x

x

FLORIDA POLITICS
Since 2002, daily Florida political news and commentary

 

UPDATE: Every morning we review and individually digest Florida political news articles, editorials and punditry. Our sister site, FLA Politics was selected by Campaigns & Elections as one of only ten state blogs in the nation
"every political insider should be reading right now."

E-Mail Florida Politics

This is our Main Page
Our Sister Site
On FaceBook
Follow us on Twitter
Our Google+ Page
Contact [E-Mail Florida Politics]
Site Feed
...and other resources

 

Welcome To Florida Politics

Thanks for visiting. On a semi-daily basis we scan Florida's major daily newspapers for significant Florida political news and punditry. We also review the editorial pages and political columnists/pundits for Florida political commentary. The papers we review include: the Miami Herald, Sun-Sentinel, Palm Beach Post, Naples News, Sarasota Herald Tribune, St Pete Times, Tampa Tribune, Orlando Sentinel, the Daytona Beach News-Journal, Tallahassee Democrat, and, occasionally, the Florida Times Union; we also review the political news blogs associated with these newspapers.

For each story, column, article or editorial we deem significant, we post at least the headline and link to the piece; the linked headline always appears in quotes. We quote the headline for two reasons: first, to allow researchers looking for the cited piece to find it (if the link has expired) by searching for the original title/headline via a commercial research service. Second, quotation of the original headline permits readers to appreciate the spin from the original piece, as opposed to our spin.

Not that we don't provide spin; we do, and plenty of it. Our perspective appears in post headlines, the subtitles within the post (in bold), and the excerpts from the linked stories we select to quote; we also occasionally provide other links and commentary about certain stories. While our bias should be immediately apparent to any reader, we nevertheless attempt to link to every article, column or editorial about Florida politics in every major online Florida newspaper.

 

Older posts [back to 2002]

Previous Articles by Derek Newton: Ten Things Fox on Line 1 Stem Cells are Intelligent Design Katrina Spin No Can't Win Perhaps the Most Important Race Senate Outlook The Nelson Thing Deep, Dark Secret Smart Boy Bringing Guns to a Knife Fight Playing to our Strength  

The Blog for Tuesday, November 15, 2005

Tragic

    SCOTUS refused to hear the felon case:
    The U.S. Supreme Court on Monday upheld Florida's system of denying voting rights to felons -- a practice condemned by civil-liberties groups for falling heavily on blacks and affecting more than 600,000 people even after their sentences were served.

    The top court declined to hear Johnson v. Bush, leaving intact a lower-court ruling that Florida's system does not violate the U.S. Constitution or the 1965 Voting Rights Act. ...

    But civil libertarians said the law affects blacks disproportionately and is one of the most restrictive in the nation.

    "It's very disappointing the Supreme Court refused to hear the case of 613,000 citizens of Florida who have fully served their criminal sentences and are still denied their right to vote," said Catherine Weiss of the Brennan Center for Justice at New York University and the lead attorney in the case. "Their stories are heartbreaking."
    And "Jeb!"'s embarassing response:
    "We have a good system that works," said Alia Faraj, spokeswoman for Gov. Jeb Bush. "Anybody who decides to commit a crime risks losing their civil rights."
    "Florida's felons no nearer to voting". See also "State's ban on felons voting stands" ("The decision, reached by the justices without hearing the merits of the case, closes the door on a class-action case that was filed weeks before Florida's divisive 2000 presidential election") and "Court passes on felon voters law" ("Democrats may mount a ballot initiative in 2006 after the U.S. Supreme Court refuses to consider a challenge to the state's ban on voting rights for former felons.")

10:56 AM

<< Home