Sunset for Florida Democrats - 2024 Edition?

How much to the Democrats hate their own losers?  Let's return to Florida to examine the evidence:

Democrat Val Demings gave up a safe House seat to challenge Republican Marco Rubio for his Senate seat in 2022.  Needless to say, she went down to defeat.  When Rick Scott's Senate seat came up for election in Florida this year (2024), Demings didn't even run for the Democratic nomination.  I suspect that Florida Democrats made it clear to her that she would not be welcome to make another try for a Senate seat.

Contrast that to the Republicans.  In 2002, there were two Democratic U.S. Senators from South Dakota - Timothy Johnson and Tom Daschle.  Johnson ran for a second term that year.  The Republican Senate nominee who ran against Johnson in 2002 lost, but in 2004 that same Republican got to try for the Senate again by running against Daschle, then the Senate Democratic leader, and this time the Republican won. That Republican is Fred Gwynne lookalike John Thune, now the second highest ranking Republican in the U.S. Senate.  This is just one example of a Republican U.S. Senate nominee who, having failed to get one of his state's Senate seats, simply tried for the other seat and succeeded; there are many more.  If there's a Democrat who lost a first bid for a Senate seat and then won his or her state's other Senate seat two short years later, I must have missed it.

How about gubernatorial candidates?  For this we can go back to Florida.  Jeb Bush lost his bid for the governorship of Florida in 1994, a great year for Republicans overall, against incumbent Democrat Lawton Chiles, but four years later, Jeb ran for the governorship of Florida against Lieutenant Governor Kenneth "Buddy" MacKay, Governor Chiles having been term limited, and won.

(MacKay never ran for elective office again, of course, but he did become governor of Florida when Governor Chiles died after the election but before Jeb Bush was to be inaugurated,  and so MacKay served out the remaining weeks of Chiles' term.  No one knew that Chiles would become and remain for thirty years and counting the last Democrat to by elected governor of Florida.  His death in office now seems prophetic.) 

This year, 2024, a double-surnamed woman named Debbie is taking on Rick Scott for his U.S. Senate seat.  No, not Debbie Wasserman Schultz, the woman responsible for Donald Trump - Debbie Mucarsel-Powell (above), an Ecuadoran-born academic administrator who served in the U.S. House of Representatives.  For one term.  She lost her seat in an upset in 2020. But she's well-spoken, she's telegenic, and she is a fierce advocate of reproductive rights in a state where such rights are severely curtailed and where a referendum codifying reproductive rights is on the ballot.  Mucarsel-Powell could win.

Or not.   It's a tossup now, and there is even talk about Kamala Harris upsetting Trump in Florida, but I have my doubts.  First of all, it's Florida.  Second of all, while Republican women - and some Republican men - might vote for the reproductive-rights referendum, they might do so without voting for Harris or Muscarel-Powell.   Third, Rick Scott, who ran a health care company that fraudulently overcharged Medicare for its services, has an undeniable and inexplicable talent for winning elections, having been elected governor of Florida twice and elected to the Senate over far worthier Democratic opponents.  Having crippled and/or ended the political careers of his earlier Democratic opponents, Scott is now poised to sign Mucarsel-Powell's political death warrant.

After all, as I've said, it's Florida.

State of the Biden

I thought President Biden's State of the Union address was going to be a rote recitation of his accomplishments and his wish list for the new Congress, and for the most part it was.  Then it became a riot - and I don't mean on like the one that took place in the Capitol two years ago this past January 6. 

Biden referred to a plan proposed by Republican Senator Rick Scott of Florida, a man Mitch McConnell despises.  The plan that seeks to have all federal legislation, including Medicare and Social Security, sunset after five years so Congress can decide whether to renew it as a way of reforming "entitlements" (they're called entitlements because we pay into it and so we're entitled to them!).  When Biden noted in his speech that only a handful of Republicans, not all of them, support Scott's plan, a gaggle of MAGAs - including the insufferable Marjorie Taylor Greene - booed and heckled the President, much to the chagrin of House Speaker Kevin McCarthy, who tried unsuccessfully to silence them. 

And with that, the President showed just how vicious Republicans can be when they're confronted with the evidence of how callous and uncaring they can be . . .  when they're confronted with the truth.  He may have ended Scott's political career, a political career that should never have made it past the 2010 Florida gubernatorial election.  And he boxed the GOP into trying to find ways to cut the budget and approve a debt ceiling increase without cutting Medicare or Social Security - all while Speaker McCarthy sat silently without applauding Biden Administration initiatives that poll well with the voters.  

Well played, Mr. President, well played.

Alas, Biden's age will still be a factor in the 2024 election.  If the 2024 Republican presidential nominee is younger than even Hunter Biden (like Florida governor Ron DeSantis, who turns 45 in 2024), the President is likely to face a grueling campaign with an opponent with much more energy then either he or Hunter has.  Which is precisely why Democrats are still a little skittish about renomainting Biden.  

Well, Democrats, you might not have had to worry about having to go with Biden without any obvious Democratic presidential possibility for him to pass the torch to after you let so many Democratic rising stars flare out and burn out or you ignored up-and-coming Democrats promising new leadership (*cough cough. Martin O'Malley, *cough cough*).   Just remember, you offered up 26 presidential candidates for 2020 and Biden was the only one who had any chance of defeating Trump.  You gotta dance with he what brung ya.

Sunset for Florida Democrats - The Sequel

Georgia ain't on my mind now.  Let me talk about Florida.

Two weeks ago today, I saw Florida gubernatorial candidate Andrew Gillum and incumbent Florida senator and re-election candidate Bill Nelson come up short in their respective campaigns but by the end of the night, neither race had been called and subsequent recounts had to be held, providing a modicum of hope for Democrats in the Sunshine State.

As of this weekend, however, Ron DeSantis is to be the new governor of Florida, and Rick Scott - who, like Madonna, somehow manged to turn accidental fame into a long career - is the state's new U.S. Senator. 

So what went wrong?  How did the two most loathsome Florida politicians not named Debbie Wasserman Schultz (who, alas, was re-elected to the House) pull off such high-profile wins when much of the rest of the country was turning against Trump Republicanism? The answer is not in the incompetence of Broward County election officials, but rather in three simple facts.  First, Florida is as divided as the country at large.  Second of all, despite Florida's young multiracial population, retirees - most of whom are white - keep moving into the state at a pretty good clip, and even the registered Democrats among them are more conservative than the state's younger and browner residents.  Older people, of course, vote more than younger people, though Florida likely has a lot of young white conservatives - DeSantis, at 40, is one of them.  Third, retirees and working people alike live in Florida for the low taxes as well as the (mostly) sunny weather, and the policies Gillum in particular espoused meant more amenities and, thus, more spending.

Florida has long been seen as the country's most populous swing state.  But is it time to cede Florida to the Republicans?  Probably.  Because after the debacles of centrist candidates for statewide office such as Alex Sink and Patrick Murphy, Florida Democrats tried something new by nominating a black progressive for the governorship even as it renominated a tried-and-true incumbent three-term white moderate senator for re-election.  They both ended up losing, albeit narrowly, to Republicans.  Two different sorts of Democrats . . . losing to Republican opponents . . . in the same state in the same year. 

That show of solidarity Gillum and Nelson had with former President Obama made for good pictures but also made for ineffective politics.

At 76, Bill Nelson is now, like many Floridians his age, retired.  And Gillum?  Pundits are already saying that Gillum isn't going anywhere, though by that they mean that he will remain active in Florida politics.  Really?  As a former mayor of Tallahassee?  That's hardly a springboard for future endeavors for higher office.  Florida doesn't have another election for statewide office until 2022, when Ron DeSantis runs for a second term as governor and Marco Rubio is up for re-election to the Senate.  A rematch between Gillum and DeSantis is unlikely; Democrats never renominate to oppose an incumbent Republican officeholder the guy that incumbent Republican defeated for that office; DeSantis would like nothing better than a rematch with someone he's already creamed once.  And Rubio is such a huge political star that Floridians will keep sending him back to the Senate for as long as he wants to be sent back.  Gillum said that the struggle to move Florida in a more economically and socially just direction wasn't about him.  He's right; by 2022, Florida Democrats will have moved on to someone else.

But who?  Gwen Graham?  (Excuse me while I laugh at the thought of her name.)  Philip Levine, the millionaire businessman who ran for governor in the Democratic primary in 2018 and was mayor of Miami Beach from 2013 to 2017, might want to try again for either the governorship or Rubio's Senate seat.  But even having been mayor of Tallahassee is preferable to being a former mayor of Miami Beach.

So, despite a few key (no pun intended, if you get my drift) U.S. House victories two weeks ago, Florida Democrats are still in the dumps.  And their queen bee, their top honcho, their most visible pol, is still Debbie Wasserman Schultz.

Pathetic.         

I have friends and relatives in Florida who keep inviting me to come down there.  In their dreams.  As long as Florida keeps electing bigoted climate-change deniers to office, I plan to boycott Florida completely.  (California orange juice all the way!)  Instead of traveling to Florida, I hope to take a vacation to warm, sunny, exotic . . . Wisconsin! :-D

Congratulations to Wisconsin's incoming Democratic governor, Tony Evers.

Sunset for Florida Democrats

I didn't know at first if this meme was made by someone for Martin O'Malley or someone against Martin O'Malley, though the unflattering picture of O'Malley's head that was Photoshopped in suggested the latter. (And it was an anti-O'Malley meme; it's from a conservative Web site.)  Nevertheless, it sums up Florida congresswoman Debbie Wassserman Schultz in a nutshell.

It was three years ago today that then-presidential contender Martin O'Malley called for more Democratic presidential primary debates at the Democratic National Committee (DNC) meeting in Minneapolis, only to be given a death-ray gaze by Wasserman Schultz, then the DNC chair.  After tipping the scales for Hillary Clinton so she could lose to Donald J. Trump, you'd think that Debbie - now running for re-election to the House for the first time since Trump became President - would be punished by Florida Democrats with a robust primary challenger.  Think again, sucka - Debbie is running in today's House primary unopposed, while Democrat Tim Canova, who unsuccessfully challenged her in the 2016 House primary, is running against her as an independent.  Florida Democrats would rather renominate and reward someone who screwed the national party and the country rather than take a chance with someone else in what is a solidly Democratic district.

And Deb's constituents will vote for her because they will be brainwashed into thinking that if they vote for Tim Canova, they're only going to split the vote, help the eventual Republican nominee win, and lessen Democratic chances of taking back the House.

Alas, lameness of the brain among Florida Democrats isn't confined to the 23rd U.S. House district.  The Democratic Party in the Sunshine State managed to allow Republican Rick Scott get elected governor twice by somehow finding nominees even more unelectable than he was; now he's leading in the U.S. Senate election against incumbent Democrat Bill Nelson, running for a fourth term.  It seems that Scott has grown on Florida voters, like a wart, almost.  Today, Florida Democrats are expected to nominate for governor Gwen Graham, a former one-term congresswoman with no executive experience whose biggest claim to fame is that she's the daughter of former Florida two-term governor and three-term U.S. Senator Bob Graham.  That is, Florida Democrats are going to nominate her for the same reasons national Democrats nominated Hillary Clinton for President in 2016 - her sex and her family name.

And I'll bet Debbie Wasserman Schultz has something to do with this.

Ahh, who cares?  The Democrats should just give up on Florida.  It's not worth fighting for, even though Martin O'Malley, in his unappreciated efforts to help rebuild the Democratic Party, keeps going down there to fight for it.

No.  Give it up, Democrats. Florida is lost.  You're not going to put Gwen Graham in the governor's mansion, and you're not going to save Bill Nelson's sorry hide.  Concentrate on the House nationwide and forget saving Nelson's Senate seat . . . or the Senate.  There may very well be a blue wave in the November elections, but the only blue wave that's going to wash over Florida is going to be from a Category 5-plus hurricane.  Never mind Florida, Democrats, climate change and rising sea levels are going to push it into the sea anyway.

In which case, the 49-star flag that was only our official flag for one year may very well make a comeback.

Is a Change Gonna Come?

I don't want to come right out and try to make any predictions, but the National Rifle Association may finally have met its match.  When Congress refused to even consider new restrictions on firearms, those teenagers in Florida, the ones affected by the mass shooting that took place in their school, refused to stand by and do nothing. They've been spearheading a movement to get common-sense gun regulations passed and they have made it clear that they won't be happy until they get them, and they won't stop fighting for them.  

The gun-control crowd won a minor victory in Florida itself, where a new school-safety bill was just signed into law by Governor Rick Scott.  With one eye on the students and another on a possible U.S. Senate run, Scott approved a bill that will allow some teachers to be armed per approval from local school districts and county sheriffs (none of whom may be crazy about the idea, so I don't see too many armed teachers in Florida in the near or even far future) but will also raise the minimum age for purchasing a rifle to 21 and appropriate $69 for mental health assistance in the schools and $98 million for increased school security.

Not surprisingly, the NRA is planing to sue Florida for placing age restrictions on firearm purchases.  This is only the first step in doing something about guns in America, and even though these teenagers are amazing in their commitment to righting a serious wrong in These States, I can't help but be skeptical about any real change.  Is this really the beginning of new movement that will recognize that guns ought to be under tighter controls and that the Second Amendment is about keeping well-regulated militias - i.e., the National Guard - and not about allowing any ol' citizen to have a gun? Or will this merely be Occupy Wall Street Mark Two?  

And the idea of Rick Scott - Rick Scott! - suddenly being on the side of gun control is like Donald Trump singing "We Shall Overcome" . . .

The Most Powerful Atlantic Hurricane Ever

That would be Irma.

This storm is expected to make Katrina look like a drizzle.  Its path of destruction will likely surpass that of Harvey.  No more powerful hurricane has ever been recorded in the Atlantic basin. 

It's a Category 5 hurricane, meaning its winds are over 157 miles an hour.  Well over 157 miles an hour - 185, to be exact.  That's as fast as Joe Walsh's Maserati!

If you live in Florida, life won't be good to you much longer.  Irma is widely expected to ravage the state and possibly make landfall there.  Even if it doesn't make landfall there and does so over South Carolina or Georgia, it will do more than enough damage.  

And to think Rick Scott, Florida's governor, still doesn't want to guess one way or the other about climate change.  And in this flat state, surrounded by water on three sides, he's barred anyone in the state government from even discussing it.

There is a special place in hell for Richard Lynn Scott. >:-(     

Where There's Smoke . . .

Florida governor Rick Scott, Mr. Sunshine himself, keeps coming up with the freshest, boldest, and most innovative ideas on how to govern a state. Unfortunately, all of them are bad.

His latest is a doozy. He signed a bill this past Thursday banning doctors from talking about gun safety and the dangers of firearms in the home to families. If they do, they can have their licenses revoked. Physicians are now only able to treat bullet wounds, not offer advice on how to prevent them.

Well, Florida's medical establishment is outraged, and the Brady Center to Prevent Gun Violence is filing a federal lawsuit to get the law repealed. It may be the only way to do so. Floridians had better not consider plans to get Rick Scott impeached; Republicans overwhelmingly control the Florida legislature. And they might have to forget about waiting to vote him out of office in 2014. See, Scott endorses legislation that would enact the same voting disenfranchisement measures recently passed in Wisconsin.

Railroaded

When the incoming governors of Ohio and Wisconsin refused federal money for high-speed rail projects citing potentially heavy operating costs and, in Wisconsin at least, a preference for highway improvements, I thought to myself that at least there was still Florida. Not . . . any . . . more. Yesterday, the Sunshine State's new governor, noted Medicare ripoff artist Rick Scott, canceled the proposed Tampa-Orlando high-speed rail line that was announced with such great fanfare only a year ago, insisting that Florida can't afford it. (This, by the way, comes on top of his decision not to implement the new health care law until and unless its constitutionality is settled once and for all.) What do high-profile Florida politicians who support the rail line think? Who cares, most of them lost at the ballot box in November.

The governors of these three states are all Republicans, raising the obvious point that the Grand Old Party has an utter disregard for any sort of mass transit projects. (Florida's earlier attempt at high-speed rail was canceled by Republican governor Jeb Bush.) But it's become obvious that incompetence with passenger rail is an American, not a partisan, phenomenon, and that we're no better at it than we are at stopping gun violence in our cities and schools, educating our children, or dealing with climate change. Consider Illinois. As soon as Scott canceled Florida's high-speed rail project, Richard Durbin, Illinois's senior senator and the Democratic whip in the U.S. Senate, wrote to U.S. Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood, a fellow Illinoisian and a Republican, requesting that money intended for the Florida project go to the Prairie State's high-speed rail project.

How fast will Illinois's passenger trains go? 110 miles an hour.

Wow, how cutting edge is that? Not very. Florida's Tampa-Orlando line would have had trains going twice as fast, and trains in France and Japan already run at such speeds. California's high-speed rail project is so far the only one still on track (no pun intended) that's designed for speeds taken for granted in those countries and in others. Even Amtrak's Acela has a top speed of 150 miles an hour, though it rarely reaches it and never actually sustains it.

I give up. If I want to ride a bullet train, I'll have to wait until I go overseas, which is as likely as Scott changing his mind on the rail issue. But even if there were genuine high-speed rail in this country, it begs the obvious question: Where would I ride such a train to? I can't afford to travel anywhere these days. And quite frankly, the lack of a high-speed train between Tampa and Orlando doesn't concern me. I'd rather be in hell than in Orlando . . .. Wait! Orlando and hell are one and the same! :-p

That Sink-ing Feeling

For the past few months, the cable news channels have been talking about the Republican gubernatorial primary election in Florida without one single word about the Democratic gubernatorial primary in that state, which was also contested. So we heard about Rick Scott and former congressman Bill McCollum on the GOP side, but nothing about the Democrats<

Last night, Scott won the Republican nomination in an upset, with the results of the Democratic nomination barely even mentioned. The winner of the Democratic nomination was Florida Chief Financial Officer Alex Sink.

"Alex Sink?" I thought. "Who's he?"

Alex Sink is a woman.

For the record, she was elected Chief Financial Officer of Florida in 2006, and she also serves as a member of the board of trustees of Florida State University. A former banker and math teacher, Sink has an interesting personal history, as she is of Thai, or Siamese, origin, and she's descended from conjoined nineteenth-century twins Chang and Eng, whose ethnicity led to the now politically incorrect term "Siamese twins." But you won't hear any of that from Chris Matthews. (Good grief, he was so fixated on Marco Rubio and Charlie Crist in the Senate race he almost forgot that Democrats were running for the same seat.)

It's never good when candidates for public office (Democrats, usually) can't get much free media, especially on the national level. On the other hand, Sink leads Rick Scott in various polls, in part because Bill McCollum beat up on him so much in the primary campaign and drove up his negatives.

Hmm, Alex Sink could actually win this thing. . . .

Fun fact: Chang and Eng supported William Henry Harrison for President in 1840.