They are troubling statistics that once again raise questions about Gov. Jeb Bush's One Florida Initiative: black students make up an ever-shrinking share of the state university system's freshman class.

A former top aide to Gov. Jeb Bush has collected nearly $32,000 during the past two years from the Republican Party of Florida for expenses including airfare and meals, but says he never violated a state law that bars state workers from electioneering while they are on state time.

As chief of staff for Bush until early July, Denver Stutler was responsible for carrying out his boss' policies, running the governor's office and staying on top of what was happening at the state agencies under Bush's direct control.

But another part of his job -- and part of the job for the two chiefs of staff who preceded him -- was to be the eyes and ears for Bush on political issues, including last year's reelection of President Bush.

Stutler, who has been secretary of the Department of Transportation since July, says that's why he was able to ask the state GOP to reimburse him $31,822 for travel, meals and telephone expenses.

TV host Joe Scarborough says he is unlikely to run for the U.S. Senate, but he is consulting with his family and political leaders before making a decision.

Scarborough, a former U.S. representative from Pensacola who hosts a talk show on MSNBC, said he has been urged to run for Sen. Bill Nelson's seat by Sen. Elizabeth Dole, chairman of the National Republican Senatorial Committee. Dole recently met with Scarborough for three hours in New York.

Dole and her aides "talked about why they thought I should run and why I could win," he said.

Dole and other top Republicans have been seeking to have someone run other than Rep. Katherine Harris of Sarasota because they are concerned she cannot beat Nelson. They also courted Allan Bense, speaker of the Florida House, but he decided not to run.

You can lead a governor to water, but you can't make him drink. Jeb named his Board of Governors, but his appointees have not exactly rushed out to take over. The Bush-flavored board has been, at times ... indifferent. ...

Rumors and conflicting speculation abound as to what direction the governors will take. The process seems to be driven by the Bush appointee who serves as the board's chairman, Carolyn Roberts. Even this seat-of-the-pants feel to the process does not befit a major state and a major university system.

It can't be a quick hire. It can't be just one more bureaucrat whose job is to parrot weakly the party line.

Neither can it be some state senator looking for a job. Not some politician or Bush hanger-on. ...

If this were a first-class state with a first-class university system, the only possible process would be a big-deal, formal national search. It would be the kind of search that made other great universities around the country worry about holding onto their talent.

When Republican leaders gathered in south Florida last weekend, state GOP Chairwoman Carole Jean Jordan said she hoped party officials they would remain neutral in Republican primaries. Two GOP chairmen from Charlie Crist's home turf aren't listening.

On Thursday, the Pasco County Republican executive committee will probably endorse Republican Attorney General Crist for governor over Chief Financial Officer Tom Gallagher, said Pasco Republican chairman Bill Bunting. Pinellas Chairman Tony DiMatteo said he expect's Crist's home county will do the same in October.

two-thirds of Florida schools [have] earned A's or B's under the state grading system this year ....

U.S. Rep. Jim Davis, a Tampa Democrat, said "restoring democracy" will be one of his key goals if elected Florida governor in 2006.

"We believe everybody's voice should be heard," Davis said. "We have lost that." ...

"I voted against the energy bill," Davis said. "It was a waste of money. Now that they've got Alaska, they're coming for the Gulf of Mexico. We will not let them destroy our beaches."

He also came out against privatizing Social Security and said the troops in Iraq should get paid before Haliburton gets any money.

"What's my toughest job? Keeping (Rep.) Tom Delay from imposing his family values on your family," he said.

Davis was not happy that education funding is last in the nation behind Mississippi.

Scott Maddox, a Democratic candidate for governor and former head of the Florida Democratic Party, proclaims he's a strong supporter of union rights, but the city he headed may have used illegal tactics to keep workers from joining a union.

The "Maddox for Governor" Web site says he's running to help working people and tells how his grandfather "had no union" to protect him when he was fired from a job hauling chunks of ice.

Yet when Maddox was mayor of Tallahassee four years ago, the city waged what union leaders call a "brutal" campaign to keep blue collar city employees from joining a union.

City efforts included spending taxpayer money to create a video of city employees urging fellow workers to reject the union. Legal experts say the video violates state law and the Florida Constitution, which guarantees government workers the right to join a union.

"The only person she would step aside for is Jeb Bush," [Harris campaign manager Jim] Dornan said. "If Joe Scarborough or any other Republican candidate runs, we are in this race to stay."

State Sen. Rod Smith, a Democratic candidate for governor, was endorsed Tuesday by Palm Beach County State Attorney Barry Krischer, Public Defender Carey Haughwout and County Commissioner Addie Greene.

Smith got six other endorsements from Palm Beach County Democrats including state Sen. David Aronberg of Greenacres and state Reps. Richard Machek of Delray Beach and Priscilla Taylor of West Palm Beach. Also backing Smith are former state Sen. Tom Rossin, who was the 2002 Democratic nominee for lieutenant governor; Port of Palm Beach Commissioner Ed Oppel; and Clerk and Comptroller Sharon Bock.

Alarmed at a continuing shortage of teachers in Florida, members of the state Board of Education endorsed a budget increase for the 2006-07 fiscal year.

said her students are surprised to hear that old people either kept working or depended on their relatives before the federal old-age pension tax was imposed. ...

Davis, whose Tampa-Bradenton congressional district includes many retirees, said Democrats in Congress will fight any efforts to privatize the Social Security system. ...

Dilley said President Franklin Roosevelt's signing of the Social Security legislation on Aug. 14, 1935, was a beacon of hope in the depths of the Depression. She said hundreds of thousands of Americans had their savings and investments wiped out in the 1930s, while millions of workers lost their jobs, but that the New Deal signalled the start of recovery.

"A lot of younger people don't understand how important it is," said Dilley, who worked on the staff of a U.S. House committee that reformed Social Security in 1983.

"Before Social Security was around, older people didn't have the ability to retire," she said. "They had to work until they died or they had to face extreme poverty."

A study by the Institute for America's Future in Washington found that Sumter County is more dependent on Social Security benefits than any other county in Florida, based on 2003 data, the most recent available.

The study found that Social Security checks produce 21 percent of the county's total personal income (Sumter, by the way, favored President Bush over John Kerry in 2004, 52 percent to 47 percent).

Crist said that although his office was not "on the precipice" of identifying the killers, he was pleased with the work so far.

"There is new ground being plowed here," Crist said, without elaborating. "That's encouraging to me."

Crist was in Orlando to announce the creation of the reward for anyone who can help investigators ...

[C]ritics say amendment opponents, led by Gov. Jeb Bush, are ratcheting up pressure for one last effort to repeal the amendment or water it down. The amendment narrowly passed despite strong opposition from Bush in 2002, and it survived a legislative effort to tweak it last spring.

The amendment says paying for class-size reduction is the state's responsibility. So far, the state has spent $2.1-billion to meet the amendment's targets, and even the most conservative estimates suggest billions more are needed.

"This issue all comes down to the mighty dollar," said Rep. Kendrick Meek, the Miami Democrat who led support for the amendment.

Meek said the state's new spin on co-teaching is the correct one. But the solution isn't to "intimidate" districts into lashing out at the amendment, he said. The solution is adequate funding.

The issue is likely to get an airing today when the Board of Education meets in Tallahassee.

Secrecy has been one of the many reasons the Florida Comprehensive Assessment Test is so easily reviled by parents and others. Since the high-stakes test was first administered in 1998, the Department of Education has kept every edition sealed. Revealing previous editions would require the state to write new ones, it has argued, and a new set of tests for every grade would cost about $10 million. Keeping them secret is a money-saver. But it's also been a way to keep scrutiny of the controversial test to a minimum. It's ironic that the FCAT, as the cornerstone of Gov. Jeb Bush's fixation on more "accountability" in public schools, has also been the least accountable tool wielded by the Department of Education.

Whatever the reason for secrecy, the state's stance was indefensible. Now, the Department of Education is modifying its course. As early as this week, the department will begin making some tests available on its Web site (fldoe.org) for public viewing.

The belated thaw doesn't go nearly far enough.

Three prominent Floridians, ardent Florida State University boosters, have embarrassed all residents of the state with their insulting, ignorance-riddled comments about the infamous ''Trail of Tears'' and the Seminole Tribe of Oklahoma. They owe more than an apology to the Oklahoma Seminoles. They owe one to Floridians, too. Then the three -- state Sen. Jim King and FSU President T.K. Wetherell and trustee Robert McFarlain -- should sign up for an American-history course at the college they so errantly tried to defend.

has taken to acting like a U.S. senator these days -- literally.

Foley, often mentioned as a potential candidate for the Senate, got laughs from a partisan GOP crowd with his imitation of Sen. Bill Nelson, a Democrat, during a Peace River Federated Republican Women's Forum luncheon last week.

"The answer to your question," Foley, a Republican, said with an exaggerated slow southern drawl, "is both yes and no." ...

Foley said he doesn't think Nelson has seen his act yet but knows the perfect time to show him.

"Maybe during a debate next October," Foley said, alluding to a potential Senate campaign against Nelson in 2006.

Attorney General Charlie Crist may be raising record amounts of money in his run for governor, but a review of records so far show Northeast Florida tipping toward his opponent, Chief Financial Officer Tom Gallagher.

Some of Jacksonville's heaviest hitters also are anteing up to show their early allegiances.

Crist and Gallagher are the only two Republican candidates in the primary, and Crist's statewide total of $3.9 million was the highest quarter total ever, according to the State Department. Gallagher has raised $3.1 million.

But more detailed records provided by the campaigns show the reverse story in the seven Northeast Florida counties: Gallagher out-raised Crist, $255,430 to $223,685 in Baker, Clay, Duval, Flagler, Nassau, Putnam and St. Johns counties.

Sen. Elizabeth Dole, R-N.C., convened a group of high-powered women to plan a new fund-raising effort aimed at women with big bucks.

The mood was optimistic at the July meeting of 18 women, the new Women's Majority Network. Dole, chairwoman of the National Republican Senatorial Committee, or NRSC, told stories of women who have opened their pocketbooks for Republican causes and gained influence on issues important to their businesses, as well as ambassadorships and administration posts.

Yet when Dole's well-publicized effort to dissuade Rep. Katherine Harris from running a Senate race came up, it was clear the network was no women-first movement.

One member of the steering committee for the network -- composed of former House members, leading political operatives and businesswomen -- said there was no time to waste on an aspiring candidate who is not going to win.

"We've just got to be very hard-hearted," said the steering committee member, who cannot be identified because of an agreement that allowed a reporter to be present.

Republican strategists say for her campaign to succeed, she has to pick up as much as 15 percent of the Democratic vote. Her campaign believes that can be achieved by introducing Harris as a congresswoman with results and by tearing down Nelson, portraying him as an out-of-touch liberal.

One noticeable difference between Gov. Jeb Bush and his brother President George W. Bush is their practice of public speaking.

While books filled with the president's malapropisms and gaffes have been published, Gov. Bush is generally erudite on his feet.

Unless the topic is, as he calls it, "the fish people."

Five years after Florida's public universities stopped weighing racial diversity when choosing students, a shrinking share of the freshmen who get in are black.

The president of the flagship University of Florida, Bernie Machen, has said Florida's ban on admissions preferences puts UF at a disadvantage against prominent schools elsewhere.

In response to attacks from Republican challenger Katherine Harris, Democratic U.S. Sen. Bill Nelson's campaign spent a lot of time last week claiming he's no liberal. So you have Florida's only statewide elected Democrat denying he subscribes to the party's core beliefs . . . in case any donkeys out there have any questions about why their party's in trouble.

For generations, the path to university president was clearly defined: Professors became department chairmen, then deans, then provosts, then presidents.

About 15 years ago, another route emerged. Universities, both public and private, began tapping politicians and CEOs for their top jobs. ...

Few states have embraced this trend as heartily as Florida. In 2003, three Florida schools named politicians as presidents: former Speaker of the House T.K. Wetherell at Florida State University, Jacksonville Mayor John Delaney at the University of North Florida and Brogan at FAU.

State Sen. President Tom Lee, R-Brandon, has hired a former executive director of the state GOP to lead his campaign for chief financial officer. Stephen Shiver, who until a week ago worked at the lobbying firm Tew Cardenas , will be campaign manager. He used to work for former state House Speaker Tom Feeney and for former Lt. Gov. Frank Brogan.

Shiver joins another former state Republican party executive director, David Johnson, who is general consultant to Lee's CFO campaign. Adam Goodman of Tampa will be Lee's media consultant.

Mississippi, where veteran lobbyist Haley Barbour is governor, does a better job regulating lobbyists than Florida, says a report compiled by the Center for Public Integrity, a nonprofit investigative research group.

Georgia does better too. So does South Carolina. While Florida enjoys a national reputation for open government, its regulation of lobbyists is tied with Louisiana, a state with a notoriously corrupt political past.

Florida's failing grade: 55 out of a possible 100. No state scored higher than 80, a score achieved by Washington. Scores below 60 are considered failing. Mississippi, 14th, passed with a score of 65, while Georgia, 18th, earned a 63.

"We just want to say thank you for stopping the madness in 2000. We love you for that," Kay Durden said from the back of a crowd of 60 at the Duval County Republican Party headquarters.

Commissioner McCarty never should have turned to developers to help her out of legal troubles caused by bad judgment and ambition. After the 2000 election, she agreed to head a committee that aimed to oust three Florida Supreme Court justices who issued rulings that Republicans didn't like. When that committee violated election law, Commissioner McCarty spent $50,000 on attorneys to defend herself. Rather than pay her bill, she passed it on to those who appear before her. Commissioner McCarty says she personally solicited no contributions — the state ethics probe agreed — but her legal defense woes were publicized on a Republican Party Web site. Did she seek the party's help? The investigator doesn't answer that question. Although forewarned about the $100 limit by her attorney, Commissioner McCarty ignored it.

Jack Abramoff, a key figure in investigations involving House Majority Leader Tom DeLay, was indicted Thursday by a federal grand jury on fraud charges arising from a deal to buy casino boats.

collected more than $100,000 for President Bush's 2004 re-election campaign and raised thousands of dollars for DeLay and other Republican members of Congress. He also was friends with former Christian Coalition leader Ralph Reed, now a Republican candidate for lieutenant governor in Georgia.

Before making headlines as Katherine Harris' Senate campaign consultant, Adam Goodman earned some unwanted headlines for his behind-the-scenes work for then-Secretary of State Harris during the Florida recount.

Goodman and fellow Republican strategist J.M. ""Mac'' Stipanovich were supposedly volunteers helping Harris out with communications during that frenzied period. But public records later revealed that Goodman had tried unsuccessfully to get paid. Harris wanted to pay him $12,000 from the state treasury rather than from her campaign account, but ultimately, the idea died.

A federal audit to be released today raps Florida's Medicaid program for paying out an estimated $11.6 million for medical treatments that could not have been supplied because the beneficiaries were dead at the time.