Crist’s support has now dropped 10-points since May, while Rubio and Meek have each made gains. In essence, Crist is bleeding Democrats to Meek and independents to both Meek and Rubio. It is also noteworthy that Crist’s statewide support has fallen below the 30% threshold, leaving him far short of the minimum required to win a three-way race under the most perfect circumstances (34%).

Meek is behind but trending in the right direction. But here’s the thing – Charlie Crist is looking less and less electable every day – his downward trajectory in the polls is not going to turn around. The only way to keep Marco Rubio out of the Senate at this point is to help Kendrick Meek pull off an upset victory.

I’ve written several pro Meek diaries on this race in the past few months and a common theme in the comments goes something like this:

Yeah, Meek is a good Dem, a strong progressive, a champion of the working class, a Democrat who votes with leadership when the stakes are down, a real Dem and a team player – just the kind of candidate we all want more of in DC. BUT I’m voting for Crist because Meek is unelectable. Meek is running a horrid campaign. Meek will lose the primary. Whatever. And Crist is good enough – at least he’s not Rubio!

So here’s my challenge to all you naysayers: now that your compromise candidate Crist is turning out to be less electable than a real Democrat, are you ready to fight for and support Kendrick Meek? Because at this point, if we don’t rally behind our candidate, we’re gonna have Senator Marco Rubio representing Florida.

It’s going to be an uphill slog, but the Meek campaign is fighting hard, and they see a path to victory. One thing is certain: there is no longer a path to victory for Charlie Crist.

Meek “has an outside chance to pull off a major comeback, but it is largely predicated on his ability to convince Crist’s newfound Democratic friends that the former Republican’s campaign is hopeless and it is time for them to come back to their party,” said Mason-Dixon pollster Brad Coker. “That will be a tough challenge, but it is now the only apparent way for Rubio to lose.”

Charlie Crist cannot win this race. Crist’s campaign is hopeless. Meek has a chance and is trending in the right direction, but we need to start fighting for him.

Support Kendrick Meek.

Sunday on CNN’s State of the Union, Crist declined to answer the caucus question – if elected, will he caucus with Democrats or Republicans? As he has for weeks, he evaded the question by asserting that he will “caucus with the people of Florida.” Unfortunately, the people of Florida don’t hand out committee assignments.

A few days ago, he tried to go both ways on healthcare. He stated that he would have voted for healthcare reform then he corrected himself and said he would not have voted for the bill. He doesn’t like it – not one bit! But since it’s already passed and everything, he thinks we should keep it and make it better. Of course, since he wont be sitting on any committees, his opinion may not matter all that much.

And last week in liberal Broward County, he thanked God that he was no longer a Republican then travelled to a much less progressive part of the state and bragged about being a “Jeb Bush Republican.”

But even as Chain Gang Charlie repaints himself as a bi-party milquetoast with compassionate leanings who still enjoys the occasional hippie punching, Kendrick Meek and Florida Democrats are gearing up to remind voters of Crist’s true preferences:

(Click to listen to wav audio file.)

This is Charlie Crist calling to set the record straight. I’m pro life, I oppose amnesty for illegal immigrants, I support traditional marriage, and I have never supported a new tax or big spending program.

The fact that Meek, a real Democrat, won the party nomination over self funding former Republican Jeff Greene will make life difficult for Crist. Democrats will use the boastful conservative’s own words against him again and again and Democratic voters will continue to come home to Meek – Meek presents a clear progressive choice vs. Chain Gang Charlie’s newly found wishy washy middle-of-the-roadism.

Meanwhile, Marc Rub’s (Marco Rubio has had the vowels removed from the end of his name for conduct unbecoming a Hispanic, per Tampa’s La Gaceta newspaper) campaign is hammering Crist as a turncoat and newly enflamed liberal. Crist wont be winning too many votes from this wing of his spurned party.

So far, Crist refuses to pick sides, but he can’t win with independents only, his old party still hates him, and Democrats are warming to Meek – Meek is far and away the best candidate on the issues, and he is, in fact, just the kind of “better Democrat” that we need in DC.

Crist’s approval ratings are dismal and he is a man without a party. Many observers do not see a way for him to win unless he promises to caucus with the Democrats, but just as he missed his oppurtunity to switch parties and clean Meek’s clock in the Dem primary, Crist may again be waiting too long to pick sides.

Support Kendrick Meek.

Florida’s 2010 Amendment 3 can be seen as a legacy of sorts of former Florida House Speaker Marco Rubio. The amendment, backed by Charlie Crist, Florida Realtors, and the Florida Chamber of Commerce, could wreak havoc with municipal budgets as it seeks to slash property tax revenue by $1 billion over three years.

As proposed, Amendment 3 offers first-time buyers more equal footing with homeowners, says David Hart, vice president of legislative and governmental Affairs for the Florida Home Builders Association. The proposal calls for a first-year tax break averaging about $500 for a $200,000 home. Benefits would be phased out over five years, with the special exemption ending in year six. Total benefits on that same $200,000 home would be about $1,500.

“We support it because in the case of the additional property tax benefit to first-time buyers, it helps level the playing field with longtime homestead property owners who’ve enjoyed the benefits of Save Our Homes,” Hart said. While the organization has not taken an official vote on the measure, Hart said the group thinks it will motivate buyers and spur housing starts and construction jobs….

Critics of Amendment 3 fear local governments and school districts would suffer the brunt of further property tax breaks under the proposal. If approved, the amendment will cost those local entities about $1 billion in lost revenue over three years, state economists estimate. The amendment is “of great concern to us because we’ve seen funding for schools go down over the last couple of years,” said Mark Pudlow of the Florida Education Association.

Even more alarming is the state’s shift from state funds to local property taxes to pay for schools and at the same time cut property tax revenue, Pudlow added. While schools would lose money from the additional homestead exemption in the proposed amendment, cities, counties and special tax districts would lose property tax revenue from both the new exemption and the 5 percent assessment cap on non-homestead properties.

Marco Rubio got where he is today by jumping on the property tax reform bandwagon back in 2007. That year, as incoming Speaker of the Florida House, Rubio gained national attention as he championed a complex tax swap package that would have increased the regressive state sales tax dramatically while completely eliminating taxes on homesteaded properties.

“I loved him. I absolutely loved him,” recalled Margie Patchett, leader of a local antitax group. “I thought, ‘This is not your standard politician. This is a man of vision.’ ”

The scene played across Florida — from Panama City to Spring Hill and Sarasota. Marco Rubio shaped anger over soaring property taxes into the defining mark of his two years as speaker.

Today, the issue has been overlooked as Rubio stands atop the race for U.S. Senate. But that period was the foundation of his success…

Some of the first calls Rubio made after declaring his candidacy for Senate were to contacts he made in 2007. Partly with their help, he won a series of straw polls that represented the beginning of the end of Crist’s run as a Republican.

And while most House speakers don’t get much attention beyond Tallahassee, Rubio enjoyed widespread exposure because of property taxes. National TV networks visited him in Miami and conservative leaders in Washington talked him up.

“He’s the most pro-taxpayer legislative leader in the country,” Grover Norquist said at the time…

Rubio’s record on property taxes invites questions about his effectiveness. His ideas were big but mostly failed, even though his party controlled the Legislature. In the end, Crist prevailed with a simpler (and less substantial) property tax relief plan…

The day after the Tallahassee rally, the House passed Rubio’s tax swap on a mostly party-line vote. That was as far as it would go.

Senate Republicans mocked the plan as a massive tax increase, even though it would have cut a corresponding level of property tax. Some of the richest Florida homeowners would have gotten huge breaks while critics said the poor would be disproportionately hurt by a higher sales tax.

His party controlled both chambers and the Governor’s mansion, but Rubio’s proposal was rejected in the end in favor of Governor Charlie Crist’s plan which was placed on the ballot as Amendment 1 in 2008.

Amendment 1 was passed by the voters in 2008 and in 2009 the now Rubio-less Legislature, again prodded by Crist, jumped back onto the still circling tax reform bandwagon and placed this year’s Amendment 3 on the ballot.

But let’s back up a bit and take a look at Florida’s tax system.

Florida has no state income tax. We rely exclusively on revenue from sales and use taxes and property taxes to fund state and local government.

Since the early 1930′s, Florida has had a homestead exemption which essentially declares a certain amount of the value of one’s primary home exempt from taxation as long as the homeowner is a permanent resident of the state.

In 1992, voters modified the homestead exemption with the Save Our Homes amendment which capped annual rises in property appraisal values (done for taxation) for homesteaded properties at 3 percent. This was sold as a way to help elderly residents facing increasing tax bills to stay in their homes.

The next major change was Crist’s 2008 Amendment 1 which doubled the homestead exemption to $50,000 and also managed to make this homeowner only tax break even more regressive by ensuring that low valued homes would not be entirely exempt – the second half of the $50,000 exemption only applies to the value of a home between $50,000 and $75,000 – meaning that your home must be worth at least $75,000 to qualify for full exemtion. (YES – there are plenty of homes – right in my county! – worth less than $75,000 right now.)

Amendment 1 passed with high expectations amongst voters that their property taxes would be slashed for free. After all, this is how the Republican politicians had sold the measure to the people.

In actuality, homeowners enjoyed modest savings while Amendment 1 combined with falling property values to decimate municipal budgets which rely almost exclusively on property taxes for funding.

So in 2009, as cities and counties throughout the state were facing layoffs and hard budget choices, firing teachers, closing schools and libraries, cutting back on police and fire protection, the GOP Legislature and Republican Governor Crist did exactly what everyone expected them to do by placing yet another property tax relief measure on the ballot.

Amendment 3 would give a homestead exemption to first time buyers, eliminating the current waiting period. The measure would also halve the 10 percent yearly cap on appraisal values for all non-homesteaded properties, including businesses and rental properties.

Needless to say, the resulting loss of revenue (estimated at $1 billion over three years) will further cripple already weakened local budgets. If Amendment 3 passes, look forward to more municipal layoffs and cutbacks in services.

Florida constitutional amendments require a 60 percent super majority to pass, so there is a high threshold right off the bat, but Amendment 3 has some powerful backers, including the Florida Realtors, who are happy for any potential lifeline for the foundering real estate market.

Republican conservative anti-tax Governor Charlie Crist fought hard to get this measure through the Legislature in the closing days of the 2009 session. Since that time, however, we haven’t heard a whole lot about Amendment 3.

Will independent left-leaning Senatorial candidate Charlie Crist continue to fight for this tax cut that many unions and other progressive organizations oppose? Do the Florida Realtors and Florida Chamber actually care enough at this point to wage a campaign in favor of this measure?

Interestingly, Florida Tax Watch, a group that often fights in favor of tax cuts, has recently withdrawn its tepid support for Amendment 3, and, in fact, for property assessment caps altogether, which could give folks like Crist plenty of cover to flip on the issue.

Now, a new constitutional amendment, Amendment 3, will appear on the ballot in November and if approved, reduce that 10 percent limitation to 5 percent, potentially crippling Florida’s economic future, the TaxWatch report says. It compares that scenario to being similar to the way that Proposition 13 has contributed to the near bankrupting of California.

In the end, TaxWatch said the more stringent assessment limitations outlined in Amendment 3 would:

• Lower tax revenues for local government

• Lower municipal bond credit ratings

• Impede local governments that are hamstrung in adapting to economic conditions

• Create greater reliance on other types of taxes and an unnecessarily complicated system for taxpayers

• Reduce real estate transaction activity

• Reduce jobs and compensation for transaction facilitators

• Become an impediment to a vibrant economy

With luck, Amendment 3 will fail to garner 60 percent of the vote and will thus be disappeared, but with a title that will be the most prominent feature on its ballot line yelling “PROPERTY TAX LIMIT…,” many voters may have a very hard time suppressing the anti-tax impulses which have been ingrained through years of conditioning and will vote for Amendment 3 without ever making a conscious decision to do so.

I think it’s likely that Rubio will come out strong for Amendment 3 – he has no choice. Crist will flip flop, siding with Florida Tax Watch, and no one, not even the hard core Dems on Daily Kos, will care what Kendrick Meek thinks, because we really don’t need a real Dem on the ballot come November as long as we have Charlie Crist to fawn over.

Stay tuned.

In Florida we saw major developments this week regarding constitutional amendments on this year’s ballot. A gubernatorial candidate has sued to block the disbursement of funds under Florida’s constitutional public financing system. Meanwhile, a judge kicked a misleading legislative initiative off the ballot while arguments were being made in court regarding two other amendments. Finally, a special legislative session has been scheduled to add an amendment to the ballot to ban oil drilling off of Florida’s coasts.

Public Financing Challenged

Florida’s sickly public campaign finance system is on its least legs, with a legislative amendment on November’s ballot expected to deliver the final blow and end all public campaign financing in Florida.

In 1998, voters enshrined into the constitution a bare bones public financing system for some statewide offices. Unfortunately, despite the will of the voters, the system never gained much legislative support and now the Legislature is tired of spending perfectly good public money to help candidates compete when it’s stunningly obvious to everyone that raising private cash from corporations and wealthy influence peddlers or just outright buying the election for oneself is teh shit.

Unfortunately, the program that Jeb Bush referred to as “welfare for politicians” is probably doomed. The system is so broken and full of loopholes that it does little to help underfunded candidates compete, and the tide of special interest and corporate money has been rising in Florida just like elsewhere despite the public system.

There is absolutely no uprising in opposition to this bill, and with even public campaign financing stalwarts like Common Cause singing the death knell of the current system, this may be the last year for public financing in Florida.

But a funny thing happened on the way to amending the constitution:  Self-funded and now front-running gubernatorial wannabuy Rick Scott has decided that even the moribund and half-hearted system that is currently in place is too much to bear during this election cycle and he wants it all gone. Now.

The provision lets traditional candidates such as McCollum get tax dollars to subsidize their campaigns when they are being vastly outspent by independently wealthy candidates like Scott.

Scott must agree to limit his campaign expenditures to $24.9-million in the primary or else the state will give McCollum $1 for every dollar Scott spends over the cap. As Scott inches ever closer to that total, his lawsuit argues that the cap is a violation of his First Amendment rights because it restricts his free speech by benefiting his opponents’ speech.

“The (U.S.) Supreme Court has concluded that a Legislature cannot enact laws that provide benefits to a candidate’s opponents triggered by the candidate’s exercise of the right to use funds for campaign speech,” the suit says.

“The Supreme Court has also consistently concluded that restrictions on a candidate’s ability to spend his own funds, or funds raised from others, cannot be justified either by the government’s interest in reducing corruption or … equalizing the relative financial resources of candidates.”

Scott sued the Secretary of State, a state agency, and the case has political implications beyond the lawsuit itself. It literally could put McCollum, the state’s chief legal officer, on the defensive, because the attorney general routinely represents state agencies in court.

The legal action also highlights how McCollum is seeking help from taxpayers to fortify his campaign at a time when he is calling for fiscal austerity, budget cuts and a two-year freeze on local property tax increases on the campaign trail.

Scott wants an expedited hearing and a court injunction to block McCollum and the leading Democratic candidate for governor, Chief Financial Officer Alex Sink, from getting state matching money. The checks are scheduled to start flowing July 23.

That last bit is really important.  Scott may or may not be able to stay under the cap that automatically triggers state matching funds, but he’s more concerned with having to spend his personal funds to offset the state money that many candidates, including Democratic gubernatorial candidate Alex Sink, will get in a couple of weeks.

Scott told reporters he planned to limit his overall spending to keep from handing McCollum the matching money. “I believe we’ll be within that limit,” he said – though he also said he’d raise money for a so-called 527 group whose spending won’t count against the cap.

But another part of the law gives public money directly to candidates, based on the number of Floridians who gave $250 or less since last September. For gubernatorial candidates, there’s a two-for-one match of the first $150,000 in those contributions and a dollar-for-dollar match above that until the spending cap is reached. In 2006, candidate Charlie Crist collected more than $3.3 million in public funds.

That’s the money set to be distributed on July 23 regardless of any caps, and all the eligible campaigns are counting on it.  Rick Scott wont benefit from these funds and wants the possible lifeline yanked from both McCollum and Sink.

Amendment 7 Fail

If you’ve been following my still in progress series on Florida’s Constitutional Amendments this week, you may have noticed that we haven’t yet touched on the dueling redistricting amendments including the legislative initiative dubbed Amendment 7.

You read right: dueling amendments.  3 ballot positions.  At dawn.  Tuesday, November 2 2010.

Amendment 7 is a legislative initiative designed to undo the 2 citizen initiatives amendments 5 and 6 that immediately precede it on the ballot.

All three amendments deal with redistricting.  Amendments 5 and 6 reached the ballot via petition and include language that the Florida Supreme Court has already signed off on.  These amendments aim to bring a little fairness and sanity to the process of drawing political districts.

Our present system permits politicians to choose their voters instead of voters having a fair chance to choose their representatives. Legislators use sophisticated computers, voter registration data and past election returns to predict how particular voters will vote in the future. Then they choose which voters are most likely to vote for them and their party and place just enough of those voters in “safe” districts — ones they are sure they can win. Those in charge also pack large numbers of unfavorable voters in into a few districts so the unfriendly voters will have a chance to win in fewer districts.

Each district is rigged to accomplish a particular result. Districts are set up to be either Democratic or Republican and opposing party candidates do not have a chance. Only 7% of Florida’s legislative elections are really competitive. Voters do not have a real choice in selecting their representatives because the elections are rigged before they even start.

The Republican led Florida Legislature, known for neither fairness nor sanity, but being pretty good at dirty tricks designed to thwart the will of the people, threw together Amendment 7 which is deceptively designed to sound benign while ripping the guts out of the Fair Districts initiatives.

Luckily for the people, the fairly insane dirty tricksters that slapped Amendment 7 together are not very good at actually writing amendments that conform to the law which states that each initiative must cover only a single subject and that it must contain a clear ballot summary.

A judge on Thursday struck down the Legislature’s proposed constitutional amendment concerning political districts because, he said, it is too confusing for voters to understand.

Amendment 7 was drafted by the Republican-led Legislature in response to two other proposed amendments that a liberal-leaning citizens group placed on the ballot to make it tougher for lawmakers to draw political districts that favor a political party or an incumbent.

But the Legislature’s proposal — which lawmakers said would “clarify” the amendments of the Fair Districts Florida group — created far more confusion, Tallahassee Circuit Judge James Shelfer said in a ruling from the bench.

“I can hardly think that the average voter going in the voting booth would be able to make an informed decision,” Shelfer said. “It took me three days — in reading all of these cases, reading all of these briefings, hearing all of your arguments — to get a handle on what this amendment did and its effect on the existing laws and the Constitution.”

A written ruling by Shelfer is expecting in the next few days. The case will likely be appealed to the state Supreme Court.

One paragraph from Amendment 7 stood out as being particularly complicated. It says “the state shall take into consideration the ability of racial and language minorities to participate in the political process and elect candidates of their choice, and communities of common interest other than political parties may be respected and promoted, both without subordination to any other provision of this article.”

In a word, Amendment 7 was “gobbledygook,” said Ron Meyer, an attorney who argued against the Legislature’s plan on behalf of the NAACP, which supported the Fair Districts proposals.

Plaintiffs say they will appeal and try to get Amendment 7 back on the ballot. Meanwhile, a challenge to Amendments 5 and 6 brought by lawmakers, including a Democrat, who fear running in Fair Districts is getting under way.

Attorneys for the Legislature, losers in their effort to protect their proposed amendment in court earlier in the day, were back later Thursday before a different judge, arguing that the other two amendments also should come off . They argued that the Supreme Court’s OK of the amendments for the ballot – which must precede any citizen-backed initiative going to the voters – was merely advisory and didn’t take into account any factual arguments over what the amendment might do.

But the Florida Department of State, joined by FairDistricts.org and former U.S. Sen. Bob Graham, who intervened in the case, argued that there has never been a case where a circuit court has overruled the Supreme Court’s consent to place a proposed constitutional amendment on the ballot.

And in another twist, rumors are flying that a deal is in the works between the GOP Legislature (unfair and unsane) and No Party Charlie Crist (late to the party, but recently out of the closet as an open supporter of Fair Districts) to put an amended Amendment 7 back on the ballot in exchange for allowing Crist’s drilling amendment a spot.

Oil Drilling Amendment?

No Party Governor and Senate Candidate Chrlie Crist first raised the possibility of a special session to consider placing an amendment on the ballot to ban drilling off of Florida’s coasts in May.  Now he has exercised his constitutional powers and called the Legislature into session specifically to consider his proposal.

Crist, who is running as an independent candidate for the U.S. Senate, took the unusual step of invoking his power as governor to unilaterally call lawmakers into a four-day special session on July 20-23.

Normally, governors call special sessions after reaching an agreement with legislative leaders on the agenda. But facing an Aug. 4 deadline to get the amendment on November ballot, Crist decided to act on his own after being ignored by House leaders.

And now the political calculations begin on who will win or lose if lawmakers reject or accept the governor’s ultimatum. The outcome of the session could impact fall elections, ranging from the Senate race to the governor and Cabinet races to the legislative races.

The measure needs to pass both houses with 60 percent to earn a spot on the ballot, and although many Republicans hate the idea of a constitutional ban, right now, with the Gulf turning into a cesspool, not too many politicians are willing to commit to voting against it.

House leaders are generally cool to adding a proposed constitutional amendment banning drilling to the ballot. They point out that Florida law already bans drilling in state waters. They call the governor’s move a political stunt.

“It’s not productive to talk about re-banning something that’s already illegal,” said Rep. Matt Gaetz, a Republican from Fort Walton Beach.

But lawmakers also know that banning drilling is a political slam-dunk in an election year with images of oiled pelicans, tar balls and empty beachfront hotels on voters’ minds.

“I congratulate the governor for at least giving the members a chance to vote on it before Election Day,” said Sen. Dennis Jones, a Seminole Republican who supports Crist’s independent bid for the U.S. Senate. “That way, the general public will have a sense of where their representative stands.”

A “no” vote poses a political risk to Republicans whose districts include sugar-white sand on the Panhandle, fragile estuaries on the Nature Coast or South Florida beaches vulnerable to the loop current.

Most of those lawmakers said they would vote for a ban or are leaning toward it.

Developing.

Look, I will always like Kendrick – he’s such a nice guy! But his campaign is teh suck. It lacks visibility and support, and Meek is not a gifted orator, and he’s not as cool and popular as Charlie, so it’s over. I can not vote for Kendrick. I am going to invite Crist into my life.

Some say we need work hard to elect better Democrats. Balderdash. I used to be in that camp, but I have seen the light – a halo, actually, just behind Crist’s head.

I don’t care if we have a real Democrat on the general election ballot in November. I don’t need a chance to vote for a candidate who stands for my values.

I am going to vote for Charlie Crist come hell or oily water. What could possibly go wrong?

To this point, Charlie Crist has been nimbly avoiding the literal gusher of indictments and arrests and trials and IRS audits and FBI investigations and lavish credit card spending sprees and, well, just about everything bad that’s been happening to the Florida GOP. So I’m betting that none of those scandals will touch him, and I’m absolutely certain that no new bombshell revelation will pop up that might affect his general election chances.

In fact, I have such faith in Crist that I’m betting everything I have.

Of course, I’m not worried that after the Democratic primary Crist will realize that I now have no leverage over him – that I’ve already placed my bet and that I will have no recourse were he to kick me in the face. I don’t need a plan ‘B’. I’m positive that Crist is different. He wont hurt me. Honest.

And by backing Crist now I can absolutely guarantee that Marco Rubio will not win the election.

After all, there’s no way that anything that no one could have predicted could possibly have come to pass by the time I cast my ballot for Charlie Crist in November.

So I see no reason to even pay any attention to the Democratic primary much less back a candidate just because his values line up nicely with mine and the rich carpetbagger he’s running against is a real schmuck. This would be a waste of my valuable time and it really does not matter one iota who the Democratic nominee is because I am going to vote for Charlie Crist.

What could possibly go wrong?

Kendrick Meek could really use our help, but none of us like him anymore, so just don’t bother.

I keep hearing folks say that they have given up on Kendrick Meek and that they’re voting for Chain Gang Charlie Crist in November because he is the only hope to keep Tea Bagger Marco Rubio out of Washington.

Bullshit.

It’s true that the polls don’t look very good for Meek right now, but November is a long way away and Marco Rubio is primed to self-destruct.  As Rubio implodes, Dems may end up with a real choice in November, but only if we ensure that Kendrick Meek wins the Democratic Primary.

Rubio is a lightweight.  He’s never been tested in a statewide race.  His West Miami district is safely Republican.   Like some other Tea Party candidates who found themselves suddenly newsworthy, his campaign is wilting somewhat as the harsh glare of the national media spotlight illuminates slimy stances that are forcing the candidate to dance around the issues.

But in Rubio’s case, the campaign is also drowning under a deluge of scandal.

Rubio, the fiscal responsibility candidate, was carrying a million dollars or so in debt as of 2008 and is a deadbeat.  Apparently, at least since he was forced to cut up his Republican Party of Florida AMEX, he has not been making monthly mortgage payments on a house he co-owns in Talahassee.  Rubio’s camp claims it’s all a big misunderstanding.  The Bank has filed for foreclosure.

Speaking of Rubio’s RPOF AMEX, he was one of the big spenders, racking up one hundred and six thousand dollars in charges.  He is known to have double billed taxpayers and the RPOF for expense reimbursement and he was very slow to reimburse the party for personal expenses incurred on his card.  He chalks all that up to accounting oversights.  The IRS and FBI are investigating.

It was accounting again, along with staff errors, that led to six million dollars allegedly being misappropriated by Ray Sansom, Rubio’s hand picked successor as Speaker of the Florida House.  Neither Marco Rubio, whose job as Speaker required him to sign off on all budget items, nor Governor Charlie Crist, who could have vetoed this particular turkey, have any memory whatsoever of the line item which paid for a brand new airplane hanger for Sansom’s future employer.  Sansom is awaiting trial.

All of these scandals are starting to wear on Rubio and he’s already slipping in the polls.  He’s not coming back up.

So, if Rubio continues to slip, then there really is no reason to strategically back Crist to keep Rubio out of DC.  And if Kendrick Meek wins the Democratic Primary then we will have a choice between Crist, a Republican who is adopting Democratic ideas in a calculated move to appeal to the political center and Meek, a real Democrat who has always believed in and voted for the ideals that form the bedrock of our party.

But now, with Jeff Greene having purchased a spot on the primary ballot, Meek first has to win the Democratic primary in order to give us a real choice in November.  Jeff Greene has bombarded the airwaves and has literally bought himself up to parity with Meek,  but no one really knows anything about him or where he stands on the issues.

It is, however, fairly easy to illustrate the difference between the Democrat in the Democratic primary race for Florida Senate and the other guy who is running in the Democratic primary.

First, from The Buzz:

Jeff Greene’s first campaign stop in Tampa Bay yesterday. He met privately with assorted politicos, taped some TV interviews and stopped by the Jordan Park gym in St Pete, to visit an after-school program serving mostly African-American children. His chauffeur drove up in a shiny cadillac, and Greene cheerfully pressed the flesh with nearly two dozen people.

Jeff Greene with his Limo and his Driver

And from The Miami Herald:

Unlike most candidates, Meek usually carries his own bags and takes the wheel on campaign road trips,  even while making fundraising calls or doing interviews. He drives a solid 80 mph on the highway, frequently in the left lane. “The one thing I like about going out on the road [to campaign] is that I get a chance to drive,” he said.

Kendrick Meek delivers petitions. Meek is the only statewide candidate to qualify for the ballot via petition in Florida history.

We’ve got a regular guy with working class credentials and values up against The Millionaire Billionaire and his wife mom.

Billionaire Democratic Senate candidate Jeff Greene features his 83-year-old mother, Century Village of West Palm Beach resident Barbara Greene, in his newest TV spot.

“My Jeff, he’ll shake things up in Washington and he’ll get results. That’s what he does,” Barbara Greene says in the ad.

The Billionaire and his mom.

People were being mean to Jeff Greene so he used his mom as a human shield.  Classy.

Look, I haven’t even touched on the fact that Crist is tied into most of the same scandals as Rubio plus a few of his own.  Crist and Rubio could both conceivably be under indictment soon.  Even if you think you will ultimately vote for Crist, you need to support Meek right now during his primary challenge or you could find yourself regretting your lack of a plan B as you hold your nose and send Democratic Primary Winner Jeff Greene to DC.

Keep your options open.  Support Kendrick Meek in the primary.  Don’t let this schmuck Jeff Greene buy the nomination.  Ensure that voters have a real choice in November.

“I’m as conservative as any governor. I’m chain gang Charlie. I’m pro-gun. I’m pro life,”

That’s Charlie Crist way back in 2009 before he made a sincere and heartfelt decision to completely change.

Charlie Crist recently became the darling of Florida’s teachers as he polished his indie cred by vetoing an absolutely horrible education bill.  But he hasn’t always had such concerns for schools.

In the 1990′s, Florida had a choice:  we could start down the road toward the proper funding of education and programs for the poor, or we could lock more people up and devise humiliating ways to publicly shame them.

Led by Republican Legislators like Chain Gang Charlie Crist, Florida decided to follow the lead of Alabama and Arizona and spend money on shackled work gangs and other high profile regressive prison policies.

After spearheading the legislation that cost 2 billion dollars and would force Florida’s prisons chief to “require selected inmates to perform labor wearing leg irons in chain gang work groups,” Crist embarked on a fact finding mission with the secretary of the Department of Corrections Harry Singletary to have a look at Alabama’s trendsetting chain gang revival and maybe get some ideas for Florida’s big debut.

As Singletary whined to a reporter that “Everyone wants a silver bullet, and this is not the silver bullet.  This is not the answer to the crime problem.  We could have 45,000 people on chain gangs, but if people are still having babies at 13, if we’re not educating folks or if there’s not enough jobs, then we’re still going to have problems,” Crist was bizy checking out the latest in Chain Gang Haute Couture:

Singletary came away from Alabama convinced that the only practical implementation of the legislature’s demands involved individual shackles rather than the Alabama model which featured prisoners chained to each other.

But Charlie Crist had a pretty specific image in mind when he first fantasized his chain gang law, and in that image a group of 5 beautifully muscled bad boys, dark skinned, heavily perspiring, bound with handcuffs and leg irons and shackled together with chains break rocks beside the Interstate.  People driving through get all warm and fuzzy as they pass within inches of these dangerous and swarthy criminals who are being beneficially overseen by several heavily armed white men with orders to shoot to kill.

Oh, wait – that’s not the image of Charlie with his “gang” that I was trying to post… let’s try this oped cartoon from the Gainesville Sun instead:

Good stuff, and Chain Gang Charlie was not about to allow the teary eyed liberal prisons chief to mess with the exquisitely detailed image that Crist had spent years thinking about.

Crist wrote the Governor.  He wrote editorials.  He complained to reporters.  He helpfully pointed out that gangs of 5 were way better than gangs of one, but to no avail.  Chain Gang Charlie’s chain gangs were about to be ruined by Singletary and no one seemed to care.

But state legislators say the program clashes with what they envisioned when they passed the chain gang law earlier this year. Senator Charlie Crist, a Republican from St. Petersburg who sponsored the law, said individual chains would pose a higher safety risk because they would not prevent an inmate from jumping into the back of a car to escape. Mr. Crist also said the setup made the punishment less harsh.

“The idea is not to be cruel but to have an appropriate punishment that also serves as a deterrent,” he said.

The Florida Department of Corrections is scheduled to start the program with 90 inmates at three prisons, and expand it by Dec. 1 to 210 inmates at seven prisons.

Corrections officials like Mr. Singletary have been reluctant partners in reinstituting chain gangs, which were abandoned in Florida and other states in the 1940′s, but which this year made a modest comeback, reflecting the nation’s tougher stance on crime. While supporters see them as an effective way to send an anti-crime message, critics cringe at the spectacle of shackled men, most black, stirring images of slavery.

The executive director of the National Prison Project of the American Civil Liberties Union, Alvin J. Bronstein, said the Alabama chain gang program had led to more injuries among inmates, for example, when someone tripped and fell, dragging others down. He said he had also received reports of fights among inmates because of slow or fast walkers in the chain.

Mr. Bronstein said the Florida and Arizona programs were more humane and preferable because they reduced the risk of accidents and tension among inmates.

So Charlie got his chain gangs, and they were no walk in the park, but they were not as punitive and regressive as Crist had fervently imagined they might be.

And Chain Gang Charlie Crist is Born.

“I’m as conservative as any governor. I’m chain gang Charlie. I’m pro-gun. I’m pro life,”

There is a true progressive in the Florida Senate race, and he is being all but ignored by the progressive community.  Kendrick Meek needs and deserves the support of everyone who is looking to put better Democrats in Congress.

Meek is the one Florida Senate Candidate who remains just as committed today as he has always been to keeping oil rigs away from Florida’s fragile coasts. Unlike Charlie Crist who

… even evoked childhood memories of cleaning birds after an oil spill in Tampa Bay. He has expressed adamant opposition to drilling throughout his career, from state senator to education commissioner to U.S. Senate candidate to attorney general.

But on Tuesday, he joined presumptive Republican presidential nominee John McCain in calling for an end to a 26-year federal ban on drilling, saying states should decide whether to allow rigs off their coasts, subject to safety and environmental restrictions.

Well, let’s just say Charlie wants us to believe that he’s back with us right now, but we know that Kendrick Meek has always been on our side against offshore drilling.

Meek is now and always has been a strong progressive and he comes down on the right side on an impressive number of issues.

• Meek strongly supports repeal of DADT.
• Supports gay marriage.
• Pro choice.
• 100% NARAL rating.  Rated 10% by Christian Coalition.
• Strong environmental record.
• Voted against oil refineries, for energy independence.
• Strong pro working families record.
• Co-sponsored Lily Ledbetter Fair Pay Act.
• Voted against CAFTA.
• Progressive on immigration.
• Progressive on taxation
• NO on retroactive telecom immunity
• Defender of Social Security

And as a State Senator he became famous for championing the Class Size Amendment and for leading a sit in Governor Jeb Bush’s office to protest the One Florida initiative that basically did away with affirmative action at state schools.

The list goes on.  Pick an issue.  I found that Meek shares my values and ideals many of my priorities.  Even on issues where we disagree, I find that his reasoning is fact based and defensible.

No Party Charlie Crist is no progressive.  It’s true that he’s not exactly a raging right winger like Rubio (or is he?) but he will never amount to a reliable progressive vote.

So, we can have in Senator Crist another Lieberdem – a guy who might sometimes vote our way, but who will always have great leverage over us and our priorities, or we can support a true progressive candidate.

Meek is not a compromise candidate – he is progressive.  He is not a typical triangulating centrist, and certainly not a right-center wishy washy GOP today Dem tomorrow flip flopper like Charlie Crist.  Kendrick Meek is a true progressive champion who we can count on for the next 6 years.

The truth is that we really have no idea how No Party Charlie might vote.  On the other hand, we know we can count on Kendrick Meek to support our causes.   But only if we support him now.

Kendrick Meek is and always has been a strong progressive.  He believes in and fights for progressive ideals.  He deserves the support of this progressive community.

The Kendrick Meek Campaign needs money and volunteers.

Each of these far right Senate candidates is playing to win, with everything from the resurrection of prohibition (tea partiers don’t mind the government regulating what you put into your body) and the elimination of Social Security to the return of the Jim Crow era being discussed.

Oh, and the Florida candidate has decided that now is a really really good time to differentiate himself by favoring expanded offshore drilling.

Game changer.

Floridians have never wanted oil rigs off of our coasts.  Drilling was always the third rail of Florida politics.  When he ran for Governor in 2006 Charlie Crist remained adamantly against drilling.

Crist even evoked childhood memories of cleaning birds after an oil spill in Tampa Bay. He has expressed adamant opposition to drilling throughout his career, from state senator to education commissioner to U.S. Senate candidate to attorney general.

But on Tuesday, he joined presumptive Republican presidential nominee John McCain in calling for an end to a 26-year federal ban on drilling, saying states should decide whether to allow rigs off their coasts, subject to safety and environmental restrictions.

Charlie Crist, cozying up to John McCain during his Presidential run, breached the wellhead when came out in favor of drilling and wasn’t subsequently beaten up in the polls.  A veritable gusher of GOP legislators followed, along with bills and proposals and rushed studies, and for the first time ever, in the last couple of years, Florida has been on the verge of allowing the rigs within a few miles of shore.

That’s right – in 2008 when Charlie Crist considered himself a prime contender for the VP slot on McCain’s ticket, he honed his rank hypocrisy polished his tough guy hetero cred by getting himself caught swapping spit in an elevator, and by openly supporting the rape and pillage of the Gulf.

Of course, in 2010 Crist is courting Democratic voters, and the timing couldn’t be better to flip around like an oil covered fish show his sensitive side by sensibly turning against drilling.  Let’s trust him!  I think he really loves us!

Anyway, Marco Rubio should probably come out against drilling too.  Public opinion in Florida, which had been trending toward drilling acceptance, has turned sharply against as the Gulf continues to bleed.

But Rubio is stuck.  His tea bagging masters are keeping him on a tight leash.  He tried to be just a little bit moderate on the Arizona immigration law, but his base gave a jerk of the lead, and he came right back into step, flipping his position to just right of crazy.

Rubio’s easily trained, and he wont attempt to roam around on drilling or be caught trending toward the center on any other issues.  This will help him with the really hard core crowd, but most voters will be turned off by his extremism.  And the hard core group wont be enough to drag him over the finish line, even in a three way race.

In fact, there is a real possibility that Rubio’s hard core supporters may end up being so bitterly disappointed by their dream candidate that they wont end up expending much effort for him in the end.   But that’s fodder for another post.

Charlie Crist made a big splash when he dumped the GOP and went independent.  Polls showed him as the new front runner.  But Charlie has a little problem.

Jim Greer was Charlie Crist’s pick to head the Florida GOP – Charlie almost singlehandedly inserted Greer into the post and Crist supported Greer right up to the day he resigned in January.  Charlie Crist was Jim Greer’s only friend for quite some time during late 2009 and January 2010.  Of course, we all know that Charlie’s buddy was just arrested.

Charlie’s Greer problem does help in one way – it has taken the spotlight off of his Scott Rothstein problem.

Marco Rubio is in big trouble.  Rubio shot to the lead in the GOP primary by playing to his Tea Bagging base.  He is running on tax reform, secure borders, the second amendment, and every other right wing hot button issue.  Oh, and he is the outsider who is untainted by scandal and corruption – his web ads all proclaim “Principles Stand for Something…  Stand With Marco.”  Oops.

RPOF Individual Spending On AmEx Cards

Speaker Marco Rubio – $110,000
Indicted Speaker Ray Sansom – $173,000
Speaker-designate Dean Cannon – $175,000
Senate President-designate Mike Haridopolos – *$2,347
Rubio Chief of Staff Richard Corcoran – $70,000
RPOF Executive Director Delmar Johnson – $500,000
Jr. Party Staffer Melanie Phister – $1,258,000

It turns out that what Marco stands for is the right to live large on a state party AMEX given to him by… Jim Greer. Rubio and other users of State Party AMEX cards are currently under investigation by the FBI and IRS.

Federal law enforcement agencies have launched a criminal investigation into the use of American Express cards issued by the Republican Party of Florida to elected officials and staff, according to sources familiar with the probe.

The U.S. attorney’s office in Tallahassee, the FBI and the Internal Revenue Service are all involved in the probe, which grew out of the state investigation into former House Speaker Ray Sansom. He was indicted on criminal charges that he stashed $6 million in the state budget for an airplane hangar for a friend and campaign donor.

In the federal case, Sansom and others could be charged with making false statements on their tax returns and tax evasion.

…

Meanwhile, in a separate inquiry, the IRS is also looking at the tax records of at least three former party credit card holders — former Florida House Speaker Marco Rubio, ex-state party chairman Jim Greer and ex-party executive director Delmar Johnson — to determine whether they misused their party credit cards for personal expenses, according to a source familiar with the preliminary inquiry.

If any of these big spenders enjoyed any personal financial gain from the use of these cards, the IRS will expect to find said financial gain declared as income on the big spenders’ tax returns.  The IRS can get kind of picky about this kind of stuff.

Regardless of undeclared personal income, the idea that Rubio managed to spend over $100,000 of party donor’s money in a short period of time kind of belies his status as principled outsider.  His zealous defenders wont mind, but more moderate potential supporters may be turned off by his easy corruptibility and rank hypocrisy, not to mention his far right stands on issues like HIR and immigration.

Last fall he opposed the nomination of Sonia Sotomayor, the country’s first Hispanic Supreme Court justice, saying he had concerns about her case history and testimony on issues such as the Second Amendment right to bear arms. He opposes counting undocumented immigrants in the U.S. census and providing them a pathway to citizenship.

He suggested in an interview with a conservative publication, Human Events, that even illegal immigrant children who have spent most of their lives in the U.S. shouldn’t be allowed to stay. He later told The Associated Press: “Young children have to go wherever their parents are.”

And after initially expressing concerns about Arizona’s immigration law, the nation’s harshest, Rubio reversed his position and came out in support, saying subsequent changes aimed at preventing racial profiling have greatly improved it.

“Most people, what they know about Marco Rubio is that he’s a young, well-spoken guy who’s Hispanic,” said Rep. Juan Zapata, a Republican state representative in Florida who was born in Colombia and supports Rubio’s rival Gov. Charlie Crist. “People don’t know the details.”

Zapata said that the Hispanic community would love to support a Latino candidate but that Rubio’s views don’t further the causes of Hispanic voters.

“I’ve known him for a long time and I’ve worked with him and I’m terribly disappointed in the positions he’s taken,” he said.

At times it seems as if the entire leadership of the Florida Republican Party is engulfed in scandal.  Former Speaker Ray Sansom is under indictment for grand theft.  Which led to the GOP credit card investigation that Marco Rubio is caught up in and, eventually, the arrest of Crist’s buddy Jim Greer.  Money Man Alan Mendelsohn indicted for fraud and money laundering.  Crist favorite Scott Rothstein indicted for a massive ponzi scheme – he funneled proceeds to Florida politicians of both parties, but the only politician he ever baked a cake for was Charlie Crist.  The list goes on and on.

Crist money-raisers have been charged with crimes, while Greer, his hand-picked state party chairman, is the target of probes; Republican candidate Marco Rubio, among 31 Republican politicians and operatives who are facing FBI and IRS scrutiny, has the IRS looking at his use of state party credit cards.

The avalanche of criminal investigations began in early 2009 with the indictment of former House Speaker Sansom after he accepted a $110,000-a-year job at Northwest Florida State College on the very day he became speaker. A St. Petersburg Times/Miami Herald investigation showed how in the previous two years, Sansom steered $35 million to the school.

…

As part of the Sansom investigation, State Attorney Willie Meggs obtained records detailing Sansom’s lavish charges to a GOP American Express card totaling more than $173,000.

The credit card charges sparked federal investigations of Sansom and Greer, the GOP chairman who had been living a life of luxury with chartered jets, four-star hotels and chauffeured limousines charged to his party card

…. Anyone who obtained personal benefits from the cards and failed to report them to IRS could be in trouble.

Now, Kendrick Meek has his own problems, but recent reports tying him to a failed Miami development indicate he was burned by family and staff, and that he had no personal knowledge of any shenanigans.  There’s apparently nothing there, but the “scandal” will be dredged up constantly to provide some balance to the scores of GOP troubles being reported.

Meek is a hard campaigner – he is the only statewide candidate to have ever qualified for the ballot via petition.  He did this by getting out and meeting people and energizing volunteers to gather signatures.  He is largely unknown, even among Democrats, and as he introduces himself to voters, his poll numbers will rise.

All 3 candidates will be battered by November, but if Kendrick Meek can take advantage of the big scandals enveloping his main rivals, he may well be the last man standing, and, with luck, we may end up with a true progressive representing Florida in the Senate.