I would like to assure my readers that the following is neither a Saturday Night Live skit, nor a Onion News Network video special. The woman shown in it is Corrine Brown, who is indeed a sitting Congresswoman from Florida. Florida’s Fifth district, in point of fact. And that is very likely even her own hair.
[link fixed]
Normally you don’t want to say things like that; but in this particular case… it’s not that the Democrats had been reduced to supporting non-party candidate Ed Jany after Alex Sink abruptly indicated that she wouldn’t run again in that district. You can sometimes work around a problem like that, assuming that you have the right candidate. No, what makes this a bridge too far is that the Democrats don’t even have that candidate anymore:
Dems’ candidate to take on @DavidJollyCD13 – Ed Jany – is dropping out. Cites work conflict, days after we found holes in resume claims
— Adam Smith (@adamsmithtimes) May 13, 2014
More details on that here. Suffice it to say that the DCCC has pretty much defecated in the blankets on this one; it’s one thing to make bricks without straw, and quite another to make them without actual clay. One wonders if the DCCC is even going to keep trying on this one…
Moe Lane
I cannot imagine doing something like this to my children.
When U.S. Rep. Alan Grayson married his wife, she was already wed to another man, according to a new court filing by the congressman’s lawyers, seeking an annulment on the basis
And by ‘this’ I mean ‘making horribly public allegations about their mother.’ I don’t have the slightest idea whether said allegations are true or not, but good Lord. How was the man planning to explain this to his youngest children? Continue reading It’s like Alan Grayson has to find new and exciting ways to be a putz.
The guy – Eric Conrad – was fresh off of mucking about with Obamacare enrollment efforts in Florida, which argues for a certain amount of applied despair and heightened sense of futility. But he barely lasted a week as Crist’s spokesman, and nobody’s exactly sure why. In my experience, that usually means that the reason is actually fairly epic. I look forward to finding out what it is…
I am not surprised, but I suspect that the Democrats are:
Quarterly fundraising reports filed in Tallahassee on Thursday illuminate the big advantage Republicans are likely to have heading into this year’s governor’s race, in which Gov. Rick Scott will fight for re-election against likely Democratic opponent, former Gov. Charlie Crist.
Combining fundraising by their state parties, their campaign organizations and the independent committees backing each candidate, Scott and the Republican side raised about three times as much as Crist and the Democratic side in the first three months of 2014.
(H/T: AoSHQ) The two were Mike Parrish in PA-06 (Lean Republican) and Buffie McFadyen in CO-0[3] (Safe Republican). Of the two, obviously Parrish is the more disappointing news for Democrats… but it’s interesting to note that ‘R+5’ is apparently enough to be effectively out of the realm of possibility for Democrats this cycle anyway. I remember a time when it was not, and that time was 2006 and 2008.
I know, I know, it’s vaguely minor news and everything. But if you’re wondering why people are making certain assumptions about the 2014 election cycle, it’s because of stories like these. You look at who is running, who is retiring, who is staying out of races, who is jumping in… money, too, of course, but money tends to get cancelled out by other money. In the end, the people running are the biggest part of this picture. To mangle Machiavelli… gold may not get you good candidates, but good candidates can always get you gold. Continue reading FL-13 Fallout Watch: Two Democratic House candidates drop out this week.
This would normally be a horrible poll for Governor Rick Scott…
34% Crist
33% Scott
…17% Somebody Else
17% Don’t Know/No Answer
…except of course that the polling historically has been worse for Scott since, well, forever. Essentially, the reason why Charlie Crist has gotten this far is that he always polled very well against Scott; will that remain true, now that Florida voters internalize the idea that voting for Charlie Crist means, well, voting for Charlie Crist? Time will, as they say, tell. Continue reading This is, remarkably, Rick Scott’s best poll yet.
Astounding.
That awkward moment when Alex Sink volunteer @mpwmcfly forgets how screenshots work. #FL13 Retweet please. pic.twitter.com/x8nqKqFLd8
— Jonathan Torres (@JonnyTorres) March 11, 2014
This is, of course:
Seriously, why is it that young people don’t seem to understand that everything you do on social media is, well, social and media? Aren’t they the ones who grew up with these platforms?
And here’s a headline that you won’t see every day: “Rand Paul Does American Crossroads Robocall to Thwart Libertarian Candidate in FL-13.”
Sen. Rand Paul is helping Florida GOP candidate David Jolly thwart a Libertarian rival polling at four to seven percent, recording a robocall that touts Jolly as someone who wants to “ensure you, not the government, are making decisions for you and your family.”
The call, funded by American Crossroads, a group former Bush aide Karl Rove helped found, will go out to about 20,000 households. The targets of the call are potential supporters of Lucas Overby, a Libertarian candidate who could take votes from GOP candidate Jolly.
…all set to go: but then I remembered that people who are amiable, middle aged, and frankly stout should not make sardonic commentary about people who are also middle aged and stout (replace ‘amiable’ with ‘filled with a seething, soul-corrupting rage’ in Alan Grayson’s case, of course).
So I’ll just note that Mrs. Grayson is now alleging adultery on her husband’s part, and avoid discussing, ah, probabilities. Continue reading Dagnabbit. I had an AWESOME @AlanGrayson slam…