For a governor determined to revolutionize how state government operates, the past seven months have not been the easiest for Jeb Bush.

In July, three top social service officials resigned after acknowledging they took favors from lobbyists. The same month, errors forced the state to scrap a felon voter list a company was paid millions to compile.

Two months later, the Bush Administration canceled $176-million in technology contracts after discovering a former official may have improperly communicated with a vendor, prompting an ongoing criminal investigation.

Last month, a Florida Supreme Court justice appointed by Bush blasted the private lawyers hired to defend death row inmates for performing "the worst lawyering I've seen."

But none of those problems compare to a single contract that threatens to undermine Bush's six-year legacy of hiring companies to do government work.

The rollout of the People First personnel system, run by a Cincinnati company called Convergys that had never had a government contract before, has caused paycheck and benefit problems for thousands of state employees - including legislators who sit in judgment of Bush's agenda.

Warning of a possible "neo-paganist triumph" in America, hundreds of conservative Christians gathered at Coral Ridge Presbyterian Church in Fort Lauderdale for two days of sermons and political strategy aimed at promoting their religious agenda and electing politicians who will turn it into law.

With a mixed sense of triumph and urgency, some 900 Evangelical Christians from more than 40 states gathered at Fort Lauderdale's Coral Ridge Presbyterian Church Friday to hear prominent Christian conservatives discuss how to advance their political agenda. ...

During one of several grass-roots training sessions Friday at the church's annual Reclaiming America for Christ conference, Cass outlined four new initiatives in his group's fight to ban gay marriage, outlaw abortion and promote religion in schools and public life.

They include:

• Opening a lobbying office in Washington, D.C.

• Launching a ''strategy institute'' to study the tactics of their political opponents.

• Expanding the center's media outreach.

• Recruiting one million grass-roots activists around the country.

has come far from the days when special-interest money paid for a hunting weekend or a fancy dinner. These days, lobbyists funnel large sums to legislators' campaigns and — as noted — write bills that can be so complex that legislators admit privately they don't read them. So the public winds up paying their representatives not to write legislation and then not to understand the legislation before voting on it.

When Gov. Jeb Bush unveiled plans this week to scale back the class-size amendment, he threw in a sweetener: a proposal to boost beginning teacher salaries to $35,000.

Some of the billions of dollars needed to shrink class size, Bush said, would be better spent on a "true challenge" - luring and keeping good teachers.

But his pay plan isn't as ambitious as it sounds.

If voters approve it in November 2006, new teachers will begin to see benefits in fall 2007. By that time, however, average beginning pay in Florida - now at $31,700 - is expected to be near $34,000, assuming an annual growth rate of just more than 2 percent.

That means the majority of beginning Florida teachers, especially those in urban counties where salaries tend to be higher, would benefit little. Some wouldn't benefit at all.

Florida's recently passed slot-machine amendment may cause more difficulty than voters initially anticipated. ...

Most voters probably imagined that dog tracks, horse tracks and jai-alai frontons would simply add the one-arm bandits to help draw additional trade. But the slot machines won't be placed only in frontons and race tracks.

The Miami Herald reported recently that the pari-mutuel owners have teamed up with the gambling industry to expand their present facilities to make slot machines a big attraction. Track and fronton owners are planning to build new facilities, complete with hotels.

W e are glad to see that Gov. Jeb Bush appears to be back-peddling from a surprise plan to have the executive branch exert greater control over Florida elections.

Bush proposes giving Secretary of State Glenda Hood control over voter registration rolls and the final word in interpreting state and federal elections law.

Part of the problem with the plan is political. Hood was appointed by the governor and is hardly nonpartisan. Another problem is the clumsy way Bush informed his constituents and the supervisors elected by them. Did he talk to anybody about this?

If the governor believes Tallahassee can best handle elections at the local level, he's wrong. We have no confidence, given the election division's track record, including using an unreliable list of former felons, that elections would run more smoothly outside the hands of local supervisors.

Legislators are allowed to spend part of the money they get from taxpayers for office expenses to communicate with their constituents once a year. Most of them produce colorful end-of-session newsletters, which tend to be self-congratulatory pieces on what a good job they did "working for you" over the past few months, with pictures of the legislator on every page.

Facing a firestorm of criticism in the wake of an attempt to consolidate more elections supervisory powers under his authority, Gov. Jeb Bush signaled a willingness to compromise Thursday.

There are ways to revise Florida's class-size amendment. Gov. Bush's proposal isn't one of them.

Gov. Bush said this week that rather than limit the number of students in every class throughout a school district, as current law requires by 2010, districts should be able to get away with using a countywide average. That scheme would invite abuse and deception. It would appear, then, to fulfill the governor's stated goal of seeking "devious" ways to get around the voter-approved amendment.

Throwing a teacher raise into the package is a transparently cynical political ploy, given that Gov. Bush has spent the first six years of his administration making life hell for public schoolteachers.

Florida is moving closer to seizing "chronically failing" schools and turning over their management to private companies.

The nation's most high-profile school privatization program is in Philadelphia, where the city school district hired Edison Schools Inc. and other private firms to run a group of low-performing schools. Restructured schools that were still run by the school system outperformed those run by private firms, according to the Philadelphia Inquirer in 2003.

Edison has managed only one Florida school -- Henry E.S. Reeves Elementary in Miami-Dade. School district analysts said in a 2001 report the Reeves hadn't shown academic advantages over the traditional public schools, and the School Board voted this week to terminate Edison's contract with Reeves.

Motivated by recent Republican successes at the polls and the threat of same-sex marriages, hundreds of conservative Christians from across the nation are gathering at Coral Ridge Ministries today for a two-day conference to sharpen their political skills and promote their social and cultural agenda. ...

"The moral landscape of America is in disarray," writes D. James Kennedy, pastor of Coral Ridge Presbyterian Church and noted televangelist in a welcoming letter. He believes the social and cultural mood of the country has shifted to the point that "there has never before been such a time as this, when the potential for God-honoring change in our land was so great."

"Bush 'tired' of Scripps delays"

The state is paying $12,000 a month in rent for an aging building here that's been sitting empty and largely neglected for more than two years.

A game plan to overhaul homeowners insurance in Florida was approved Thursday by a group of state legislators, ranging from revamping the state-backed insurer of last resort to creating tax-free savings accounts for hurricane deductibles.

Overall, [counsel for Allstate Insurance Co. in Florida, George] Grawe was complimentary of the committee's work. ...

"These recommendations will yield workable, common-sense solutions that will ensure affordability and availability of insurance for all of Florida's families," [executive vice president of the Florida Insurance Council, a trade group that represents the state's insurance companies, Sam] Miller said in a statement.

In a move that would dramatically increase state control of elections, Gov. Jeb Bush and the state elections office will ask the Legislature for greater authority, including the ability to decide which voters should be purged from voting rolls.

Leon County Election Supervisor Ion Sancho said Hood and Gov. Jeb Bush are making a power grab.

"It's a control issue," Sancho said. "They want to control the election process."

Sancho said centralizing some election functions is a good idea, but only if it is handled by a nonpartisan state election office.

Sancho said Hood and Bush, who appointed her, are fiercely loyal Republicans who made some of the most partisan and mistake-ridden calls in Florida's otherwise successful 2004 election.

Sancho, a former Democrat who now is an independent, pointed to the botched felon list, which critics charged unfairly targeted black, Democratic-leaning voters, and Hood's push to put third-party presidential candidate Ralph Nader on the state ballot. That move was seen by critics as a way to siphon votes from Democrat John Kerry and help President Bush's re-election bid.

TaxWatch describes itself as a nonpartisan government watchdog group, although it has been criticized recently for being too cozy with the business establishment.

If Florida Democrats can't bring themselves to be happy about Howard Dean, they ought to at least give him a chance.

It's been disheartening to watch Gov. Jeb Bush spin never-ending schemes to circumvent voter's approval in 2002 of a constitutional amendment calling for sharp reductions in public-school class size.

Instead of giving Convergys an $88 million "golden lollipop" contract extension, the state should be looking for a way out of Gov. Jeb Bush's biggest privatization project, House money managers said Wednesday.

As far as overseeing elections, Florida's secretaries of state haven't exactly generated positive buzz so far this century.

Persons aggrieved by a violation of this amendment may bring a civil action in a court of competent jurisdiction against an Employer or person violating this amendment and, upon prevailing, shall recover the full amount of any back wages unlawfully withheld plus the same amount as liquidated damages, and shall be awarded reasonable attorney's fees and costs.

Florida GOP state House leaders want to let violators of the law escape those double damages if they give the money back within 15 days of being notified by employees of the intent to sue.

The Florida Republican leaders claim this provision fits within the intent of the Amendment. Since I drafted the damn thing, I think I can say with some authority that their bill completely violates the constitutional amendment.

the basic problem with this 15-day notice is the same as the Wal-Mart deal: Employers will have every incentive to violate the law recklessly. Even if they are caught underpaying a few employees, they can simply pay back the wages owed with no fine, while pocketing the profit from underpaying the many workers who will inevitably never challenge the employer's illegal activity.

But then that's the point of these "notice" provisions-- to gut minimum wage laws and discourage enforcement. These rightwing politicians hate working class people and support corporate criminality. They are soft on crime when the criminals wear a nice three-piece suit.

The state Board of Education on Tuesday endorsed Gov. Jeb Bush's new proposal to undo the class-size amendment, urging lawmakers to put the plan before voters quickly to avert a "crisis" in teacher recruitment.

Chairman Phil Handy, like all the board members a Bush appointee, quickly and without discussion got a unanimous vote endorsing the proposal to make the goal of class-size reduction district-wide averages — which most districts have already matched — instead of the more stringent classroom-by-classroom limits that voters approved in 2002.

Phil Handy, a Winter Park businessman who led the "Eight is Enough" campaign in the early 1990s, did not immediately return a phone message about lawmakers' revisiting the issue.

Florida ranks a dismal 47th nationally in spending per pupil."

A few years ago, when Robert J. Baker, a Catholic bishop in Charleston, wrote a letter urging that the Confederate flag finally be lowered from the South Carolina statehouse, he argued:

"We know that symbols used well can inspire faith and good works, but used inappropriately they can divide and destroy." Baker deplored the Confederate flag as a symbol that "will not unite us for good but will continue to foster division and cripple our future."

His remarks about the power of symbolism - for good or evil - came to mind when a coalition of religious organizations, including the Florida Catholic Bishops, announced on Valentine's Day the kickoff of a state constitutional amendment initiative to ban same-sex marriages in this state.

Florida, of course, does not recognize same-sex marriages. By Florida law, marriage can take place only between a man and a woman. No court has attempted to force Florida to sanction same-sex marriages. There is virtually no political or popular support in Florida to allow such marriages.

So why amend the constitution to "save" an institution that is in no distress?

Because such an amendment will have great symbolic value in the ongoing cultural war being waged in America. Timing the referendum for the 2006 ballot will virtually force Florida's politicians to declare sides in one of the most divisive ideological conflicts of our day.

There is a remedy short of revolution this time. It is to establish an independent districting commission, as 12 other states have done, guided by explicit and binding standards against such corrupt practices as fashioning a seat for the convenience of an incumbent.

That's right, Jeb Bush in 2008. Notice that Jeb Bush isn't mentioned by Morris as a loser, and Jeb places 3rd in the poll above, and 3rd behind Guiliani and Rice as most desired by the conservative bloggers in the other linked poll. George Bush has kept a tenuous EV majority & political coalition togther, but it's probably only replicable by Jeb Bush.

pushing to obtain the required signatures to get this awful [anti-gay] amendment on the 2006 ballot. In fact, supporters are confident that Floridians will do as voters in 11 states have done and approve the measure in large numbers. Only a vigorous resistance by fair-minded Floridians who respect our Constitution will repel this call to further institutionalize a hateful form of discrimination.

Now after four years, there is a consensus among politicians that eight years isn't enough time. Legislative leaders are considering asking voters to extend the term limits to 12 years. That makes sense.

The chief of technology at the state Department of Children & Families resigned late Tuesday after less than a week on the job, an agency official said.

John R. Hurd submitted his resignation after a reporter for The Miami Herald questioned the agency about gifts he accepted from a technology company in Ohio that won a $1.9 million contract there.

Three protesters arrested as they demonstrated against a free-trade conference have agreed to settle a lawsuit claiming Miami-Dade County jailers unnecessarily strip searched women, forced them to squat naked and "hop like a bunny" in open view.

won't be running for governor in 2006 because of term limits, but his proposal this week to freeze class-size cap efforts and give teachers pay raises with the money saved may give Republicans seeking his job a powerful weapon to attack their Democratic opponents.

"It's a great Republican issue and a great Republican idea," said Richard Pinsky, a veteran campaign consultant for the party. "It was a stroke of genius to tie it to teacher salaries."

"I've got a couple of devious plans, if this thing passes, that we might want to consider having another look at it -- kind of the full Monty."

-- Jeb Bush, 2002

It was funny, and a little naughty, back when, as he met with lawmakers, the governor's off-the-cuff "devious" talk to derail the class-size amendment was caught on tape by a reporter he didn't know was in the room.

That was before 52 percent of Florida voters approved the class-size amendment despite Jeb's "sky will fall" claims that hiring more teachers and building more classrooms would break the budget.

That was before the self-described "education governor" gave in to the day-care lobby and negotiated away "quality" in the state's new pre-kindergarten program.

That was before Jeb threw a few more billion dollars in tax breaks at the richest Floridians while changing the rules to keep thousands of children, the working poor and disabled on waiting lists, stuck without state-subsidized health care.

Now it turns out the governor is doing pretty much what he told those Panhandle legislators he would do. Among his suggestions then: play politics with the teachers' union by proposing to limit the money the union can use for collective bargaining, then redirecting that money to increase teachers' pay. Another tactic: list popular programs that would have to be cut to pay for smaller classes.

Sure enough, the governor this week proposed raising teacher pay to a statewide minimum of $35,000 -- but only if voters approve tinkering with the class-size requirement. Oh, yeah, he offered doomsday scenarios that would occur if the voters reject his offer: Art and music classes might have to be scrapped to make room for smaller classes for required courses, such as English; school districts might have to rezone kids from far-away neighborhoods (read: busing to poor, black neighborhoods from overcrowded, white, suburban schools).

Talk about a devious plan. The governor should try the truth for a change.

A Cuban American [Juan Galán, former chairman of the Cuban American National Council or CANC] challenged the president of the National Council of La Raza to help Hispanic organizations shed their Democratic image.

Through the institutes, people with bachelor's degrees and teaching aspirations can go through a yearlong boot camp program designed to give them the skills they need in a fraction of the time required for a traditional education degree.

"That's a spectacular increase," council president John Kavulich said in a telephone interview Tuesday.

It was to have been a candid discussion of the Democrats' future in Florida - behind closed doors.

But concerns by six state senators prompted the Florida Mainstream Democrats to decide Monday to hold their inaugural meeting in public this Saturday.

An audit released Monday found that Florida officials did not properly plan for or negotiate a contract with a private company to run the state's purchasing program, a finding that some view as the latest in a line of problems with outsourcing state government.

The report criticizes a 2002 state contract that awarded Bermuda-based technology giant Accenture $91 million to construct and maintain MyFloridaMarketPlace.com, an Internet-based system that lets government agencies and some local governments purchase goods and services online.

It was the aspiration of Gov. Jeb Bush when he went into office, to reduce government's reach and cost by finding private vendors to do state work. Most experienced students of government knew it would be a while before we'd know whether it worked as envisioned.

Outsourcing hasn't. Virtually every major and large contract let by the state has created problems and expenses and no small amount of heartburn for users, recipients and - recently - lawmakers who know they must step in and make sure outsourcing really does save money and deliver quality.

They have, unfortunately, abdicated their responsibility in exchange for loyalty to the governor. That was an error.

On the day dedicated to love and romance, a coalition of conservative and Christian groups launched a Valentine's Day petition drive Monday to send a message: Marriage is not for everybody.

The goal of the group, headed by the Orlando-based Liberty Counsel, is to gather enough signatures to ask voters statewide in 2006 to amend the Florida Constitution to ban same-sex marriage.

Bush wants to set a statewide minimum for teacher salaries and perhaps give all of them a raise while limiting a voter-approved plan to reduce class sizes.

Florida's top election official was notably absent last week from the first congressional hearing on the 2004 elections. ...

That Florida Secretary of State Glenda Hood preferred to address the British-American Chamber of Commerce of Central Florida should come as no surprise to Floridians. The chairman of the House Administration Committee, who clearly doesn't know Ms. Hood, was disappointed. Rep. Bob Ney, R-Ohio, said he would try again to get testimony from her and Ohio's Kenneth Blackwell. "We can have disagreements," Rep. Ney told The Associated Press, "but you can't run and you can't hide. Not that Ms. Hood ever has hidden her disdain for questions about her work.

Rep. Juanita Millender-McDonald, D-Calif., found "the arrogance of these secretaries of state to not be here today is an affront." Maybe, but it's no surprise. Ms. Hood treated the congressmen the way she has treated Florida voters.

A Palm Beach Post investigation published in December found hundreds of juvenile justice workers fired for abuse or misconduct who were hired again in centers run by different companies. Most supervisors at those centers did not know they had hired employees with records of beating or abusing teens in their care.

Florida will keep a central record of every public and private worker at juvenile justice programs to help stop the recycling of employees with histories of violence and incompetence, state officials say.

Two South Florida legislators are pushing a bill in Tallahassee to help state National Guard and Reserve soldiers who lose wages when they are called up for active duty. ...

State Sen. Steven Geller, a Hallandale Democrat, and State Rep. Jack Seiler, a Fort Lauderdale Democrat, want the Legislature to set aside money to help private businesses make up the difference between a Guard or Reserve soldier's civilian base pay and his or her pay as a soldier. If the difference is $500 a month, for example, the state would pay half, and the private employer half.

"I've seen that idea and am intrigued by it," Bush said. "If our reenlistment rates continue as they have been, and we don't have evidence that employers are not fulfilling their commitment, then why would we change it?" Bush asked.

Political hyperbole is another affliction that has broken out during the trial. Attorney Larry Klayman, who is representing one woman suing the government, told the judge that federal agents vented their prejudice against Cuban exiles during the raid and that then-Attorney General Janet Reno was "following the instructions of the Cuban government." Any credibility the plaintiffs have evaporates with such absurd fantasizing.

has done a lousy job of explaining his Medicaid reform plan.

There comes a time in a political campaign when the candidate realizes that there's no tomorrow. Mel Martinez met that moment by deciding he would rather be a U.S. senator than protect his reputation as a good guy.

He aired an ad accusing Bill McCollum, his more conservative rival, of co-sponsoring a bill "granting homosexuals special rights." It was a hate-crime bill that also applied to other vulnerable minorities, for which McCollum deserved praise, not blame. Notably, Martinez did not accuse him of "granting blacks special rights," as the demagogues of the 1950s would have.

Dirt works better than ever these days. The irony is that Martinez probably could have won without disgracing himself.

But try to imagine Martinez trashing McCollum if, at the same time, he needed to ask McCollum supporters for their second-choice votes.

Cleaner campaigning is the intangible bonus to the instant-runoff primary that Florida sorely needs to adopt.

Nelson, who faces re-election in 2006, has tried to cultivate a moderate image. But new rankings by the National Journal won't help him.

In a Senate made up of 55 Republicans, 44 Democrats and one Democrat-leaning independent, the nonpartisan magazine ranked Nelson more liberal than 76.7 percent of his colleagues. Republicans criticized John Kerry and John Edwards for being among the most liberal senators in previous National Journal rankings. ...

In the U.S. House, where Republicans have a 232-202-1 majority, gubernatorial candidate Jim Davis, D-Tampa, is ranked more liberal than 68.7 percent of his colleagues.

Republican Mike Bilirakis of Palm Harbor was more conservative than 20.7 percent of colleagues and Republican Ginny Brown-Waite of Brooksville was more conservative than 77.3 percent of House members.

The speaker of our state House, Allan Bense of Panama City, says Florida should extend its term limits for legislators from eight years to 12.

To this proposal, I would like to get about a million folks together, climb up on a really tall ladder and lead a big fat Bronx cheer.

If you were looking for a sure bet in the legislative gamble that begins next month, play the Medicaid card. Don't wager on growth management -- it may not get dealt. ... When it comes to managing growth, don't be surprised if lawmakers fold.

In the Sunshine State, the number of people receiving federally sponsored food stamps soared 53 percent in the past four years to almost 1.4 million residents -- a startling statistic when considering the state's population during the same time period grew 8.4 percent.

Officials with the state, which administers the federal food program, tout the increase as a sign of progress.

The Legislature, not the governor or an agency head, would have to approve all major state contracts for services or goods under Sen. Nancy Argenziano's bill that puts privatization under a microscope.

Any proposed contract of $10million or more, or one adding up to 5 percent or more of an agency's budget, would require a legislative thumbs up under her proposal (SB 1146). Similarly, a contract eliminating at least 50 full-time state employees or 5 percent of an agency's positions would need legislative OK.