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
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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.

 

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The Blog for Sunday, March 10, 2013

"Jeb!", The Original Teabagger

    Jeb Bush, who was a teabagger before teabaggery was cool, and one of the most divisive politicians in Florida history*, has the temerity to claim this morning that "President Obama won a second term in the White House in part by 'dividing the country'". "Jeb Bush: Obama won reelection by ‘dividing the country’".

    This is the same genius for whom, as reported in Time Magazine, "basic competence has been an issue". Among the many examples of his divisiveness include his kow-towing to the religious right, once nearly provoking "a constitutional crisis -- and a confrontation between dueling lawmen":

    Hours after a judge ordered that Terri Schiavo wasn't to be removed from her hospice, a team of Florida law enforcement agents was en route to seize her and have her feeding tube reinserted -- but they stopped short when local police told them they would enforce the judge's order, the Miami Herald has learned.

    Agents of the Florida Department of Law Enforcement told police in Pinellas Park, the small town where Schiavo lies at Hospice Woodside, that they were on the way to take her to a hospital to resume her feeding Thursday.

    For a brief period, local police, who have officers around the hospice to keep protesters out, prepared for what sources called a showdown.

    In the end, the state agents and the Department of Children and Families backed down, apparently concerned about confronting local police outside the hospice.

    "We told them that unless they had the judge with them when they came, they were not going to get in," said a source with the local police.

    "The FDLE called to say they were en route to the scene," said an official with the city police who requested anonymity. "When the Sheriff's Department, and our department, told them they could not enforce their order, they backed off."

    The incident, known only to a few, underscores the intense emotion and murky legal terrain that the Schiavo case has created.

    It also shows that agencies answering directly to Florida Gov. Jeb Bush had planned to use a wrinkle in state law that would have allowed them to legally get around the judge's order. The exception in the law allows public agencies to freeze a judge's order whenever an agency appeals it.

    Participants in the high-stakes test of wills, who spoke with The Herald on the condition of anonymity, said they believed the standoff could ultimately have led to a constitutional crisis -- and a confrontation between dueling lawmen.

    "Report: State Tried Schiavo Grab". As Paul Krugman noted, there was "little national exposure for a Miami Herald report that Jeb Bush sent state law enforcement agents to seize Terri Schiavo from the hospice - a plan called off when local police said they would enforce the judge's order that she remain there.")

    More: "When Jeb Bush speaks, people cringe".

    - - - - - -

    *Divisiveness is just the beginning of the story: A former federal prosecutor looking into Jeb's lucrative business dealings with a now-fugitive Cuban, "considered two possibilities -- Jeb was either crooked or stupid. At the time, he concluded Jeb was merely stupid." "Bush Family Value$".



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