The Political Whore

Some of that old GOP desperation is starting to set into the campaign rhetoric. Two instances in the blogosphere today.

First, GOP Forida Chairman Jim Greer told a hyuk-hyukking crowd of Panhandle sycophants that his son once asked him what the difference between a Republican and a Democrat was:

“Republicans get up and go to work,” Greer said he told the boy. “Democrats get up and go down to the mailbox to get their checks.”

Yeah, that’s fresh and original, Jimbo. The Tallahassee Democrat account of Greer’s old welfare saw points out that the crowd “guffawed” in “a chorus of assent.”

I know lots of Democrats who are out busting their ass in this economy, and plenty of Republicans, too. Last I saw, the national unemployment stats weren’t cross-tabbed by party registration, but maybe that is good idea, right Jim? The reality is that after 10 years of Republican governors and leadership in the House and Senate, Florida consistently is at or near the top of Bad-News Economic Statistics lists these days.

In the second instance, Lt. Gov. Jeff Kottkamp blasted the media (what’s new there?) and seemed to chucklingly long for the day when journalism goes belly up because it is so biased. In a speech to some Miami business owners, Kottkamp said:

… the press exaggerates the state’s economic problems because its own business is in trouble.

“Print media is really archaic,” Kottkamp told the board of the Beacon Council, Miami-Dade’s nonprofit business recruitment agency. “They’re laying off people. Their view of the world is pretty skewed.”

He got called on his comments by a Miami Herald exec in the audience and quickly dissembled:

Kottkamp quickly backtracked, saying he was just advising the print media to look to the future online.

“My message is not that I don’t like you,” he said. “I love you.”

An interesting theory: the media is making Florida’s economy seem worse than it is because we’re all personally affected by the layoffs and cutbacks and it makes us dour and negative.

Any thoughts on that? Or should I spend the rest of the day linking to unemployment stats, housing starts, avg incomes, spending power, consumer confidence, etc.?

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