Midnight Meme Of The Day!

by Noah

Flor-i-duh! It's not like it shouldn't have been done years ago, but the time has now definitely come to boot Florida from the United States. Cut the Florida peninsula off of North America and float it over to Central America; assuming they'd even want it. I mean, Central America might be insulted just by the idea!

Does it even matter? Should we go to the effort and expense of ridding ourselves of the idiocy of Florida? It's already disappearing under the water anyway. It's two or three super hurricanes from the end of existence. Nature is taking its course. There are streets and neighborhoods in coastal areas that have ponding water even when it isn't raining. Nature is the big cleaner. Interior areas of Florida are featuring more and more homes dropping into more and more massive ever-growing sinkholes. Almost 20 years ago, I went to Orlando on business and saw the ugliest theme parts in the known universe. One even had a bunch of complete moron tourists climbing up and down fake mountains! If you want mountains, why would you go to Flor-i-duh? Why not go to a state that has real mountains? I stayed in Ocala and the shower water reeked of sulphur and burned the skin. I walked out the front door early that morning and animal control was trying to haul off a giant snake before anyone saw it or some Jurassic Park sized gator ran across the lawn and chomped it up.

The people? They elected Rick Scott governor, even after his role in the Columbia/HCA Medicare fraud scandal, twice! They did so despite or because of his legal troubles, Now, however it ends up, they've got the mess they've got. The mess they deserve but we don't. Screw 'em. Senator Rick Scott? Wasn't Senator Marco Rubio already bad enough? Did Floridians feel they couldn't import "Ted" Cruz from Texas so they'd go for the next best thing? At least "Ted" never faced a possibility of jail time, as far as we know.

They call Florida God's Waiting Room. People go there to die. How perfect! Problem is, they don't realize God left the building 50 years ago. He gave up. God knows hopeless when he sees it.

Will The Big Self-Funders Win Today?

Many of the most egregious self-funders this cycle lost their primaries, like Democrats Herbert Lee (CA- $1,057,942), Alison Friedman (VA- $1,080,365), Hans Keirstead (CA- $1,080,400), David Kim (GA- $1,164,689), Jerome Segal (MD- $1,271,189), Tahir Javed (TX- $1,333,416), Sara Jacobs (CA- $2,117,987), Andy Thorburn (CA- $2,832,018) and Paul Kerr (CA- $5,912,728), as well as Republicans Troy Downing (MT- $1,100,000), Peter deNeufville (NJ- $1,238,165), Bob Corlew (TN- $1,496,153), David Dodson (WY- $1,643,784), Mike Gibbons (OH- $2,690,226), George Flinn Jr. (TN- $3,068,270), Don Blankenship (WV- $4,107,710), Sandy Pensler (MI- $5,009,578), John Kingston (MA- $5,188,265), and Kathaleen Wall (TX- $6,169,732).

Don't you love to see plutocrats waste millions of their own dollars on campaigns and fall flat on their faces. Today there are 18 candidates running who have already spent at least a million dollars of their own on their campaigns. Some will win and some will lose. Here are the ones still in the running, in order of how much they had put in by last month.

• Florida Senate- Rick Scott (R)- $51,028,228 (45%) WON
• New Jersey Senate- Bob Hugin (R)- $27,500,000 (30%) LOST
• MD-06- David Trone (D)- $15,983,172 (100%) WON
• PA-01- Scott Wallace (D)- $12,756,892 (55%) LOST
• Indiana Senate- Mike Braun (R)- $9,614,377 (49%) WON
• CA-39- Gil Cisernos (D)- $8,852,762 (60%) LOST
• Tennessee Senate- Phil Bredesen (D)- $5,516,942 (50%) LOST
• California Senate- Dianne Feinstein (D)- $5,006,050 (90%) WON
• Massachusetts Senate- Shiva Ayyadurai (I)- $4,805,464 (1%) LOST
• Ohio Senate- Jim Renacci (R)- $4,000,000 (25%) LOST
• IN-02- Mel Hall (Blue Dog)- $2,522,000 (10%) LOST
• TX-03- Van Taylor (R)- $2,136,908 (99%) WON
• NY-01- Perry Gershon (D)- $1,843,746 (25%) LOST
• PA-08- John Chrin (R)- $1,622,762 (10%) LOST
• Minnesota Senate- Jerry Trooien (I)- $1,591,000 (1%) LOST
• NJ-03- Thomas MacArthur (R)- $1,400,000 (45%) ?
• PA-09- Dan Meuser (R)- $1,161,442 (99%) WON
• CA-48- Harley Rouda (D)- $1,138,955 (60%) WON

That percentage next to each name is my own handicapping-- not the actual scores, but the chance the candidate has to win for all that money. We'll see later how many candidates have been able to buy seats in Congress.

[NOTE: As you can see, I've updated the list to show who won and who lost. NJ-03 is too close to call right now, although MacArthur is leading narrowly.]

No Red Wave But A Red Tide Catches Up With Florida Governor Rick Scott

Last month, in a post, Florida's Lovely Beaches-- Over-Run With Deadly Human Waste, we looked at a gigantic problem for Floridians that their politicians aren't adequately addressing. When I woke up yesterday, I was glad to see a headline from a Florida newspaper, Rick Scott campaign stop besieged by red tide protesters.

Zac Anderson wrote that "Protesters jammed the sidewalk and spilled into the street around Mojo’s Real Cuban, forcing Scott to enter the restaurant through the back door and leave the same way after just 10 minutes as members of the crowd shouted 'coward.'... With the noxious odor of red tide hanging in the air and a fresh wave of dead fish washing up on nearby Gulf beaches, a large crowd of people incensed about the devastating algae bloom that has plagued the region for months directed their anger at Gov. Rick Scott during a campaign event in Venice Monday." And does Scott ever deserve it!

The Republican governor is on the defensive about his environmental record as he tries to unseat Democratic U.S. Sen. Bill Nelson. Protesters gathered Monday took aim at Scott for cutting funding for environmental agencies early in his first term, arguing Scott’s cost-cutting and deregulation have kept the state from implementing measures that could have helped minimize naturally occurring red tide blooms.

“The more I learn about red tide the more I can point to Rick Scott making it worse,” said Venice resident Rich Peabody, 71. “It’s not his fault, but he’s making it worse.”

Peabody stood by the back door to Mojo’s and shouted “coward” at Scott as he left the restaurant.

“He’s a coward; he wouldn’t face these people,” said the semi-retired Peabody, who moved to the area nine years ago. “Look at our beaches.”

...Scott’s critics say his policies have exacerbated the problem. Red tide blooms start offshore but can feed on nutrients found in nearshore waters. Leaky septic tanks, lawn fertilizer found in stormwater runoff and other factors can add to nutrient levels in nearshore waters.

Scott signed off on legislation that repealed a mandatory septic tank inspection program. The inspections were intended to identify failing septic tanks that are leaching pollutants.

The governor also cut $700 million from the state’s water management districts, which help implement a range of water quality programs. And Scott reduced staffing at the state Department of Environmental Protection and pushed to speed up and streamline environmental permitting, leading some to accuse the state of cutting corners in protecting the environment.

...The unusually strong red tide bloom that has lingered along a vast stretch of Southwest Florida coastline for nearly a year and a separate blue-green algae bloom that originated in Lake Okeechobee and is fouling estuaries on both coasts have mushroomed into major campaign issues in Florida’s midterm election.

Sarasota resident John Citara, 52, came out to protest Scott’s visit wearing a white hazmat suit and a gas mask.

Citara said he used to take his sons to the beach on a regular basis to go swimming, but now they go to document the environmental devastation.

“Once you wipe out the economy and the tourism, Florida’s dead,” Citara said. “If this doesn’t show us we need to do things differently and hold people accountable, what will?”

Nokomis resident Kim Hileman, 60, moved to the area from Pennsylvania in April “for quality of life.”

“Thinking I would escape the snow and enjoy the warm weather and beaches,” Hileman said.

But there have been very few nice beach days since Hileman moved south. So on Monday she led the crowd outside Mojo’s in a chant of: “Hey hey ho ho red tide Rick has got to go.” The “red tide Rick” moniker was featured on a range of other signs.

Jane Hunter helped organize the protest as a leader with the liberal-leaning Englewood Indivisible group.

“We need to make a statement back to our community and the Scott campaign that you can’t just totally befoul the Southwest coast of Florida and then run for Senate and vote against the environment,” Hunter said. “Nope. Not gonna happen. There needs to be some accountability.”

South Florida congressional candidate Tim Canova was the first person to warn me about the scope of the environmental catastrophe unfolding in Florida right now. And though Rick Scott deserves all the blame in the world, this problem is the result of corrupt politicians from both parties playing footsie with fat cat polluters. Tim's opponent, Debbie Wasserman Schultz, is as culpable as Scott. Yesterday, Tim told me that "The Gulf coast of Florida is being devastated by Red Tide and the blue-green toxic algal, both fed by agricultural runoff from massive factory farms. This has resulted in the deaths of hundreds of sea turtles, manatees, dolphins, sea otters, and thousands of fish, pelicans, herons and other birds. Hundreds of people have fallen sick with respiratory illnesses. According to Toxic Puzzle, a documentary film narrated by Harrison Ford, scientists are now connecting these toxins with higher rates of Parkinson’s and Alzheimer’s disease and Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis (ALS), known as Lou Gehrig’s disease. Unfortunately, this deepening crisis is brought to us by the pollution in our politics. Politicians in both parties are taking millions of dollars in campaign donations from Big Agribusinesses and Big Sugar, including my opponent Debbie Wasserman Schultz who repeatedly voted to appropriate billions of dollars in federal subsidies for these same polluters. My campaign takes no corporate money, perhaps one of the reasons we are now being throttled and shadow banned on social media, making it more and more difficult to raise money in small online donations. We are standing up to Big Sugar and other predatory corporate interests, and our grassroots campaign is growing on the ground where it matters most."

Do The Republicans Have An Ace Up Their Sleeves For November?

Last week, Señor Trumpanzee schlepped his fat ass to upstate New York to campaign for Congresswomen Elise Stefanik (NY-21) and Claudia Tenney (NY-22). Stepfanik didn't want one of his raucus, hate-filled. red-meat rallies so they orchestrated a bill signing ceremony at Fort Drum. Trump managed to make a spectacle of himself anyway, signing the John S. McCain National Defense Authorization Act without mentioning John McCain's name.

Later he went down to Utica, to hold a high-dough fundraiser at the Doubletree Hotel for Tenney. He called her wing-wing Blue Dog opponent, Anthony Brindisi, "a puppet of Nancy Pelosi" and babbled one of his inauthentic, one-size-fits-all lines about how Tenney won't have a problem beating him. Outside the event there were about 100 racist Trump supporters screaming about illegals. They were out-numbers by protesters. Two days later Inside Elections changed the rating for Tenney from Tilt Republican to Toss Up. Nathan Gonzales also changed ratings for Dana Rohrabacher (R-CA), Mike Coffman (R-CO), Pete Roskam (R-IL), and John Faso (R-NY). He also changed the ratings for the open CA-49 race (Issa's seat) and for Barbara Comstock's race to Tilt Democratic from Toss Up. In all. he shifted 30 races away from Republicans and towards Democrats. He said the Republicans aren't facing a wave as much as raging fires. "Whether it’s GOP Members in Hillary Clinton districts, extraordinary Democratic challengers and fundraising, competitive open seats, or lazy incumbents," wrote Gonzales, "Republicans have dozens of fires around the country, and the party might not have enough resources to put them all out."

I'm not so sure about that "might not have enough resources to put them all out" resources. Conservative billionaires are ready to spend more money than on any midterm in history. According to a NY Times report yesterday, the GOP tax scam that is so unpopular with ordinary Americans is a big hit with corporations multimillionaires and billionairesand they ponying up, "unlocking tens of millions of dollars in campaign donations from the wealthy conservatives and corporate interests that benefited handsomely from it... Billionaires and corporations that reaped millions of dollars in tax cuts are pumping some of that windfall into the Congressional Leadership Fund, a super PAC closely aligned with Speaker Paul Ryan that is flooding the airwaves and front porches of swing congressional districts with increasingly sharp attacks on the Democratic candidates vying to wrest control of the House."

Is in enough to thwart the massive anti-red wave that has been forming up ever since Trump started tweeting from the White House? If the polling, special elections and primaries we've seen so far are an indication, it doesn't matter how much the millionaires and billionaires flush down Ryan's toilet to save the compliant Republican majority in the House. At this point, it would be a safe bet to assume the Republicans are going to lose not the 23 seats that will put them in the minority, but as many as 70 seats that will put them in the history books.

Is there anything that could save them? Absolutely-- the same thing that saved Trump in 2016: the Kremlin. Ken Dilanian, reporting for NBC News, noted that Bill Nelson wasn't making things up when he said Russians hacked Florida's election system.. At this point Florida appears to be the most likely state to miss the anti-red wave. That's odd considering the wretched GOP candidates, from Rick Scott to Ron DeSantis-- until you factor in Russian hacking. The GOP enablers of the Russian efforts are losing their shit over Nelson blowing the whistle on Kremlin penetration of the state's voting system-- especially Rick Scott, the most crooked and corrupt governor in America, who "blasted his claim as irresponsible. The top Florida elections official, also a Republican, said he had seen no indication it's true." And the Washington Post, that bastion of Beltway status quo, agreed and "all but accused Nelson-- without evidence-- of making it up."

However, three people familiar with the intelligence tell NBC News that there is a classified basis for Nelson's assertion, which he made at a public event after being given information from the leaders of the Senate Intelligence Committee. The extent and seriousness of the threat remains unclear, shrouded for reasons of national security.

The episode illustrates the extent to which secrecy, politics and state-federal rivalries can stand in the way of a unified response to the threat from Russian attacks on a diffuse U.S. election system run by state and local officials. Through a spokesman, Nelson declined to comment.

At a, Aug. 7 campaign event in Florida's capital, Nelson said Intelligence Committee leaders asked that he "let supervisors of elections in Florida know that Russians are inside our records." He added that Russian hackers "have already penetrated certain counties in the state and they now have free rein to move about."

"Either Bill Nelson knows of crucial information the federal government is withholding from Florida election officials, or he is simply making things up," said Scott, who is seeking to take Nelson's Senate seat, which the senator has held since 2001.

But Scott, who as governor has a security clearance, has not actually disputed Nelson's assertion. His spokesman said the governor had not personally called anyone at the Department of Homeland Security to seek a classified briefing to get to the bottom of the matter. The governor's appointee to supervise elections in Florida, Secretary of State Ken Detzner, was reaching out to federal officials for clarity, spokesman McKinley Lewis told NBC News.

Detzner faced criticism this year for delaying an application for federal funds to improve Florida election security, only to be overruled by the governor.

A February report by the left-leaning Center for American Progress gave Florida an "F" grade for election security, one of only five states that received a failing grade. Florida was one of 21 states notified by DHS that it had been targeted by hackers in the 2016 election.

NBC's sources declined to provide the exact details of what Nelson was attempting to describe, because they remain classified. They said Nelson was talking about intelligence related to ongoing repercussions stemming from a 2016 hack of a Florida elections vendor, VR Systems, based in Tallahassee. They said the intelligence had been described to Nelson by Sens. Richard Burr (R-NC), the chairman of the Senate intelligence committee, and Mark Warner of Virginia, the ranking Democrat.

A Top Secret National Security Agency document leaked last year to The Intercept website said that VR Systems had been penetrated in August 2016 by hackers working for Russian military intelligence, and that the hackers "likely used data obtained from that operation to... launch a voter registration-themed spear-phishing campaign targeting U.S. local government organizations."

The NSA report didn't name the company but it described some of its products, making clear which company was being referenced, the Intercept reported. VR Systems Chief Operating Officer Ben Martin did not respond to a request for comment.

The report described a scheme in which Russian hackers tricked local government voter systems officials into clicking on bogus links that would allow the hackers to access credentials for voting systems.

The report said it was unknown to what extent the campaign had been successful, and what data on "election-related hardware and software applications" may have been obtained.

"The threat from that breach seems to be ongoing," a cybersecurity expert briefed on the matter told NBC News. In addition to Florida, VR Systems has contracts in California, Illinois and Indiana, its website says.

The sources say Nelson was not supposed to speak publicly about the matter, and he erred by suggesting that the information was new. Still, Nelson and Florida's other senator, Republican Marco Rubio, were asked to warn local officials about the ongoing threat to election systems by Russian state-sponsored hackers, two sources told NBC News. Rubio alluded to the matter with county officials in private, according to the Tampa Bay Times, which cited two sources who were in the room.

None of the senators on the intelligence committee would confirm Nelson's assertions. Nor would they deny it.

"While I understand your questions regarding Senator Nelson's recent public comments, I respectfully advise you to continue engaging directly with those federal agencies responsible for notifying you of and mitigating any potential intrusions," Burr said in a letter to Florida's top election official.

The Department of Homeland Security also declined to confirm or deny Nelson's comments.

Sara Sendek, a spokeswoman for the Department of Homeland Security, said in a statement: "While we are aware of Senator Nelson's recent statements, we have not seen any new compromises by Russian actors of election infrastructure. That said, we don't need to wait for a specific threat to be ready."

Nelson's remarks came after he and Rubio sent a letter to Florida officials urging them to take seriously the threat of Russian election intervention.

"We encourage you in the strongest terms to take advantage" of help from federal officials, the letter said.

Warner said in a statement that "Russian activities continue to pose a threat to the security of our elections, as Senators Nelson and Rubio rightly pointed out in their letter… I hope all state and local elections officials, including Florida's, will take this issue seriously."

Rubio, who serves on the intelligence committee and has frequently expressed concerns about discussing classified information, declined to address Nelson's assertion directly.

"Given the importance of Florida in our national politics, our state's election systems have been and will remain a potentially attractive target for attacks by foreign actors," the Republican senator said in a statement.

Nelson, who had served in the past on the intelligence committee, has been unable to fully respond to the criticism of his comments, presumably because he spoke out of turn about classified information.

When he made the remarks Aug. 7, he was asked, "Do you know which records the Russians are accessing?"

He replied, "That's classified."

Yeah, that's literally the only way the Republicans can save themselves from electoral catastrophe in November. Selling out our democracy-- our country-- to the Russian kleptocrat. Easy enough too see Trump doing that... but Ryan, McConnell... the whole party? Has it gone that far down the road?

Is Florida Salvageable For The Democrats In November-- One Democrat In Particular

Bill Nelson will be 76 in September

There are no guarantees in electoral politics, but right now the smart bet would be that the Democrats win a majority in the House, maybe even substantial majority. The Senate is a lot tougher. Winning back the Senate, means that the Democrats keep all the red state seats that Trump won that they hold and pick up 2 more, bringing their caucus to 51 and redicinging the Republicans' down to 49. Some of the Trump states look pretty safe for the Democratic incumbents: Pennsylvania, Ohio, Wisconsin, Michigan, North Dakota, Montana, West Virginia, perhaps even Indiana and Missouri. Democrats even look competitive in 3 or 4 Republican-held Trump states: Nevada, Arizona, Tennessee, possibly Texas. So what's missing from this picture? One purple state with a Democratic incumbent: Florida. Bill Nelson has held the seat for 18 years. Trump didn't wipe out Hillary the way he did in some of these other seats. He only won 4,617,886 (49.0%) to 4,504,975 (47.8%).

Last time Nelson ran (2012) he trounced Republican Connie Mack IV, 4,523,451 (55.2%) to 3,458,267 (42.2%). Nelson out-spent Mack $17,125,413 to $7,508,151. As of March 31 of this year Nelson had already raised $13,466,786 and his presumptive opponent, Governor Rick Scott hadn't started raising yet-- but is wealthy enough for it not to matter. He can self-fund whatever he needs to outspend Nelson.

Yesterday, Marc Caputo took a look at the Florida race for Politico and it didn't look good for the Democrats. Caputo starts with a bad omen: "Rick Scott’s Senate campaign has a Spanish-language web page. Sen. Bill Nelson’s doesn’t. Scott is advertising in Spanish. Nelson isn’t. Scott is learning Spanish and does interviews with Spanish-language media about once a week. Nelson isn’t and doesn’t. For Democrats who recognize protecting Nelson’s seat is essential to their hopes of winning a Senate majority this fall, the veteran senator’s lackluster outreach to one of the fastest-growing voting blocs in the nation’s largest swing state is causing alarm." And Caputo's report gets worse.

The depth of Nelson’s troubles-- and Scott’s advantage-- came into sharp focus last month in four focus groups conducted in Central Florida’s influential Puerto Rican community, where few knew who Nelson was, despite his three Senate terms and holding elected Florida office for 41 years.

“There’s a lot higher awareness of Rick Scott. He’s got much higher name recognition. And people associate him with trying to do something for Puerto Rico,” said Marcos Vilar, director for United for Progress PAC, which had the focus groups conducted for it by the polling firm Latino Decisions.

“Bill Nelson has very little name recognition,” Vilar said. “The people who know him don’t know what he’s done. They don’t know him in the community. They don’t see him out to the community as much.”

Party insiders and Latino activists -- in Washington, Miami, Orlando and Tallahassee-- fret that it’s a serious problem against Scott, who is expected to spend tens of millions of dollars out of his own pocket to knock off Nelson. They say the two-term Republican governor is running a robust campaign that’s “pandering” to Hispanics but drowning out Nelson’s support of issues important to the community-- from his clear support for comprehensive immigration reform to advocacy for Medicaid expansion to criticizing the Trump administration’s underwhelming response to Hurricane Maria in Puerto Rico.

“At the end of the day, he can be great on all the issues but if people don’t know that that’s happening, it almost doesn’t matter,” said Mayra Macias, political director for the group Latino Victory and a former political director for the Florida Democratic Party. “There seems to be a disconnect between the outreach to the community and the policy work that he’s doing, the advocacy for our community-- he’s been spot-on on our issues.”

...The panic surrounding Scott’s possible inroads with Hispanic voters-- who account for about 15 percent of the voter rolls-- results from their role as part of the diverse coalition the Democratic Party relies on to win in Florida.

With the notable exception of GOP-voting older Cuban Americans, Hispanics tend to vote Democratic, but their turnout has tended to be abysmal in midterm elections-- which Democrats have consistently lost here. Nelson has been the exception, in part because he has faced historically weak opponents.

Recent polls show Scott leading Nelson largely on the strength of a $12 million ad campaign that’s about to grow to nearly $17 million spent between his campaign and his allies. Nelson, by comparison, was quiet on air until the Senate Majority PAC announced a $2.2 million ad campaign last month. The ad, a Nelson bio, did not have a Spanish-language version.

But all is not lost for Nelson when it comes to Puerto Rican voters, United for Progress PAC’s Vilar said.

In the PAC’s focus groups, one fact sharply turns sentiment against Scott: the governor’s association with President Donald Trump, whose handling of Hurricane Maria has earned him widespread condemnation by Puerto Ricans. The mere mention that Scott raised money for Trump’s election-- and that Trump encouraged Scott to run for Senate-- was a potent message. Vilar said the only subset of Puerto Ricans it didn’t work with were registered Republicans he observed in yet another focus group, in Tampa.

“In Orlando at least, it’s a very effective argument: a vote for Scott is a vote for Trump,” Vilar said. “It’s gold. Everyone in doubt completely flipped. For people leaning for Scott, Trump is toxic.”

...Asked about the differences between the Scott and Nelson campaigns, Roberto R. Tejera, a veteran political commentator and host of The Roberto Rodriguez Tejera Show on Actualidad Radio in Miami, joked: “Who is Bill Nelson?”

Another reporter for a national Spanish-language network couldn’t recall any recent high-profile Latino-focused Nelson events in South Florida either and said that Scott, Sen. Marco Rubio and even New Jersey Sen. Bob Menendez are more active in Florida than Nelson in reaching out about Latin American issues of importance to the network’s viewers. “[Scott] also learned Spanish which is pretty amazing,” the reporter, who could not speak on the record under company policy, told Politico in a text message.

Scott, at the event for Colombian-American voters, said Nelson’s outreach was indicative of the Democrat’s campaign more broadly: “I haven’t seen him reach out in the last six years, either. I haven’t seen him around the state.”

Nelson’s campaign disputes that claim and pointed to more than two dozen dates when he met with Hispanic leaders and Puerto Rican officials, activists and evacuees. The list also includes two meetings with Venezuelans in Miami.

Nelson’s predicament doesn’t surprise Democrats familiar with Latino outreach in Senate campaigns and Nelson’s successful 2012 election, when he faced a weak opponent and rode President Obama’s coattails to an easy win while doing relatively little Hispanic-centric campaigning. At the time, some faulted Nelson for not doing enough and since then, they say, neither he nor the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee has taken Latino outreach seriously enough. Two operatives said the DSCC has ignored repeated entreaties to fix the situation.

“You do things necessary to mobilize the community and to communicate,” said one Democrat who didn’t want to be identified for fear of political retribution. “And the fact you don’t have that in Florida set up, you don’t have that in DC set up-- it’s baffling. And people are taking notice.”

...Juan Escalante, an undocumented “DREAMer” from Venezuela who grew up in Florida and is now communications director for the immigrant-rights group America’s Voice in Washington, said Latino activists and Democratic insiders worry that the party is in denial about the effectiveness of Scott’s outreach and the relatively low-key campaigning by Nelson.

“When it comes down to it, Scott seems more willing to speak to Latino audiences-- going to where they are and speaking their language and showing a vested interest in what they care about,” said Escalante, criticizing Nelson for not embracing DREAMers and Latinos in the same way that former Nevada Sen. Harry Reid did.

“It’s rather unfortunate that we don’t have the senior senator of Florida embedding himself in that energy,” he said. “We may end up with a Rick Scott as a junior senator and a Marco Rubio as a senior senator. And I don’t want to see that.”

The NRA And Two GOP Governor Scotts-- One In Florida And One in Vermont

Vermont's PVI is D+15 and Hillary beat Trump there 178,573 (55.72%) to 95,369 (30.27%). Trump won just one of Vermont's 14 counties (Essex, the least populated). Florida is a more swingy state, although the PVI is R+2. Although Obama won Florida both times he ran, Hillary gave up on the state's crucial 29 electoral votes. Trump beat her (narrowly)-- 4,617,886 (49.0%) to 4,504,975 (47.8%). Of the state's 67 counties, she won 9.

Both states have Republican governors named Scott-- Phil Scott in Verment, who is running for reelection, and Rick Scott in Florida, who is running for the U.S. Senate. And the NRA has turned against each of them. In 2016 the gubernatorial seat was open in Vermont and the Democrats ran a weak EMILY's List nothing candidate, Sue Minter. Scott, the state's lieutenant governor, beat her 166,817 (52.96%) to 139,253 (44.21%).

Rick Scott, a convicted criminal who was caught stealing from Medicare, beat another weak EMILY's List nothing candidate, Alex Sink, in his first run (2010). He was reelected in 2014 against pointless ex-Republican Charlie Crist. In 2010 he beat Sink 2,619,335 (48.9%) to 2,557,785 (47.7%), largely because she allowed EMILY's List run her campaign). In 2014, Scott beat Crist 2,865,343 (48.1%) to 2,801,198 (47.1%) to 2,865,343 (48.1%).

Today the NRA is angry with both governors. How angry? Last week Phil Scott approved a package of gun-related laws passed by the state legislature and the NRA called on gun owners to abandon him. Dana Loesch, a national spokeswoman for the NRA: "This governor in Vermont completely gave a one-finger salute to the Constitution and to gun owners. He is no friend of firearm owners and I hope that all firearm owners remember this betrayal the next time he’s up for re-election." That's in about half a year.

The NRA gave Scott an A rating during his first gubernatorial campaign in 2016, when Scott said he saw no need for new Vermont gun laws. The governor changed his position in February "after deep reflection" after an alleged school shooting plot came to light in Fair Haven, and on Wednesday he signed three gun-related bills into law.

Loesch described Scott's shift as "an attempt to appease the gun-grabbers in his state."

The NRA spokeswoman seemed particularly bothered by S.221, a bill that won support from even the most ardent gun-rights lawmakers and passed both the Vermont House and the Vermont Senate unanimously.

The new law sets up a court process from removing weapons from people deemed to be at "extreme risk" of violence or suicide. State's attorneys or the Attorney General's Office may petition a family court judge to require a person to relinquish their firearms for up to six months. In emergency situations, these orders may be granted without the person's knowledge, and would expire after 14 days.

... Gun-rights advocates have reacted angrily to Scott's decision to sign the bills, and some jeered and shouted during the bill signing ceremony Wednesday.

"I understand I may lose support over the decision to sign these bills today," Scott said, "but those are consequences I am prepared to live with."

Scott will seek re-election for a second term in November. He is facing a challenge from fellow Republican Keith Stern, who has made gun rights a cornerstone of his campaign.

Rick Scott has an uphill battle to displace Bill Nelson-- especially in a blue wave environment. The last thing he needs is his right flank in tatters. And that's what he's got, with gun nuts stepping up their attacks on him for signing gun control legislation after the school shooting in Parkland. First off, the far right Republican Trumpist campaigning to replace him as governor, Ron DeSantis says he would have vetoed the legislation Scott signed. And the gun group to the right of the NRA, the National Organization for Gun Rights, has already attacked him in an e-mail entitled "Gov. Gun Control Running for Senate," for signing a popular bill putting minor restrictions on the sale of assault-style weapons.

One of the most respected Democratic political operatives in Florida, an old friend, Kevin Cate: "The whole guns and NRA situation is very complicated for Rick Scott. This is a guy who sprinted far to the right, who's BFFs with Donald Trump, he signed a gun bill that did have some more moderate positions in it, so he's got to be sprinting back and forth, back and forth, and someone as robotic as Rick Scott, that's tough for him to do. He's got to sprint back and forth to keep that base happy because if they don't turn out, if these Trump folks don't turn out, he doesn't have a chance."

Meanwhile, reflecting one of those back and forth, the Tampa Bay Times reported late last week that mayors of several cities are suing Scott for sticking with the NRA's agenda.

[St. Petersburg] Mayor Rick Kriseman announced Wednesday that he will join 10 other Florida cities and mayors in a lawsuit against Gov. Rick Scott over the issue of being able to regulate firearms in local jurisdictions.

..."What I see is a collective effort at taking away our home rule authority,'' he said. "I also find it incredibly ironic…the Florida legislature complains about Washington telling them what to do…But they don't seem to have any problem telling us, cities and counties, what to do."

The mayor said he would ban military style weapons, bump stocks, and armor-piercing bullets if he could.

"Governor Scott and legislative leaders decided to overstep their authority and use fear and intimidation as a tactic to preserve the NRA's agenda," Kriseman tweeted before the City Hall announcement.

Alex Leary and Steve Bousquet, writing for the Miami Herald speculate that Scott angering the gun nuts would actually help him in November. Yes, gun nuts are angry. Comments on Scott's campaign Facebook page prove that: "Sorry, Governor Scott. You blew it when you signed the anti-gun legislation into law. Will not be voting for you," one person wrote. Another compared him to Democrat Charlie Crist. A third fumed, "Shouldn’t have gone against Americans with your knee jerk pandering to the gun grabbers." Scott’s embrace of Florida’s first gun restrictions in decades has infuriated the gun lobby and its fiercely loyal lieutenants. What will the NRA do about Scott's A+ rating now? It's a lot more important than their stance on Phil Scott in Vermont.

If Scott escapes attacks after weakening gun rights, other Republicans may feel emboldened in a time of soaring public support for solutions to Parkland and other mass shootings.

“It has always been our practice to hold public officials accountable for their actions that impact law-abiding firearms owners and their Second Amendment rights. Nothing has changed,” said Marion Hammer, the NRA’s Florida lobbyist who, pre-Parkland, had achieved a legendary reputation for her control over the agenda in Tallahassee. 
...“She is very much, 'You’re with us or you die,’ ” said Robert Spitzer, an expert on gun politics and chairman of the political science department at SUNY Cortland in New York. “But Scott’s well positioned. It’s certainly helpful to his campaign because he can say that he’s not completely in the thrall of the NRA.

“It’s a pretty clear message that it’s possible to weave a path that amounts to expressing support for gun rights but also some gun measures, even if they are limited.”

Part of the lesson, Spitzer added, “is that the NRA’s bark is worse than its bite. It’s certainly an influential group. But the idea they can just sort of wiggle their finger and make things happen magically in politics, it really isn’t like that. There are many other candidates who have sided with them then parted ways and lived to tell the story.”

Pennsylvania Republican Sen. Pat Toomey was an A+ rated NRA darling during his 2010 campaign, the group spending $1.5 million to help him get elected. But a few years later, after the Sandy Hook tragedy, he sponsored bipartisan legislation to expand background checks. It did not pass and the NRA turned on Toomey, but he still won re-election in 2016.

“You can do the right thing and you’ll be fine,” Toomey said in an interview about the climate Scott now faces. “In his state, like mine, a majority of voters feel very strongly about the Second Amendment, as do I, and these folks voted for me. I commend him for being willing to stand up.”

Despite all the social media noise, the legislation just might help the Republican governor win a seat in the Senate.


The law Scott signed last month raised the age to buy a gun in Florida from 18 to 21 with a three-day waiting period. The NRA filed suit immediately. In public comments, Hammer included Scott among “turncoat Republicans” who “caved to bullying and coercion” by passing the changes in response to the shooting at a high school in Parkland that killed 17 people on Feb. 14.

Four years ago, Hammer praised Scott for his “historic” signing of five pro-gun bills.

Florida has long been at the vanguard of NRA-backed policies, including the controversial “stand your ground” law. But the national movement spurred by Parkland, with massive rallies in Washington and cities coast to coast, led to action from state and local governments and companies such as Dick’s Sporting Goods to end some gun sales.

It came just as Scott was preparing to run against Nelson, and Scott’s critics say his change of heart is all about politics. Scott showed no such initiative after the 2016 mass shooting at the Pulse nightclub in Orlando or an attack early last year at the Fort Lauderdale airport.

“The fact that Rick Scott in this politically craven way sees opportunity in accommodation with our side is an indication of the weakness of the NRA,” said Peter Ambler, executive director of a gun safety group started by former U.S. Rep. Gabby Giffords. “But elections are about choices. Bill Nelson has had the courage throughout his tenure to do the right thing, to vote for gun safety, while Rick Scott was doing the exact opposite, while he was embracing the NRA.”


Nelson, who likes to tell audiences he’s been a lifelong hunter, charges that Scott “will say and do anything to try and get elected. He highlights an NRA-backed provision of the new law that calls for arming school personnel, though it would not apply to many teachers and school districts have largely said they would not participate in the optional program. (Scott opposed arming teachers but said he had to compromise.)

On raising the purchase age and adding the three-day waiting period, the Democrat said they were “steps in the right direction” but stressed that stricter measures are needed, including universal background checks and limiting large-capacity magazine clips. Nelson also wants to ban assault-style weapons.

For Scott, being under attack from the NRA could attract votes from independents and moderate voters who are more inclined to favor gun restrictions. Scott also has the support of some families of the victims of the shooting at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School, who stood with him at his Capitol office in Tallahassee on March 23 as he signed the legislation. (Others, particularly Douglas students, say the legislation fell well short.)

Scott can avoid the weight of the NRA because he doesn’t face a serious primary challenger, will have no trouble raising money and is not likely to face an exodus of Republican voters over the gun issue.


... [The NRA] is unlikely to mount a full-throated attack on Scott, though it could withhold formal support. A membership drive mailer that reached homes across the state last week mentioned “anti-gun politicians” but did not say anything specific about Florida.

The showdown with Nelson is expected to be wildly expensive and extremely close. Scott won two races for governor by about 1 percentage point in Republican wave elections against underfunded Democratic opponents.

Four years ago, against Charlie Crist, Scott won 54 of 67 counties. Some of Scott’s most lopsided victory margins were in counties such as Bay, Okaloosa and Santa Rosa in the Florida Panhandle. Even there, in the most conservative region of the state, where opposition to gun restrictions could be strongest, Scott is unlikely to face a political backlash.

Rep. Brad Drake, a Walton County Republican and an A+ NRA-rated lawmaker who voted against the gun bill, said: “I’m going to strongly support Rick Scott. I agree with him on almost every issue. Once in a while we disagree, but it’s never personal. He’s very conscientious.”

Sen. Dennis Baxley, R-Ocala, one of the NRA’s strongest allies in the Legislature, also voted against the gun bill, but said he has no quarrel with Scott.


“I view people based on their overall competence and effectiveness, and he’s A+ in my book. You’re never going to agree 100 percent of the time,” said Baxley, who represents The Villages, home to a vital bloc of Republican voters in statewide elections.

“It may give pause to some people who view the Second Amendment as a litmus test,” Baxley said. “But compared to the record of Sen. Nelson on the issue, the contrast is huge.”


Scott joins a host of other politicians who are finding daylight with the hard line of the NRA-- out west, in states such as Montana, some Democrats are shifting as well-- and it comes as Republicans face a tough midterm election climate.

Dan Eberhart, an energy executive and major conservative donor, recently held up Scott as an example of candidates needing to appeal to suburban voters and doing so by standing up to the NRA.

“Republicans are going to have to move a little to get 51 percent-plus in elections, and the NRA will have to deal with it,” Eberhart told the New York Times. “The NRA is really out of step with suburban GOP voters.”

Scott hasn’t brought up guns on the campaign trail but Nelson will make it an issue, as will a flood of outside groups trying to paint Scott as an opportunist.

Thanks In Part To Trump, Florida Heats Up As A 2018 Battleground

EMILY's List has come up with a way for Democrats to lose in Florida again

Yesterday Lisa Hagen wrote that Florida governor, Trump crony and crooked multimillionaire Rick Scott is running into headwinds as he considers his Senate run against Bill Nelson. GOP analyst Rick Wilson: "He’s got the ability to lay the hammer down very quickly and be in the fight very quickly. At this point if you’re him, you want to wait as long as you can [because] Donald Trump is really unpopular in Florida with people outside the Republican base." He has until May 4 to file; no other Republicans will as long as they think Scott's going to.

Republicans are expected to face strong headwinds in both the Senate and House heading into November. Democrats have held a consistent lead in generic ballot polling, while an unexpected Democratic special election victory in deep-red rural Wisconsin last week served as just the latest suggestion that a Democratic wave could be coming in November. While Scott sits on the sidelines, Democrats haven’t wasted any time taking shots at him and his record as governor.

  ...[T]he Republican governor will need to walk a fine line on how closely he associates himself to the president. Trump has said he wants to be active in 2018 campaigns and it remains to be seen whether he comes down to Florida to boost Scott and vulnerable House Republicans.

There are already signs that Scott is seeking to distance himself from Trump. After news broke about Trump calling Haiti, El Salvador and African nations “shithole” countries, Scott released a statement that he does “not think this way, nor do I agree with this kind of sentiment.” Florida has a sizable number of Haitian-born residents who are registered to vote.

“What will hurt Rick Scott is the endless beat down of ads showing him next to Donald Trump,” Wilson, an outspoken GOP critic of Trump, said. “People who hate Donald Trump will crawl over broken glass to vote against people who like Donald Trump.” 

Meanwhile, in the race to replace Scott in Tallahassee, Tallahassee mayor Andrew Gillum-- the Blue America-endorsed candidate and thinly progressive the race-- is making spectacular games against the three right-of-center Democratic corporate shills in the race-- Gwen Graham, Philip Levin and Chris King. Writing for Tampa Bay Beat, Jim Bleyer noted that while Levine and Graham "are relying on piles of money and a legacy name to boost their respective candidacies,  Gillum has issued meaningful, detailed policies and criticized the positions of Rick Scott, Donald Trump, Ron DeSantis and other high-profile Republicans." Last Friday Gillum released Fair Share for Florida’s Future, "a plan to invest more than $1 billion in the middle class, education, and job training, by adjusting the state corporate income tax rate."

 “Thanks to President Trump’s tax scam, Florida’s richest corporations will take home even more sacks of money than they already do,” said Gillum. “For decades they’ve gotten richer and richer, while working families have fallen further behind. Now, I’m proposing that the tiny fraction of Florida’s richest corporations pay their fair share, so we can invest in working families through world class public schools, a pay raise for teachers, early childhood education, and SHOP 2.0 vocational training.”

Gillum’s plan adjusts the state corporate income tax rate on large corporations to 7.75%, more in line with a fast-growing populous state, and invests the added recurring revenue in public school construction, teacher pay raises, early childhood education programs, and vocational training.

Karen Woodall, of the Florida Center for Fiscal and Economic Policy termed the Gillum plan “a job creator for Florida's working families.”

And concrete proposals from Graham and Levine to help the Democratic constituency? Nada. Bupkes.

Levine and Graham are submissive at best; craven at worst.  Levine in the past allied himself with Donald Trump in criticizing the media; Graham’s voting record in Congress during her two-year stint as a public servant is undeniably abysmal.

Instead of taking on the GOP’s steamrolling of the 99 percent, the two corporatists have contracted with pay-to-play blogs to publicize their campaigns. A sample of their touted accomplishments: Levine helped Miami International schedule a direct flight to Tel Aviv. Graham developed a sudden epiphany to help displaced Puerto Ricans.

The pair’s pandering to two important Democratic constituencies in Florida are repugnant, transparent, and meaningless in light of their track records. Neither displays a shred of “thrausos.”

If Democrats continue rewarding corporate donors and ignoring the voters, they will always be in the minority, wrote Richard Eskow in this penetrating piece.

“I want Walter Cronkite to come back. I think we need objective news,” Levine said when asked about Trump tweeting out a clip of himself body-slamming someone with a CNN logo over their face.

In May, Levine threw the door wide open to shunning the Democratic label and running as an independent candidate for governor. Since he could not meet deadlines prescribed by law, he is now running as a Democrat.

“I love the Democratic Party. But you know what’s interesting? I actually like the Republican Party, and I like a lot of Republican ideas, and I like a lot of the people in the Republican Party as well,” he declared in Tampa.

“But this millionaire Democrat also is making headlines-- with words like ‘tirade’ and ‘flies off handle’-- because of his off-the-cuff remarks and juvenile posts on social media,” the South Florida Sun-Sentinel editorialized in March. “With the gubernatorial field beginning to take shape, Democrats should be asking themselves whether they really want a nominee whose temperament draws comparisons to that of 'President' Donald Trump.”

Graham is even more shameful. Her pivoting and pandering makes her anathema to voters of either major party.  If it weren’t for her last name and the carpet bombing of her pay-for-play propaganda, she would be polling in the low to mid single digits.

As a one term Congresswoman, Graham voted with the Republican majority in 39 of 90 key votes:  43 percent of the time. Among her indiscretions:

• Voting for the Keystone pipeline
• Voting against the Unfunded  Mandates and Transparency Act
• Voting for the relaxation of permitting for natural gas pipelines
• Voting for improving coal combustible residuals
• Voting for the prohibition of transfers of prisoners held at Guantanamo
• Voting for  a joint resolution for Congressional disapproval under Chapter 8 of Title 5, United States Code, of the rule submitted by the Corps of Engineers and the Environmental Protection Agency relating to the definition of “Waters of the United States” Under the Federal Water Pollution Control Act.

There are so many other environmental transgressions that John Muir is doing somersaults.

As Tampa Bay Beat reported a month ago, Graham would have no chance in a general election unless her opponent was at the epicenter of a Mooresque-proportioned scandal.

Florida's Crooked Governor Rick Scott Discovers Hell Hath No Fury Like A Woman Scorned

Unless you're from Florida, you probably don't remember Jennifer Carroll, Rick Scott's former Lt. Governor, a crook-- like him-- but one he held to a much higher standard than he holds himself. Just over a year ago, we covered her problems with ethics and common decency, problems that caused Scott to force her to resign. Kartik Krishnaiyer used to occasion to point out that the resignation was just the latest example of the ongoing culture of cronyism and corruption in the Sunshine State.

Florida Republicans have created a class of entitled politicians who lack intellectual curiosity or any governing wisdom. They are not conservatives as much as they are political whores for power and certain big business. They have lived for years on easy street being opposed by an impotent Florida Democratic Party that lacked organization or the courage in its own convictions to take the fight to the Republicans. The Democrats have benefited from these same tendencies in liberal southeast Florida, where it seems half the elected Democrats on the county level have been at one time or another linked to scandal.

...Lt Gov. Carroll’s resignation is an indication that consequences are now being suffered by those in power for excessive and potentially illegal behavior. The progressive movement throughout American history has focused on issues of graft, greed, cronyism and corruption. Florida Progressives should do the same. Regardless of party, corrupt government cannot be progressive government.

She works as a political commentator for WJXT Channel 4, a Jacksonville TV station. Her side of the story-- an autobiography called When You Get There-- hits the bookstores today, her birthday. I suppose Gov. Scott could be happy that the book isn't being released closer to November, since he's the villain of the story.

Carroll, a retired U.S. Navy lieutenant commander, was the first black woman to serve as lieutenant governor of Florida and held the largely ceremonial job for more than two years. Scott's two top aides forced her to resign on March 12, 2013, after state law enforcement agents interrogated her about past public relations work for Allied Veterans of the World, a group linked to Internet cafes that were shut down after investigators uncovered widespread fraud.

Carroll initially did not disclose all of her income in 2009 and 2010 from Allied Veterans on state financial disclosure forms, but later reported the money on amended forms.

She was not charged with any wrongdoing and writes that she felt humiliated by how Scott's aides "ambushed" her with a one-sentence resignation letter they forced her to sign.

Carroll describes Scott as overly controlled by his own staff and lacking in a personal touch, saying he showed no concern after she fainted and struck her head on the floor at a hot Greek church.

"Clearly, something was missing there, some ability to make personal connections that he just didn't have," Carroll said.

Working with black political consultant Clarence McKee in the 2010 campaign, Carroll said she built a plan to reach out to black voters with local newspapers, radio and phone calls and that despite the campaign's objections, she attended a forum in Miami hosted by Bishop Victor Curry, a radio host and prominent voice in Miami's black community.

"The campaign didn't want it, but I did it anyway," she writes.

As a result, Carroll writes, Scott got 6 percent of the African-American vote, according to 2010 exit polls, and if she had not directed a "minority stealth" campaign, "Scott would have lost the election."

…Carroll's book contains no new bombshells, and many of the incidents she describes were reported by the Florida media at the time. But few in Scott's orbit escape Carroll's wrath.

She claims that Scott's former chief of staff, Steve MacNamara, blocked access to the governor and would "undermine or get rid of people who didn't go along with him," and that his replacement, Adam Hollingsworth, was "even more ruthless" and lower-level staffers cowered in his presence.

Carroll, a stylish dresser, wrote that when she wore designer pants and boots for an event at the Governor's Mansion, Hollingsworth ordered her to change clothes, and told her to scrap a scheduled birthday party in 2012 because a hurricane was approaching the state and Scott had canceled public events.

"It was just so silly," Carroll writes.

Carroll writes that she spent months asking superiors for a travel budget before she got one, but after security costs in her first year approached $300,000, Scott's staff limited her travel and assigned her a lower-ranking state trooper than previous lieutenant governors had.

During Scott's inaugural celebration, she writes, "I was treated like an unwanted stepchild," and when she wanted to talk to the governor, she said, she was told to ask for an appointment with his scheduler.

Is Florida Really The Most Corrupt State In America?

The superficial, court-ordered redistricting in Florida only scratches the surface of the prevalent culture of political corruption that permeates the state's two political parties. The judgment does not attempt to deals ith anything but two tiny and blatant cases of grotesque gerrymandering-- and that was all the state legislature dealt with. Even if the new plan goes into effect in 2016, Florida will still be one of the most unfairly gerrymandered states in the Union-- despite the overwhelming passage of a citizens' initiative to put an end to the practice. But even the tiny ameliorative effort agreed to by the legislature is being challenged by corrupt Republican political hack Daniel "Taliban Dan" Webster.

Webster is busy raising money for a court challenge. No one has contributed yet, but Taliban Dan has filed the Daniel Webster Legal Expense Trust with the House Ethics Committee and plans to use it to solicit money from crooked lobbyists and other special interests who have already maxed out to his reelection campaign. Webster, a crackpot religious fanatic and follower of cult leader and child rapist Bill Gothard, has managed to amass one of the most reactionary/anti-family voting records of any Member of Congress. Webster on Gothard's demented teachings: "They are the basis for everything I do today." He brags about using Gothard's sick, corrupted rants in the political life of his central Florida district:



Webster, like many Florida Republican legislators, has been violently anti-LGBT throughout his miserable career. On February 28, 2013, for example, he voted for the failed amendment to strip protections for American Indians, immigrants, and members of the LGBT community from an anti-domestic violence bill. It failed because 60 Republicans joined the Democrats to defeat it, 257-166, including conservative Floridians Ted Yoho, Ron DeSantis, Mario Diaz-Balart, Ileana Ros-Lehtinen, and Trey Radel. Two years earlier he had worked frantically to prevent gay men and women volunteers from serving in the military and has voted against every attempt to allow members of the LGBT community to get married. He's a sick cookie-- and he isn't evolving, not even at the snail's pace other Florida Republicans are finally adopting. Just yesterday, the Miami Herald in covering the GOP primary debate for FL-26, pointed out that Republican candidates are not taking the kinds of vicious anti-LGBT stands that Old Testament authoritarians like Webster are clinging to. In fact, other GOP candidates have also been lightening up a bit on Global Warming, another agenda item that finds Taliban Dan off muttering to himself and to a shrinking band of fringe lunatics in crazy-land.

Questions on sea-level rise, immigration and gay marriage revealed divisions among the four contenders who taped Facing South Florida, which will air Sunday on Miami Herald news partner WFOR-CBS 4. A fifth candidate, ex-Congressman David Rivera, declined to attend.

By the end of the taping, Carlos Curbelo, Ed MacDougall, Joe Martinez and Lorenzo Palomares-Starbuck had agreed on plenty. But there was dissent in the very first question from investigative reporter Jim DeFede, who asked if all the candidates vying to represent Westchester to Key West would concur that-- whatever the cause-- seas are rising.

Yes, said the candidates-- except for one.

“I’m not exactly sure,” said Martinez, a former Miami-Dade County commissioner. “I’m not a scientist, Jim.”

…On gay marriage, it was again Martinez who differed with his three rivals. MacDougall, Curbelo and Palomares-Starbuck said they support making marriages among same-sex couples legal.

“It’s the right thing to do,” MacDougall said.

Martinez, however, said the question should be left up to states-- and if Florida voters were asked to repeal the state’s gay-marriage ban, he would vote no, Martinez added after the show’s taping. He does support civil unions and benefits for same-sex partners, he said.

A federal judge in Tallahassee ruled Thursday that Florida’s gay-marriage ban is unconstitutional, though he stayed his own order pending appeals.

Reform-minded citizens in every state like to brag that their state is the most corrupt: New Jersey, Pennsylvania, North Carolina, Illinois, Texas, New York, California, all have good cases that can be made on their behalf. But some say that Florida already has it sewn up. We're talking about a state that elected the most overtly corrupt governor in modern history after he had plead the Fifth Amendment 75 times and was then fined $1.7 Billion for running the biggest Medicare fraud scheme in history. This guy:



But Rick Scott isn't the root of Florida's endless epidemic of political corruption. One of the worst symptoms is the toxic role Big Sugar plays-- not just with slimy Republicans like Scott, but with just as slimy Democrats like Debbie Wasserman Schultz, the Democrats' go-to shill for the Fanjul sugar empire. This week Eye On Miami singled out Florida Republicans for their shocking corruption in relation to Big Sugar.

The excellent investigative report by the Tampa Bay Times, exposing links between Florida's top GOP politicians-- including Gov. Rick Scott and Republican legislative leadership-- Big Sugar and high cost, free hunting trips to the King Ranch in Texas show the extent to which the party of the "free market" freely undermines the ideals of its base: sugar is one of the most heavily protected industrial crops in America, enjoying vast subsidies including illegal (according to the Florida Constitution) subsidies for the costs of Everglades cleanup.

Sugar's true cost to taxpayers, and the context of U.S. Sugar and Florida Crystal's flagrant entertainments of elected officials, isn't the Everglades and measures to shift cleanup costs to taxpayers-- it is public health and strategies to prevent Big Sugar from becoming the next Big Tobacco.

"Drastic Measures," in the Financial Times (April 25, 2014): notes the reach of Big Sugar, but also details a dramatic shift in health care priorities that is putting the first significant, coordinated pressure on sugar consumption. Earlier this year the World Health Organization reduced the recommended daily sugar intake by half, to the equivalent of six teaspoons of sugar a day.

"The amount of scientific research linking sugar intake with obesity has increased. And governments are waking up to the rising costs of illnesses such as diabetes and cancer that have increased alongside obesity. "The discussion of sugar linked to dietary concerns has been has been gathering momentum," says Stefano Natella of Credit Suisse. "The related global healthcare costs are at an all-time high--the bill is $500 billion or over 10 percent of global healthcare spending-- as are obesity and diabetes levels."

While Republican members of Congress ranted and raved about the costs of the Affordable Health Care Act, none also complained about the toll on consumers' health through excess consumption of sugar.

Democrats have also been loathe to tie the costs of Big Sugar to the domestic health care emergency, because of the enormous impact of campaign contributions to members of Congress and state legislatures where sugar is grown. When Michele Obama tried to move her popular "Get Moving" campaign towards the sugar problem, she was warned off by White House policy makers.

It is not just Florida, but Florida is the state where the lockdown by Big Sugar of the Florida legislature and Governor's Office is a given. The entire governmental investment for Everglades restoration, spending billions and hundreds of thousands of man hours in the multi-decadal effort, is a work-around of Big Sugar.

Cynical industry manipulation of public processes, with billionaires at their joysticks -- is crippling government agencies and forced Congress through the Farm Bill and state legislatures through lax regulations to keep intact taxpayer backed programs that form the backbone of protectionist trade policies.

So why haven't environmentalists decried Big Sugar as the same kind of destroyer as Big Tobacco? It's time.

"Sugar has become the new tobacco," says Simon Capewell, professor of clinical epidemiology at Liverpool University, one of the founders of Action on Sugar, a UK campaign group formed in January. "Everywhere, sugary drinks and junk foods are pressed on unsuspecting parents and children by a cynical industry focused on profit not health."

A secondary impact for bribe-hungry conservatives is that sugar rots the brains of people who over-use it, which explains why non-millionaires vote for Republicans and for deceitful politicians from the Republican wing of the Democratic Party.