Posted by Mitch Perry on Aug. 18, 2009, at 4:21 pm
By Mitch Perry
PoHo contributor Mitch Perry is the anchor of the WMNF Evening News on 88.5 FM community radio.
Despite the censure vote on Governor Charlie Crist last week that evenly divided Palm Beach County Republicans (it failed to pass as the group deadlocked at 65 votes apiece), the head of the Palm Beach County Republican Executive Committee says his membership is united.
Posted by Wayne Garcia on Jun. 30, 2009, at 12:39 pm
His candidacy has been called “quixotic” as he flies into the face of a Republican challenger who likely will be Charlie Crist, but Kendrick Meek is strongly confident in his ability to force Floridians to examine the real record of their favorite, white-haired governor.
Meek is a rising star in the Democratic Party, finding himself with a seat on the powerful House Ways and Means Committee after just four terms in office. Helps to have a progressive voting record and agenda. It probably also doesn’t hurt when your mom served on the House Appropriations Committee with (now Speaker) Nancy Pelosi, as Congresswoman Carrie Meek did.
He’s largely untested (he won his seat in Congress unopposed after his mother retired so close to the qualifying deadline that nobody could mount a real challenge to her son) but he’s shown great energy and won a good deal of the hearts and minds in the Florida Democratic Party, so much so that a few major challengers have stepped aside rather than force an expensive primary race with him.
Meek was in Tampa today and stopped by the Creative Loafing offices. We talked about how to pay for health care reform, whether the stimulus is working, his role in forcing smaller class sizes in public schools and his famous 2000 showdown with then-Gov. Jeb Bush over the dismantling of affirmative action in the state, which resulted in a 26-hour sit-in at the lobby of the Governor’s Office after Bush refused to meet with him and another lawmaker.
Posted by Mitch Perry on Jun. 15, 2009, at 6:22 am
By Mitch Perry PoHo contributor and anchor of the WMNF Evening News on 88.5 FM community radio.
For weeks, state and national political reporters have been anticipating that the Charlie Crist/Marco Rubio race for the Republican nomination for Senate in Florida next year will be a barn-burning battle between competing philosophies in the party.
That’s despite a poll released last week that shows the governor with an overwhelming lead in the match-up.
And now Rubio doesn’t necessarily have a hold on all those disaffected Republicans who think the Governor is too moderate for their tastes.
Posted by Mitch Perry on Apr. 13, 2009, at 9:41 am
By Mitch Perry
PoHo contributor Mitch Perry is the anchor of the WMNF Evening News on 88.5 FM community radio.
This is the story of a little-known South Florida mayor, a progressive anti-automatic weapons kinda politician with little name recognition and labeled with the tag “the gay candidate” in his quest to be the next U.S. senator from Florida. His name is Kevin Burns. More about him after we set the rest of the field.
Charlie Christ’s decision to wait until the end of the legislative session before declaring his political future has frozen most Republicans with fanciful ambitions of higher office through the first part of 2009.
But with three weeks to go before the popular chief executive announces whether he’ll run for re-election or opt to set his sights on Mel Martinez’s seat in Washington, some members of the GOP last week realized they can’t wait any longer.
First, any prognostication made this far in advance has to be taken with a grain of salt. So, keep that in mind as you read what I am about to say: Kendrick Meek will lose his bid for the U.S. Senate.
Now, there will be quite a few people up in arms about this. I’m sorry. Maybe this will make them work harder to prove me wrong. One of those things where knowing the future could change the future… but I digress.
There are quite a few reasons why I think he will lose, and none are related to the color of his skin. Read the rest of this entry »
Posted by Wayne Garcia on Jan. 13, 2009, at 1:07 pm
The first big name is officially in the U.S. Senate race to replacing the retiring Mel Martinez. South Florida Congressman Kendrick Meek made it official today, whacking away at the Republicans in Washington right out of the chute in a speech at his home in North Miami:
In the last eight years, we have seen incompetence and bad decision-making by too many in Washington. We have sacrificed our children and grandchildren’s future by saddling them with unprecedented deficits. We borrow money from foreign countries in order to give tax breaks to the wealthiest people. And now we have corporate bailouts with some CEOs abusing tax-payer dollars, continuing with their multi-million dollar salaries, bonuses, corporate jets – and yet they refuse to be accountable to how OUR tax dollars are being used to bail them out.
Today, I call on those corporate leaders to not take one dime in salary or bonus until their business is back on solid ground and they have paid the government back every dollar.
OK, good luck with that request, Kendrick.
His full remarks (as prepared) follows the jump, courtesy of his campaign (which has hired former Barack Obama deputy national campaign manager Steve Hildebrand as the top honcho):
By Mitch Perry
