair's strings. Read more at TampaBay Democrat.

Bill Young Fails to support the Troops - Again

2007-07-13T13:51:00.000-04:00

Once again Congressman Bill Young (R-Fl-10) has failed to support the troops. It was horrific to learn that Young knew of the wretched conditions for the troops at Walter Reed Hospital and did nothing. Now just yesterday, Young has failed to support our troops once again.

Young voted no yesterday on the Responsible Redeployment from Iraq Act. This bill reads in part:

1) the Authorization for Use of Military Force Against Iraq Resolution of 2002 ... authorized the President to use the Armed Forces ... in order to defend the national security of the United States against the continuing threat posed by the Government of Iraq at that time;

(2) the Government of Iraq which was in power at the time the Authorization for Use of Military Force Against Iraq Resolution of 2002 was enacted into law has been removed from power and its leader indicted, tried, convicted, and executed by the new freely-elected democratic Government of Iraq;

(3) the current Government of Iraq does not pose a threat to the United States or its interests; ...

Requirement- The Secretary of Defense shall commence the reduction of the number of Armed Forces in Iraq beginning not later than 120 days after the date of the enactment of this Act and shall complete the reduction and transition to a limited presence of the Armed Forces in Iraq by not later than April 1, 2008.

Young voted with 190 other Republican Members of Congress to keep our troops in the middle of the civil war in Iraq. So once again, Bill Young has failed to support our troops.

I'm not sure if Young believes that the current Government in Iraq is still a threat to the national security of the United States or not. What I do know is that if Young really believed in supporting our troops, he would have voted to get them out of Iraq as quickly and as responsibly as possible. Instead, Young voted no.

A Picture To Use - Over and Over Again

2007-07-13T13:13:00.000-04:00

I just posted the following comment on Jeffrey Feldman's DKos diary Frameshop: The Photo The GOP Wants To Hide :

The Gopers have been trying very hard to make inroads with African Americans here in Florida. Florida Kossacks should take full advantage of these photos in making our case to the black community.

The photo is of the Republican Presidential candidates who showed up at the NAACP Convention. All one of them - Tom Tancredo.

So the next time you hear of GOP efforts to make inroads into the African American community, make sure and get this photo out there, along with the message:

Here's how much the Republican Party really cares about you.

Fasano Just Says Yes to Slush Fund

2007-07-11T15:22:00.000-04:00

Last Sunday, the St. Petersburg Times reported that state Senator Mike Fasano (R-New Port Richey) declined the 3% pay raise that state lawmakers received starting July 1st. Fasano said:

I'm just a believer that we didn't run for this job for the salary

Sounds like he is really thrifty with the taxpayers money, huh?

There may be another reason Fasano doesn't need the measly $2,400 raise. Since July 2005, Fasano's Committee for Floridians for Principled Government has paid the Senator $19,000 in "reimbursements."

In just the second quarter of this year, the Committee for Floridians for Principled Government received $39,000 in contributions. Senator Fasano, the Chair of the Senate Transportation and Economic Development Appropriations Committee is the registered agent for the Committee for Floridians for Principled Government. So who is providing this largess for Senator Fasano?

In the latest reporting period, $5,000 came from lawyer / lobbyist Ron Book. Among Book's clients is URS Corp., the company that oversaw construction of the elevated lanes of Tampa's Crosstown Expressway. You know, those elevated lanes where the piers collapsed. Another $2,500 came from the Florida Transportation Builders Association. Yep, these are the guys who the state pays to build the roads.

In just the last three months road building interests have paid $7,500 into Senator Fasano's slush fund. That's three times the raise the Senator has foregone. Which raises the question. How much has the Senator's frugality really cost us?

Blog Florida Blue Logo Contest Winner

2007-07-11T12:30:00.000-04:00

We have a winner in the Blog Florida Blue Logo Contest. And here it is:

Many thanks to Storm Bear for submitting the winning logo.

So, what are we going to do with this fantastic logo? Well, we have a lot of work to do to Blog Florida Blue , so let's talk about it below the fold...

First, I would once again like to thank all the very talented Kossacks out there who submitted designs for the Blog Florida Blue Logo. As one who can't draw a straight line with a ruler, I am in awe of all the creative talent in this community.

As I stated in the Blog Florida Blue diary back in May:

I'd like to invite all Florida bloggers to adopt this brand name (and now this logo) whenever they are blogging on the effort to elect Democrats and build the Democratic Party in Florida. Blog Florida Blue can be a powerful branding device linking otherwise disparate efforts from Key West to Pensacola.

There are a lot of interesting things going on in the Florida blogosphere and the Florida Netroots these days. In June, we had the Bloggers Luncheon at the Florida Democratic Party (FDP) Jefferson Jackson Weekend. There are too many things going on at the Florida Progressive Coalition to mention in a single diary. One item of particular interest is Florida Progressive Radio. This is done through Blog Talk Radio. Their second show had FDP Internet Director Phillip Perry as their special guest. I particularly liked FPC guru Ken Quinell's Crashing the Gates in Florida Diary.

In the end though, the point of all this activity is to get more Democrats elected to public office. Since this is a Presidential election cycle, there is a huge amount of interest being paid to that particular process, and rightly so. However, if we are really going to be successful in Blogging Florida Blue, we are going to have to think longer term and more strategically. Sites like Build Florida's DEC's can help us do that, because we definitely need help building our party infrastructure. We just had a special election for an open Florida State Senate seat (SD-3). This election did not go the way we wanted for any number of reasons. There are a lot of good diaries that gave tactical reasons why we were not successful. In Reflections on SD-3 , I take a more strategic look at the loss.

We also need to pay a lot more attention to "building our bench" here in Florida. Local elected officials are like stocking your farm team with up and coming talent. Most of the best candidates for higher office have had prior public service experience, mostly as elected public officials on the local level. Congresswoman Kathy Castor was a Hillsborough County commissioner first. State Representative Rick Kriseman was a St. Petersburg City Council Member before getting elected to the Legislature. And if you think losing an election is the end of a political career, think again. The best political move our Governor Charlie Crist ever made was taking on a losing effort against US Senator Bob Graham.

We have a lot of work left to do to Blog Florida Blue. But we have a great launching pad coming up in October at the Florida Democratic Party Convention in Orlando. We are going to have the Bloggers Conference as an official part of the agenda. And we are looking for a special guest speaker to keynote the Bloggers Conference. We have already started putting out feelers to get a certain guy named Markos from DailyKos to give the keynote address. So I just want to end this little missive with a shout out:

Attend our effing Convention Kos!