Hallandale Beach Blog

Contrary to MSM's contention, while I'm neither an Undecided, Early, Hispanic or I-4 voter, it looks like I "may hold key" to 2012 Florida GOP Presidential Primary

2012-01-31T13:42:00.002-05:00

Wall Street Journal video: Florida Tea Party to Vote Against Mitt Romney. January 31, 2012. http://youtu.be/6V1muYp0bGU

Contrary to MSM's contention, while I'm neither an Undecided, Early, Hispanic or I-4 voter, it looks like I "may hold key" to the 2012 Florida GOP Presidential Primary. I am definitely NOT undecided.

Before I leave to go cast my ballot in today's Florida primary, can I please make two quick points about ALL the very bad reporting that I've seen the past year, nationally and in Florida, along the lines of "What's new with the Tea Party?"

First, in a large grass-roots movement that is intentionally decentralized, in large part because so many of its supporters have regular lives, jobs and family responsibilities, and do NOT have a taxpayer-paid PR flack like members of Congress to arrange sit-downs with reporters, the news media's insistence that any story about the Tea Party, esp. one that is filmed, involve a conversation with a purported "leader" is especially problematic.

Problematic since 99.9% of the people within that particular state who support the movement in a general way, likely have never heard of this person interviewed.

And frankly, in many cases, it makes them wonder why if this bottom-up point is so well understood by them, and is actually part of its appeal to them and many others, i.e. effort over ego, why does this person in the news video -any video- seem so unaware of the central tenet of the movement and unwilling to say so during the interview.

Is it simply the way the piece is edited they wonder?

And so it is today in this Wall Street Journal video at the top of the post.

Why does the MSM persist in expending so much time and energy looking for someone that is simply not there?

There's no Tea Party Oz behind the curtain.

Certainly many liberals want to believe that there is, despite all the evidence to the contrary, because this fits into their mindset that,

a.) people who think differently than they do are clearly sheep being led around by someone else that the sheep are too stupid to see for themselves,

b.) they'll have a face in particular to hate and a person to write snarky comments about in newspaper and blog reader comments at 2 a.m., when they can't get their venom out of their system and fall asleep.

You see this more and more frequently all over the blogosphere and on YouTube, when you see the time stamp next to their remarks, that is to say, when they aren't posting meet-up times and locales for their local Occupy Wall Street protests, on news stories that have nothing to do with it.

Second, Tea Party supporters are the main reason that the GOP took over the U.S. House of Representatives in the election of November 2010, NOT some grass roots movement that desperately wanted to see much more of uninspiring, charisma-challenged, Cincinnati tear-jerker John Boehner appearing on Sunday morning TV chat shows.

In the process, they defeated many of the few remaining moderate House Democratic incumbents -some of whom I'd met- and elected many conservative Republicans in districts that weren't necessarily leaning GOP, but had gotten past the goal line because of a larger-than-expected Tea Party turnout.

This, of course, also had the practical effect of making the Democratic Party in Washington MUCH more liberal and less able to keep itself tethered to reality, given that the most liberal Democratic members of Congress also have long had the advantage of being able to run from gerrymandered districts.

Unlike most of the Dems who lost, who'd previously won elections in either Neutral or Leans GOP districts, but had somehow found a way to win, either personality, experience or campaign fundraising.

But that momentous election was just 15 months ago, not 15 years ago, yet judging by many of the news stories I've seen and read, there's literally an army of reporters and columnists who have been waiting to declare the Tea Party moment dead or dying, because...

Well, they can't point to anything specifically, but they keep telling us that they 'feel' it.

They were especially keen on mentioning this during the Fifteen Minutes of Occupy Wall Street a few months ago.

The problem is that there is not a national election for Tea Party supporters to weigh-in on for another nine months, and it's as predictable as hurricane warnings in late August down here that lots of well-known liberal columnists and Beltway pundits will be talking about the Tea Party being dead without any tangible evidence, other than them simply wanting it so.

But don't you actually need elections first before you do post-election analysis?

No, for them, their intuition is enough.

National & Florida MSM reach unanimity: Undecided voters, Early voters, Hispanic voters, Anglo voters, I-4 voters and Older voters "may hold key" to 2012 Florida GOP Presidential Primary

2012-01-30T17:55:00.004-05:00

Newt Gingrich campaign video: Newt Gingrich discusses "the Facts and Florida" on his campaign bus with Greta Van Sustern of Fox News. January 28, 2012. http://youtu.be/mpOg027vWp4

National and Florida Mainstream Media reach unanimity: Undecided voters, Early voters, Hispanic voters, Anglo voters, I-4 voters and Older voters "may hold key" to 2012 Florida GOP Presidential Primary."

Gee, thanks for clearing that up!

Who did they leave out, left-handed blue-eyed Veterans?

Last weekend I watched Meet the Press for the first time in a long time when it first airs instead of the early morning encore on MSNBC.

It was an embarrassing spectacle that I think would've made the late Tim Russert fume, since more than anything, he liked genuine competition!
That alone separates him from what seems to be the majority of the American MSM in the year 2012.

Meet the Press played the role of elite Beltway MSM and Obama-backer to the nth degree, had guests struggle to out-do one another in their predictions of their dread of Newt Gingrich as nominee -less-than-24 hours after he won the South Carolina primary.

The Republican National Convention in Tampa isn't until the end of August, so how about taking a chill pill on the forecasting and simply let the process play itself out instead of constantly gazing into your crystal ball?

But in the year 2012, the MSM don't want to leave the elections results up to mere voters.

(And really, despite all the undue attention he's received of late because he used to be a member, the last time I checked, nobody in Florida was saying how much they missed seeing smarmy Joe Scarborough in Congress.

And honestly, for what it's worth, I don't know a single person who watches his MSNBC show due to its smug shallowness, even fair-minded liberals I know.

They're either watching C-SPAN or driving to work or on a train to work somewhere.

MSNBC's programming is like a well-appointed tree-house, except the kids that nobody on the block likes have it in their backyard, so nobody wants to be in it save the unpopular kids who are eager to be there under any circumstances, and who thus try to make it seem more important than it is It's actually pretty funny, but unintentionally so.)

And did I mention yet that the MTP telecast, airing the day after South Carolina's primary and in advance of the Florida primary, had ZERO guests on from South Carolina or Florida?

Really.

The roles that once upon a time under Tim Russert might've seen then-Miami Herald political editor Tom Fiedler or someone from The State newspaper on, dispensing some carefully-rehearsed nugget of insight for the rest of the country to make sense of, instead had dopey Katy Kay of BBC America on as a guest, a past target of much-deserved criticism here on the blog.

Kay, who from what I have seen and heard of her in the many, many years since she was first stationed over here -and used to be on The Diane Rehm Show on WAMU a little too much when I listened to her show everyday at work in Washington- has seemingly NOT challenged the Conventional Wisdom since she took her A-Levels.

She hardly ever says anything that is not entirely predictable based upon her past.

http://youtu.be/IPBl370Zpe8

If you can believe this, after only two states had participated, and with more absentee ballot requests from Florida than all the cast votes in Iowa and New Hampshire combined, David Gregory and his guests actually raised the issue of "favorite son" candidates and "brokered conventions."

Talk about putting the cart before the horse... Jesus, it's not even the end of January!

You can just imagine what they would say as football analysts at halftime.

Yes, that the team leading by a field goal at the half is the "inevitable" winner.

But there's a reason we play four quarters in a game not two, especially for the Super Bowl of U.S. politics.

Not surprisingly, the assembled geniuses on the set could NEVER quite explain why GOP voters in upcoming states, especially those who are unhappy with the establishment of both parties, would find voting for an establishment favorite son candidate a better alternative than voting for someone who is, you know, ACTUALLY running for President.

It seems counter-intuitive, right, but they never explained.

And that's what passes for news analysis these days!

The track record of the Beltway-based GOP Establishment that Mitt Romney is joined-to-the hip to -or alternatively, has made a blood pact with- especially when it comes to picking congressional candidates the last few years when personal or health matters have led to 'special elections,' is NOT an encouraging sign.

But for Beltway media elites, the non-candidate is preferable to an energized and emboldened Newt Gingrich who consistently articulates why he believes fundamental social and fiscal changes will be necessary to get this country moving again, and out of its deep psychological funk.

Newt Gingrich campaign video: Sarah Palin: Newt Best Candidate to Articulate Ideas and Solutions for GOP. January 28, 2012.
http://youtu.be/FTRqc9Sq-vs

Remember when one of the cherished-if-cliched notions of American journalism was the news media challenging the establishment and the-haves?

I know, I know -it's a case of collective hysterical amnesia.

Today, if David met Goliath, the MSM would not only be picking Goliath, they'd be openly rooting for him and tut-tutting David's "incivility."
Then, they'd tell David that Goliath's victory was, yes, "inevitable" and he ought to just give-up.
This sycophantic mentality of the news media rooting for the establishment and the-haves instead of the upstart, has been rapidly making its way into the sporting press for the past 20 years.

As I've stated here previously, you see it clearly when nationally-known TV and print sportscasters, reporters and columnists all claim they want to see some upsets before the NCAA basketball tourney actually starts, but once they have to reveal who they select to make it to the Final Four, far too many pick 'all chalk' because what they really want is the status quo to reign. Duke, North Carolina, Kansas, Ohio State... so very predictable.
Like their political brethren, they can't think outside-the-box, just ask Virginia Commonwealth University.

If everything goes as expected, I'll likely have some photos and maybe even some video here on the blog tomorrow of election activities taking place here in Broward County, and maybe some other places, too.

Weather forecast hereabouts is mostly sunny with a 100% chance of the MSM raining on Newt and being eager to count him out if he doesn't win Florida tomorrow.

But if he loses, and were foolish enough to listen to the news media experts who say he should then drop out, what do we need THEM for until after the end of August?
Exactly.

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http://www.foxnews.com/on-air/on-the-record/index.html

Be careful what you wish for, MSM. If Gingrich loses in Florida, you'll get standoffish Romney to talk about for 9 MONTHS straight; funny negative campaign ads

2012-01-30T12:48:00.000-05:00

Winning Our Future PAC video: Obama's Dream Debate, Part 1, January 17, 2012. http://youtu.be/mv078A36t7Y

More Winning Our Future PAC videos at: http://www.youtube.com/user/WinningOurFuture

If you think that Mitt Romney doesn't like the national news media now, i.e. the Mainstream Media, and their questions he doesn't want to answer truthfully -the very questions that Newt Gingrich has been asking and that Romney SHOULD have had the answers for 6 years ago if he wanted to be taken seriously by me and others, but STILL DOESN'T have- wait until Romney knows that he can ignore the MSM until the Republican National Convention in Tampa Bay in seven months.
Yes, sweltering late August in Florida, the sweet spot for hurricane season.

The point of this pro-Newt Gingrich ad above could hardly be clearer.
The folks at the Winning Our Future PAC who support Newt Gingrich are gazing into their crystal ball and not having to break a sweat to predict that Mitt Romney, having been the very portrait of a liberal Republican as governor of Massachusetts, will fail to be able to contrast himself sharply enough with President Obama on a few key issues, and once they have erased that supposed difference, le déluge.
The rationale of Romney candidacy disappears.

Seriously, why would you expect Obama's campaign team NOT to make a comparative ad in the future that questions Romney's bona fides, essentially asking voters who agree with the idea of Obabacare to keep the person who already thinks that way and who is already president, rather than vote for Obama Lite?

Not that this line of argument will appeal to most well-informed Independents, who by and large are leaning against Obama's re-election, or even to me, but Obama's campaign staff already knows that I won't vote for him; I'm not his target audience.
It's the number one rule of politics: know your universe.

I'm smart enough to know that Obama won't change course.
But you know who are his target of those sort of ads?

Squishy middle-aged Democratic women in urban areas, esp. single Jewish women under 55.
Also, under-30 singles with a college education and likely few serious financial cares.
People who will once again NOT hold Obama's awful track record against him, and give him the benefit of the doubt.

And let's face it, in this country, right now, there are a lot of people who never learn their lesson, and who continue to keep making the same mistakes over and over again, and who thereby becoming willing victims.

Who do you think is watching all those seriously unfunny TV sitcoms (see CBS' show Two Broke Girls below) or who continue to patronize Jennifer Anniston's never-ending string of unfunny and cringe-worthy rom-coms that fall flat?

CBS-TV video: 2 Broke Girls: Facebook Friends. September 30, 2011.
http://youtu.be/iRL0QXLFGV4
(Seriously, could the forced laughter on this video possibly be any more cringe-worthy? Last summer, one of my sisters, who has very different TV & film tastes than me, saw a preview of the show while visiting Las Vegas. She said that she was dumbfounded at how unfunny it was, yet a few people there laughed like hyenas. I'll bet I can guess who they voted for in 2008, that is, IF they voted. I can't be the only person in the country who watches the preceding CBS show, How I Met Your Mother, and then flips over to cable news or ESPN for thirty minutes while this awful show is on.)

Who? Yes, that same Obama 2012 target audience, which includes many if not most of the under-45 demo who voted for Obama in 2008 and thereby got played.

Obama's team is only too happy to take the vote of such dummies before they wise-up, knowing that he will NOT feel encumbered by norms of reasonableness or having to run again. More Obama is MORE Obama being Obama.

But a lot of people like the ones I described above will think he will be different in a second term.
"He'll change" they tell themselves to allay their fears.
If that's what it takes to get their vote, Obama's campaign team will find an ad that spins that faux message to snag their vote.

That's why a funny negative campaign ad like the one at the top of this post works so well -it's all-too true!

The antidote to Romney's negative campaigning is laughter, mockery and stone-cold facts

of truth.

Unfortunately, that only works when both campigns have the same resources, but here in Florida, Romney is outspending Gingrich on TV by a factor of 5:1.

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Almost four years later, this Saturday Night Live skit about John McCain and negative advertising is STILL funny, esp. Bill Hader's sarcastic voice!

Saturday Night Live video: McCain Approves Open.

2008 skit of Sen. McCain approving truth-enhanced negative campaign messages, with Kristen Wiig, Jason Sudeikis, Darrell Hammond as U.S. Senator John McCain and Bill Hader as the creepy-yet-effective VO announcer.

http://www.nbc.com/saturday-night-live//video/McCain-Approves-Open/669582

Justine Ezarik -a.k.a. iJustine- our modern-day Digital Renaissance Woman, back from CES, is in Miami for NATPE and checking out the South Florida scene

2012-01-29T02:46:00.003-05:00

iJustine video: Justine at NATPE. January 28, 2012.
http://youtu.be/Q3S1yKyYhyw
http://ijustine.com/natpe-in-miami-2/

Justine Ezarik, a.k.a. iJustine, modern-day Digital Renaissance Woman and well-known YouTube Partner, back from CES, is in Miami for NATPE and checking-out the South Florida scene.

iJustine video: we in miami, trick. January 29, 2012.
http://youtu.be/gPQFUzahJEM

I originally meant to post the two videos -below- of lovely multi-tasker Justine about three months ago, back when she was visiting Norway and taking some awesome photos and videos of that beautiful country that's been the sad subject of so many posts of mine here since the massacre in Utøya, and home to so many friendly people and beautiful women, like blogger, dancer and runner-extraordinaire Rachel Nordtømme.
http://rachelnordtomme.blogg.no/
http://www.bj0rn.net/wordpress/2011/09/01/rachel-nordtomme/

Plus, Justine finally explained, to those who didn't know, what the reality of the Swedish Fish situation was.

Curiously enough, that video of Justine and her Norwegian friends doing the glacier trek was one of the things that I had waiting for me in my YouTube inbox one night three months ago, when I'd come home from spending a few hours with my Dad when he wasn't doing very well after he'd taken a fall, and I'd had to rush him to the Mt. Sinai ER in Aventura with a gash above his right eye.

When I finally got home and flipped on my computer and the TV, with Jimmy Kimmel about mid-way thru his monologue, I was both physically exhausted and emotionally distraught, and driving home I'd once again been mentally debating my idea of whether or not to go to Sweden and Iceland soon to get away from here for a while and clear my head.
Something I've mentioned a time or two here before.

But as she has so many times before, especially the rough last year-and-a-half, with all of its ups-and-downs with my Dad's health, Justine made me laugh and smile when I really needed it... so there's that.
She's Pittsburgh thru-and-thru!

iJustine video: EPIC GLACIER HIKE! October 27, 2011.
http://youtu.be/pD0xXf9-_lI

iJustine video: Moose meat and glacier wounds. October 27, 2011.
http://youtu.be/n5JAIrd8IFI

Months after I'd originally planned on doing so, I'm going to be over on South Beach Monday afternoon to take some photos and shoot some video of the space on Lincoln Road that was supposed to be the new H&M store many months ago, but which is, well, STILL not open.

I'm going to try to get some straight answers from some responsible people as to when that soon-to-be cash cow store is going to be a reality, but if by chance I run into Justine, with her camera in tow, well, that sleuthing of mine may well have to wait until another time.

Even though I'm NOT a fan of reality shows anymore, having given up two years ago on the only one I consistently watched, CBS's The Amazing Race, Justine is definitely someone whose personal adventures, mis-adventures and hijinks I would watch on the small tube.
Yes, smarts, savvy and personality still counts for a lot with me, and Justine has enough personality for any two women.
Take that as a hint, NATPE programming types looking for new ideas.

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http://ijustine.com/

The trip to Norway: http://ijustine.com/?s=Norway&x=14&y=11

Justine's photoshoot for Maxim magazine: http://youtu.be/YLKU4tkWH2s

Photos at: http://www.maxim.com/amg/girls/girls-of-maxim/91021/ijustine.html

Justine Ezarik's media portfolio, besides ijustine.com, consists of the following portals:

twitter.com/ijustine,

youtube.com/ijustine,

youtube.com/otherijustine,

youtube.com/ijustinereviews,

youtube.com/ijustinesiphone,

youtube.com/ijustinegaming,

ijustine.spreadshirt.com,

dailybooth.com/ijustine,

facebook.com/ijustine,

myspace.com/ijustine

Yes, there's a Justine for every demographic!

A head's-up for those of you with YouTube Channels, esp. those of you who DON'T receive anywhere near the volume of visits that Justine gets.

Which is to say, all of you. And me.

After originally planning on posting it over Christmas week but not being able to do so for reasons that some of you know about, in the next day or so I'll be posting the fascinating and instructive video of ABC News' 20/20 program from September called "YouTube Generation" that I've already spoken to some of you about via email.

I'll also post some of my observations about it.

Breaking News: Mannix Marathon on Cloo until 6 am Eastern Sunday

2012-01-28T15:57:00.000-05:00

CBS-TV - Mannix (1969) Intro credits.
Music composed by Lalo Schifrin.
http://youtu.be/vyZL_3bxD68

Breaking News: Mannix Marathon on Cloo until 6 a.m. Eastern Sunday, DirecTV Channel 308. Be there!

Back in the day before we all knew what CSIs and mass spectrometers were, all you needed when you were in a real tight pinch was to call your ex-Army pal from Korea out in LA named Joe Mannix.
Mannix would get us the answers we need!

Mannix wasn't just a crime-fighting gumshoe, a top-shelf detective with a keen eye for clues, beautiful women and people who got the shaft from the system, but someone who wasn't afraid a of a fight.
Joe Mannix also had a deeply ingrained sense of integrity and righting wrongs.
Remember that, integrity?

Joe Mannix for Broward Sheriff, Al Lamberti for Media Photo Ops!

Longer version of theme song.
http://youtu.be/mznUMYY7YC8

Yes, strings, woodwinds and brass in perfect harmony!
It's why Lalo Schifrin was a genius.

http://www.televisiontunes.com/Mannix_-_Long.html

If you play the extended version above now for any half-normal kid in elementary school -like one of my teachers once did at Fulford Elementary in North Miami Beach, back when the show was still on the air- I absolutely guarantee you that their eyes will light up.

rook88 video: Castle like Mannix. October 16, 2010.
http://youtu.be/nMntqvijI-Q

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http://www.schifrin.com/

Lalo Schifrin samples: http://dougpayne.com/samples.htm

http://www.cloo.com/

http://beta.abc.go.com/shows/castle

Kiefer Sutherland talks about his remarkable new hit Fox-TV drama, "TOUCH," and reminisces about "Stand By Me" and how much he still misses River Phoenix

2012-01-28T04:08:00.001-05:00

Fox Broadcasting video: TOUCH - Father and Son. January 27, 2012.
http://youtu.be/7Sox4gYi6HQ

Kiefer Sutherland on Jimmy Kimmel Live PART 1. January 23, 2012.

http://youtu.be/HSKdVeW_83k

Kiefer Sutherland on Jimmy Kimmel Live PART 2. January 23, 2012.

http://youtu.be/RsUuHI4ZskM

Kiefer Sutherland on Jimmy Kimmel Live PART 3. January 23, 2012.

http://youtu.be/TWrFoY--de0

Keep in mind that per the discussion above, while the TOUCH World Premiere is on Monday March 19th at 9 pm Eastern, you can see the first episode -that was given a sneak preview by Fox-TV this past Wednesday and won its time-slot- right now on Fox's Video-on-Demand (VOD).

The show's creator is Tim Kring, the executive producer for both NBC-TV's Crossing Jordan, starring longtime HBB favorite Jill Hennessey, and NBC's Heroes.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fibonacci_number

http://www.fox.com/touch/

http://www.youtube.com/user/FoxBroadcasting

http://www.youtube.com/user/JimmyKimmelLive

That stink you smell is coming from Wilton Manors' cocky lawyer/lobbyist/mayor, Gary Resnick, who doesn't much care for Ethics rules that negatively affect his own wallet

2012-01-28T02:42:00.002-05:00

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Over the past few weeks, many well-informed observers of the Broward political and govt. scene have surely asked others they trust in private, "What is it with Gary Resnick?"

Alternatively, they've asked themselves, "WTF is with Resnick?"

Those of you reading this today obviously know which camp you're in, though you can be in both, of course.

Like me.

Does Resnick honestly think that the Broward County Commission-approved Ethics laws that are supposed to govern the conduct and behavior of all elected municipal officials in Broward, among many others, was just a strong suggestion?

What are the real reasons that have animated Resnick's fervent efforts the past few weeks to figure out a way to obfuscate, blunt and somehow overturn those clear-cut rules on Ethical conduct, so that they do not apply to him and his small fiefdom north of Fort Lauderdale?

There are lots of reasons to choose from, and obviously only Resnick knows the real ones, though surely they can't be the transparently self-serving ones he's been offering up to the local South Florida news media that has drawn gasps of dismay from county residents and activists, can they?

Oh yes they can!

Hmm-m... let me restate that last point.

To be factual, I should say the local South Florida news media in the singular form of the South Florida Sun-Sentinel, as they have done the lion's share of the reporting on this issue.
The four English-speaking TV stations and the Miami Herald -with the exception of a two-minute segment by Channel 10's Bob Norman- have yet to engage any of their own reporters, columnists, producers or cameramen in a SINGLE hour's worth of reporting or investigating on the story, and get the answer directly from Resnick and his band of acolytes at Wilton Manors City Hall or outside of his law firm's office.

Why?

Do I REALLY have to tell you?

Not if you are a regular reader here and are aware of the shallow-end of the journalism pool that South Florida has unfortunately drawn in these early years of the 21st century.

Channel 10 News
Bob Norman's Blog
Resnick wants to keep lobbying
Published On: Jan 16 2012 09:20:39 AM EST
Updated On: Jan 16 2012 09:37:09 AM EST
Video at:

http://www.local10.com/news/blogs/bob-norman/Wilton-Manors-mayor-undercutting-ethics-reform/-/3223354/8148064/-/14v1vb9z/-/index.html

This being Broward County, where it's far easier for a person publicly doing the wrong thing to get friends, acquaintances and supporters to stick-up publicly for their own bad judgment and uncouth behavior than it is for the South Florida news media to find any fair-minded people of stature and accomplishment in the community to point it out, as would happen in other parts of the country, I encourage you to not only watch the Bob Norman video, but to peruse the reader comments as well.

You see, this being Broward, the reader comments contain public cheerleaders for Gary Resnick's behavior and attempts to 'secede' from the county's ethics law, which he finds so troublesome for his personal bottom line.

Not surprisingly, one of them is a longtime pro-union, Democratic Party functionary named Ron Mills, the president of the Dolphin Democrats, which he describes as "Florida's oldest and largest lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender (LGBT) Democratic club."

He is also the person behind the blog called Broward's Blog, http://browardsblog.blogspot.com/

In my opinion, Mills' comments on the Channel 10 website speak for themselves, just like Resnick's audacity and gall.

It seems to me that if, like Mills, you hold your friends to a lesser standard than you would tolerate in others, have such a high tolerance for uncouth and unethical behavior by your friends and people you support politically that you've got no problem in publicly making pathetic excuses for their inexcusable actions or words, you're clearly going to be labeled a hypocrite publicly in the future when you try to use your perch to point-out smaller moral and ethical deficiencies in people whom you oppose politically.

At that point, people are more than entitled to disregard your opinion in the future, given your own opaque outlook on ethics, and the difference between right and wrong.

You tell me, is Resnick doing it and thinking he can get away with being so ballsy because he is an elected official in an otherwise obscure one-horse town, where most people outside that duchy of his prefer cars as transportation?

Is it because Resnick lives in a county where other elected municipal officials rarely if ever criticize or call-out another, and most of the local public policy groups that in other parts of the country might be engaged and call him on the carpet, instead maintain their Hear No Evil, See No Evil and Speak No Evil policy of looking the other way?

Is it because Resnick is an attorney who lobbies other cities in Broward County for his clients, yet has so perfected his wax indignant pose, that when people paying close attention to what he's actually doing publicly use the word "lobbyist" as a pejorative, just like it was applied so frequently and accurately for years to lawyer lobbyist Steve Geller -the previous champion of lawyerly distinctions-without-a-difference- he practically pouts, hurt by your critical words?

Is it because Resnick is so cocky, and thinks that by being upfront about it, that somehow mitigates what he is attempting to do, burrow underneath an ethical fence that is supposed to be a barrier to self-serving behavior, a move made necessary because of so many recent ethical lapses by elected officials in Broward, big fish and minnows?

In this situation, Resnick truly seems to want to ignore both the spirit and the letter of the law, one passed unanimously-if-unhappily by the Broward County Commission last year.

Or, could it just be that Resnick -like everyone else down here with a pulse and two eyes- knows that the local news media is NOT exactly a beehive of eager worker-bees who give 110% on local news stories, so because he's the Gay mayor of a heavily-Gay city, he thinks that if he gets any sort of serious push-back on the issue, he can always pull out the 'victim card' from his back pocket, flash it to the news media, and maybe even play them a tune on his tiny violin?

Maybe it's some weird combination of all these things that make Resnick think that he and his tiny town are above the rules that govern everyone else.

They aren't, of course, and the proof of that is that you can smell HIS stink all the way down on the Broward and Miami-Dade countyline.

With or without an ocean breeze.

Read the following and draw your own conclusions about this 'character" and watch as things begin to heat up on this issue starting Tuesday, when he attempts to go over, around or under the ethical wall of conduct.

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South Florida Sun-Sentinel
Broward politicans need to choose: Lobbying or public office, not both
Ballot measures would undo new ethics code in some municipalities
Michael Mayo, Sun Sentinel Columnist
January 23, 2012

Wilton Manors Mayor Gary Resnick has taken some heat lately, for good reason. He's been leading the charge to undo some provisions of Broward county's strict new ethics rules for municipal officials, which took effect Jan. 1

Read the rest of the column at:
http://articles.sun-sentinel.com/2012-01-23/news/fl-ethics-vote-mayocol-b012412-20120123_1_new-ethics-code-mayor-gary-resnick-broward-cities

South Florida Sun-Sentinel

Wilton Manors leaders accused of 'scare tactic' over ethics ballot measure
By Brittany Wallman, Sun Sentinel
9:03 p.m. EST, January 25, 2012

Wilton Manors voters are being encouraged to approve a ballot measure Tuesday that weakens the brand new Code of Ethics. According to Mayor Gary Resnick and City Manager Joe Gallegos, the code requires advisory board members to share their salaries with the public.

But that's not true, Gallegos acknowledged Wednesday.

The Code of Ethics has no such requirement in it, despite what he and Mayor Gary Resnick have said publicly.

Read the rest of the article at:
http://www.sun-sentinel.com/news/broward/wilton-manors/fl-wilton-manors-misinformation-20120125,0,6413170.story

South Florida Sun-Sentinel

Mayo on the Side blog
Are ethics code foes distorting the truth?
By Michael Mayo
January 25, 2012 09:32 AM

As part of the effort to weaken Broward's tough new ethics code in some local municipalities, are some officials distorting the truth to rally support for their cause?

I ask because it seems salary-disclosure requirements might not apply to appointed advisory board members, contrary to what Wilton Manors Mayor Gary Resnick told me in an interview on Monday.

Read the rest of the post at:
http://weblogs.sun-sentinel.com/news/columnists/mayo/blog/2012/01/are_ethics_code_foes_distortin.html

-----

My three most recent posts that mentioned both the new ethics laws in Broward County among municipal officials and Gary Resnick's rather strange understanding of them, all from this month, are here in chronological order:

Broward cities need tougher ethics laws, not self-serving pols like Gary Resnick & Debby Eisinger, whom we need like more bad restaurants, more ruined-views of the beach... -NOT at all!
http://hallandalebeachblog.blogspot.com/2012/01/broward-cities-need-tougher-ethics-laws.html

My coda to "Broward cities need tougher ethics laws, not self-serving pols"; Debby Eisinger's curious fact pattern

http://hallandalebeachblog.blogspot.com/2012/01/my-coda-to-broward-cities-need-tougher.html

Please stick to your guns on stronger ethics and do everything in your power to prevent Mayor Resnick & Co. from beginning the race to the bottom of the ethics barrel in Broward
http://hallandalebeachblog.blogspot.com/2012/01/please-stick-to-your-guns-on-stronger.html

Jeffrey Lord dissects a Romney hit-job on Gingrich: Elliot Abrams' revisionist hit-job at NRO is debunked by simple facts the MSM didn't care about

2012-01-27T14:08:00.000-05:00

POLITICO video: Jim Vandehei on the anti-Newt attacks. January 27, 2012
http://bcove.me/nx4mo74a

Jeffrey Lord dissects a Romney hit-job on Gingrich: Elliot Abrams' revisionist hit-job in NRO is debunked by simple facts the MSM didn't care about

Glad to see that at least someone in this country is doing their homework and fact-checking the "facts." Especially the "inconvenient" facts that the MSM is too busy to look at before throwing them out into the ether.

But first, here's the predicate:

National Review Online

Gingrich and Reagan

In the 1980s, the candidate repeatedly insulted the president.

By Elliott Abrams

Posted online January 25, 2012 4:00 a.m.

http://www.nationalreview.com/articles/289159/gingrich-and-reagan-elliott-abrams

Which led to my post of yesterday re Newt Gingrich and specifically, Rush Limbaugh's observations, and this from today, from which the video at the top of this post appeared:

POLITICO

Drudge, conservative media criticize Newt Gingrich

It’s as if the conservative media over the past 24 hours decided Gingrich is for real.

By Jim Vandehei and Mike Allen

1/26/12 8:00 AM EST

Updated: 1/27/12 7:48 AM EST

http://www.politico.com/news/stories/0112/72000.html

Now, here's the fact-filled retort that lays bare the lies.

The American Spectator
The Spectacle blog
Elliott Abrams Caught Misleading on Newt
By Jeffrey Lord
Posted online January 27, 2012 11:28 a.m.

As Ronald Reagan used to say: Well.

Yesterday we took note of former Reagan State Department official Elliott Abrams' piece over at NRO that went after Newt Gingrich on his relationship with Reagan. While voting regularly with Reagan as a young congressman from Georgia, Gingrich, claimed Abrams, "often spewed insulting rhetoric at Reagan, his top aides and his policies to defeat Communism." Abrams then goes on to cite " a famous floor statement Gingrich made on March 21, 1986."

Or sort of cites it.

Read the rest of this spot-on post at:
http://spectator.org/blog/2012/01/27/elliott-abrams-caught-misleadi

Newt Gingrich campaign video: Ed Rollins: Gingrich was one of "most important players and most loyal to Ronald Reagan." January 27, 2012

http://youtu.be/SjOMMweAJ_s

Yes, The American Spectator that was started in Bloomington and which later moved to Arlington County, VA, just like me. In fact, for years, it was right near the Metro train station I used everyday, the Clarendon Metro, home of all those delicious Vietnamese restaurants I dearly miss, like Queen Bee. http://spectator.org/

When I lived and worked in the Evanston/Chicago area in the pre-Internet mid-1980's, I always purchased a copy of TAS (and The Washington Monthly) every month at the Chicago-Main newsstand to see stories and columns about heretofore unknown issues, long-simmering grudges and policy flights-of-fancy in Washington and the country that I didn't see elsewhere.

Not that I always agreed with everything, but just like manhattan, inc. and SPY, my two favorite magazines, which I was also a charter subscriber to, their contributors writing was so spirited and fun that, sometimes, not always, it was easier to just believe rather than to fight it.

That was where I first got large doses of Michael Barone's prescient insight, which he now dishes from The Washington Examiner.
http://campaign2012.washingtonexaminer.com/author/michael-barone
and Real Clear Politics
http://www.realclearpolitics.com/authors/michael_barone/
and TownHall
http://townhall.com/columnists/michaelbarone/
and National Review Online, where he has this piece today:

Gearing Up to Govern
The GOP candidates are more serious about governing than is the incumbent.
http://www.nationalreview.com/articles/289283/gearing-govern-michael-barone

Below, the new-and-improved version via Google Maps of the newsstand, long the best on The North Shore, that re-opened in 2001, after apparently vanishing for 8 years because of the CTA and city of Evanston being unable to get their acts together for the benefit of the area's residents. Eight years!
http://www.citynewsstand.com/progressupdate.htm

View Larger Map

Bob Dole, remember him? Worst GOP Presidential nominee in memory, his White House chances laughed at openly by the Mainstream Media weeks BEFORE the election, now criticizes Newt Gingrich. Another GOP Establishment lobbyist for Romney to add to his collection!

2012-01-26T22:58:00.000-05:00

CBS News video: CBS Evening News with Scott Pelley. Dean Reynolds reports on "Gingrich feeling heat from GOP Establishment." January 26, 2012.
http://www.cbsnews.com/video/watch/?id=7396509n

Bob Dole, remember him?
Worst GOP Presidential nominee in memory, his chances laughed at openly by the Mainstream Media weeks BEFORE the election, now criticizes Newt Gingrich.
Yes, Bob Dole, the most over-rated member of Congress of the past thirty years, not that it ever stopped his pals in the Beltway news media from the logrolling after he became a lobbyist.

Try this simple amateur detective assignment yourself.
Each day ask five people who don't follow politics as deeply as you do, "Who ran against Bill Clinton in 1996?"

Give them ten seconds to answer, with no clues.

Do this for a month.

The gaping silence you hear, there's your evidence!

Yes, the same person who talked openly about "Democratic wars" in the 1976 Vice-Presidential debate.

Bob Dole.

And yet he ran for president only 16 years ago...

Just saying...

If you saw the CBS Evening News segment tonight that dealt with the Beltway's GOP Establishment falling-in behind Mitt Romney and attacking Newt Gingrich - especially the once-familiar Republican names who for years have been making lots of money from leveraging their connections!- it's not for nothing that their interview was with one of the the poster boys for the old GOP Establishment who resented Newt's tight personal connection with younger members and who have fought the Tea Party tooth-and-nail the past two years: Bob Dole.

And did you notice that nowhere in the piece did the reporter mention how what Bob Dole did after he left office?

Lobbying.
Surprise!

I listened to Rush Limbaugh for about two hours today, including when he said this...

Coordinated Avalanche Against Newt Doesn't Match My Memory of Reagan Years
http://www.rushlimbaugh.com/daily/2012/01/26/coordinated_avalanche_against_newt_doesn_t_match_my_memory_of_reagan_years

Dole assails Gingrich in plea to conservatives
Posted by CNN's Kevin Liptak
http://politicalticker.blogs.cnn.com/2012/01/26/dole-assails-gingrich-in-plea-to-conservatives/

And did you notice that nowhere in the piece did reporter Dean Reynolds mention how what Bob Dole did after he left office?

Lobbying.

Seriously, look at who these former GOP congressmen supporting Romney are... Vin Weber, Susan Molinari...
A largely-forgettable Minnesota Republican and a not-too-bright-but-cute daughter of a longtime Staten Island GOP congressman, who played her feisty thirty-something Mom Congresswoman shtick to the hilt? And then some!
(She later turned being cute-and-precious with a smile into a ticket to host a network TV news program -another CBS News debacle.)

NOT exactly the people who were doing the heavy lifting to make the GOP Revolution of 1994 possible.
In fact, Weber retired in 1992 to... well, lobby.
And after Molinari left CBS and had another kid... well, since 2001, she's been a lobbyist.
What a coincidence!

Seriously, would anyone outside of New York in those pre-Internet days have ever talked about Molinari if Newt hadn't personally led the GOP takeover in 1994, when she'd been in Congress for all of two terms?
In a word, no.

I was there.
I knew people who knew them, some who liked them and those who didn't, all who had some degree of insight into them and their ilk.
Which is why i ask you simply, quick, name one accomplishment of significance for either Weber or Molinari before 1994 that anyone has ever heard of?
Exactly.
Just saying...

And if you're one of those few people out there in the blogosphere who think you've heard it all and seen it all before, but didn't know about this story, which I first heard about when I lived and worked in the Washington area, you might want to consider this as a mitigating factor in Molinari's feelings about Newt Gingrich.

The bitter backstory between Newt Gingrich and Romney backer, Susan Molinari
Posted by Marc Caputo on January 18, 2012
http://miamiherald.typepad.com/nakedpolitics/2012/01/the-bitter-backstory-between-newt-gingrich-and-romney-backer-susan-molinari.html

Hmm-m... Vin Weber -lobbyist. Susan Molinari -lobbyist. Bob Dole -lobbyist.
Sort of makes you wonder why they don't form a PAC called GOP Silver Spoon Lobbyists for Romney.
They don't, of course, because they don't need to as long as Mitt's Super PAC is around buying up all the air time it can swallow

Dole's comments were almost as laughable as Bob Schieffer's tonight.
http://www.cbsnews.com/8301-18563_162-57367151/schieffer-modern-american-politics-is-vulgar/?tag=cbsnewsTwoColUpperPromoArea

Do you recall what Schieffer said after Barack Obama's infamous comments in 2008 while in San Francisco about residents of Pennsylvania became public, an incident that I referenced the other day?

http://youtu.be/xNoJ0q6HrK8

Bob Schieffer said nothing about those vulgar and condescending remarks.

Say sayonara, Bob.

Just saying...
-----
I found this after writing the above but it still made me laugh nonetheless...

A question we’ve never posed and likely no one outside of CBS News has ever considered: “We wondered what Bob Schieffer thinks of all of this?”

http://newsbusters.org/blogs/brent-baker/2012/01/26/appalled-schieffer-blasts-vulgar-and-rude-brewer-we-re-better-people

Hallandale Beach P&Z Board unanimously REJECT The Related Groups' Beachwalk project on Intracoastal; vote is also a rejection of Bill Julian's support for it

2012-01-26T04:16:00.000-05:00

By turns surprising and forceful, and much to the delight of the clear majority of the dozens of Hallandale Beach citizens who came to City Hall on Wednesday afternoon to oppose it, the Hallandale Beach Planning & Zoning Advisory Board unanimously REJECTED The Related Groups' Beachwalk project on the Intracoastal by a vote of 4-0.

It's also noteworthy that former HB Comm. William "Bill" Julian, a 2012 candidate for the City Commission and a longtime object of scorn and enmity on this blog for reasons that are well-known to regular readers, typically, showed the sort of VERY BAD judgment that marked his ten years on the city commission, by choosing the wrong time and the wrong place to come out in support of a 30-story-plus development project on an already gridlocked road -a block from a drawbridge no less!- that was completely out-of-scale for the area.

And this came after he prefaced his remarks by verbally patting himself on the back and engaged in revisionist history by implying that he had a been an eagle-eyed watchdog for the community, when the reality is that he was one of the most disconnected and oblivious of all of Joy Cooper's Rubber Stamp Crew while he sat up on the dais.

Julian WASN'T a watchdog by any stretch of the imagination, rather he was the proverbial Wooden Indian that just sat there and consistently said and did the wrong thing while the city continued its sad decline into incompetency and irrelevancy, even while its budget nearly doubled in six years.
(And where's the tangible proof now of any of that spending?)

Many of the people in the room who pay close attention to what goes on in this community and who are, thus, all-too-familiar with Julian's troubling history on the commission and well-known knack for making bad things worse, made a point of speaking to me in-person immediately after the public meeting or thru emails later, all asking a variation of the same thing: "What the hell was Julian thinking?"

But then one need only ask when WASN'T that the question in everyone's mind after watching him in action, even when he wasn't in action but rather in repose?
Julian is nothing if not consistent in his ability to make HB's citizen taxpayers cringe and flinch, and even occasionally recoil in horror or dismay.
And he showed why again on Wednesday.

Among the well-informed Hallandale Beach residents from all over the city who made it a point to see for themselves what the P&Z Board would do, Julian's botched effort and the Board's rejection of his points was almost as much of a reason to smile as the decision itself, which will now go the full commission for further action.

More particulars on the Beachwalk vote and how it came to be rejected, complete with photos and videos, should be up on the blog on Saturday.

The Related Group's 31-story Beachwalk project in Hallandale Beach -on the Intracoastal- goes to HB Planning & Zoning Board Wednesday at 1:30 p.m.

2012-01-25T03:02:00.001-05:00

Above, looking east from the south sidewalk of the Intracoastal Bridge/State Road 858 over the Atlantic Intracoastal waterway, looking towards State Road A1A and the city's iconic beachball-colored water tower and the adjoining three condo towers of The Beach Club. If the Beachwalk project is approved by the Hallandale Beach City Commission in a few weeks, it would be located just south of this bridge and this particular view will never be the same. September 8, 2008 photo by South Beach Hoosier.

The Related Group's proposed 31-story Beachwalk mixed-use development project in Hallandale Beach, to be located at 2600 E. Hallandale Beach Blvd., on the south side of the Intracoastal Bridge/State Road 858, where the old Manero’s restaurant was formerly located, and across the street from Walmart, goes before the Hallandale Beach Planning & Zoning Advisory Board Wednesday at HB City Hall at 1:30 p.m.

The official name for the group behind this proposal is PRH-2600 Hallandale Beach LLC

Above, an admittedly not-so-great photo I snapped of one of the artist's depictions of the project during a Power Point presentation by attorney Debbie Orshefsky at the developer's October 11, 2011 Community Forum at the HB Cultural Center. This depiction is looking southwest from the beach/State Road A1A. The Beachwalk is on the extreme right, on the south side of the bridge.

One of my last posts on this project -full of useful information I encourage you to read before the meeting if you never saw it the first time- was on October 3rd, 2011 titled, October 13 Community Meeting re Beachwalk - 31-story mixed-use project at old 'Manero's' restaurant site; new gridlock-inducing plan for HB?
http://hallandalebeachblog.blogspot.com/2011/10/october-13-community-meeting-re.html

Wednesday's agenda is here:
http://www.cohb.org/files/PLANNING%20AND%20ZONING%20BOARD%20AGENDAS/2012-01-25-Planning%20and%20Zoning/Agenda%20Outline%20for%202012-01-25%2013-30.htm

-----

South Florida Business Journal
Related Group buys waterfront site for 60% off
by Brian Bandell
Thursday, May 5, 2011, 3:42pm EDT -
Last Modified: Thursday, May 5, 2011, 4:20pm EDT

After handing over several of its condo projects to lenders, this time Jorge M. Perez and his Related Group are buying a property from a bank.

PRH-2600 Hallandale Beach LLC, an entity ultimately managed by the Miami-based developer, bought a Hallandale Beach site along the Intracoastal Waterway from TD Bank for $2.92 million.

Read the rest of the article at:

http://www.bizjournals.com/southflorida/news/2011/05/05/related-group-buys-waterfront-site.html

------

http://www.bizjournals.com/southflorida/

http://therealdeal.com/miami/

One week from Florida GOP primary, Mainstream Media & Florida's own MSM continue to coddle Ron Paul, and NOT force him to answer self-evident questions re Florida; Ron Paul is missing-in-action

2012-01-24T17:43:00.001-05:00

Flag image from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flag_of_Florida

Both the national Mainstream Media & Florida's own MSM continue to coddle Ron Paul and NOT force him to answer self-evident questions, and thus be held accountable.

Paul has not won any of the first three contests and is NOT running a serious campaign in Florida, the fourth-largest state in the country.

As I've written here a few times previously, I was not only born in Texas, I'm a direct descendant of a pioneer Texas Hill Country family that has lived there continuously for well over over 155 years.

And just as the entire country is NOT a small-scale replica of everyday life in Manhattan or Santa Monica, despite what Hollywood and Madison Avenue marketers and network TV execs may attempt to persuade us in films and in television programs and commercials, the entire country is also NOT the south suburban Houston area that is Ron Paul's own congressional district, TX-14.
Map: http://www.govtrack.us/congress/findyourreps.xpd?state=TX&district=14

Voters in Florida next Tuesday, like voters in Iowa and New Hampshire the past few weeks and the upcoming state primaries, quite reasonably believe that they're entitled to be represented by a person as president who at least ATTEMPTS to understand their unique concerns and issues, and who takes those into account when setting national policies and making important decisions.

Given that, how does Ron Paul's failure to even mount a serious effort in Florida to garner their votes, failure to even pretend to try to understand THEIR unique concerns instead of merely repeating his own, now make him a person Floridians should take seriously, now or in the future?

And isn't Paul's behavior towards Florida voters more accurately described as patronizing?

To answer my own question, yes.

So how come nobody in the traveling national press corps or Florida-based news media, print or electronic, will ask them that simple question on camera?
Sometimes, as we've learned, the absence of evidence is evidence of a sort, too, isn't it?

But you don't have to take my word for Paul's patronizing attitude toward Florida voters.
Let me directly quote the Tampa Bay Times' Alex Leary in their Buzz politics blog today under the headline, Florida presidential primary tracker for Tuesday
http://www.tampabay.com/blogs/the-buzz-florida-politics/content/florida-presidential-primary-tracker-tuesday

Ron Paul: No events scheduled.

Ron Paul is missing-in-action.
Res ipsa loquitur.

And when, exactly, does Ron Paul actually WIN a state primary election?

WHEN?

Name that state?

http://elections.nytimes.com/2012

That's a question that mouthy and opinionated Paul supporters can't or won't answer, for obvious reasons, so when you run into them in-person on see them on TV news segments on the cablenets or C-SPAN sounding loftier than they have any right to sound based on what's actually happened, ask them that simple question.

And tell them that after Paul has ACTUALLY WON SOMETHING, to get get back in-touch, but otherwise, stop annoying everyone with their nonsensical conspiracies about how someone who can't even win a single state presidential primary can be elected president in the year 2012.
Sorry, it's not the 19th Century anymore.

It's preposterous.

The truth of the matter is that Paul won't even be able to win the Texas GOP primary on April 3rd.

Since we don't have a parliamentary system, an American president, whatever else they need to be or do, MUST be seen by both Americans and people overseas as the president of the entire country, not just the small parts of it that happen to agree with him.
And if it's not too much trouble, NOT appear to be overly-contemptuous and dismissive of other Americans.

Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton responds to Barack Obama's recorded comments at a San Francisco fundraiser about residents of small towns in Pennsylvania being "bitter." "Small towns cling to guns or religion" April 2008. http://youtu.be/xNoJ0q6HrK8
http://www.politico.com/blogs/bensmith/0408/Obama_on_smalltown_PA_Clinging_religion_guns_xenophobia.html

In my view, that's one of President Obama's chief (and unsolvable) problems -he doesn't.

Repeating that same mistake with someone else is NOT a reasonable solution to our current problems.

Pied Piper Ron Paul, go sell crazy somewhere else.
We've already got more than enough of that here in Florida.

-----
Central Florida Political Pulse politics blog of the Orlando Sentinel:
http://blogs.orlandosentinel.com/news_politics/

The Buzz politics blog of the Tampa Bay Times
http://www.tampabay.com/blogs/the-buzz-florida-politics/

http://www.c-span.org/Campaign2012/

http://watchdog.net/us/tx-14

http://www.texasgop.org/

http://www.texashillcountry.com/

A thought on Fred Thompson's endorsement of Newt Gingrich; Newt will be in Coral Springs on Wednesday morning

2012-01-24T05:55:00.000-05:00

Fred Thompson Endorses Newt Gingrich on Fox News Channel's Sean Hannity Show, January 23, 2012. http://youtu.be/_XYzaHkpEQg

Speaking of making the case for American Exceptionalism, how great would it be to have Fred Thompson as the U.S. Secretary of State representing our interests abroad, and to know that no matter what country he visits, he is instantly recognized by both the general population on the street and the elites in power, as someone that can forcefully and articulately make the case for this country in ways that few other Americans can?

If Fred Thompson gives a foreign minister, a prime minister or some ruling general a message on behalf of the president and people of the United States instructing them that they have until a certain time to make a decision, the right decision, you DON'T have to worry about whether or not they fully understand that it's a real deadline with genuine consequences.
They know.

Fred Dalton Thompson's Best Movie Moments
http://youtu.be/tjXgS5lqqRQ

Arthur Branch's Final Scene -Law & Order, Season 17, Episode 22, aired May 18, 2007. http://youtu.be/RyCedhLgUYk

Melanie Phillips fillets out-of-touch female reporters in the Beltway, like Gloria Borger, who WON'T let facts get in the way of their asinine predictions about Newt Gingrich & women voters. She shoots and she scores!

2012-01-23T03:05:00.000-05:00

In her Daily Mail blog post of Sunday titled, Well, what a surprise (not), Melanie Phillips quite properly fillets out-of-touch female reporters in the Beltway who WOULDN'T and WON'T let self-evident facts get in the way of their asinine predictions about Newt Gingrich & women voters, per the Marianne Gingrich contretemps of last week.

Predictably, longtime Washington Week in Review panelist Gloria Borger of CNN was among the most egregious of these disconnected talking heads for her asinine "women won't vote for Newt" comments of Thursday immediately following the debate in Charleston on CNN and then on Friday night on PBS.

Phillips , author of one of my favorite books of the past 20 years, 2006's Londonistan: How Britain is Creating a Terror State Within, wrote, in part:

All those who said the onslaught upon Gingrich by his ex-wife Marianne would leave him dead in the water, particularly among women, have been shown to be spectacularly out of touch. Gingrich actually won more women’s votes than his opponents.

She goes on to conclude that in the battle of Newt vs. Mitt,

The gladiator in question may be flawed and far from ideal in a number of respects, but if he’s the only one who can fell his opponents rather than be felled by them, he wins.

Read the rest of the post at:
http://phillipsblog.dailymail.co.uk/2012/01/well-what-a-surprise-not.html

-----

C-SPAN video: Melanie Phillips - Londonistan. Heritage Foundation. May 10, 2006. http://youtu.be/DvgypX2-f4k
To watch a higher-quality video of this, see: http://www.c-spanvideo.org/program/192456-1

http://phillipsblog.dailymail.co.uk/

http://www.melaniephillips.com/

http://twitter.com/MelanieLatest

Tourists, "amateur detectives" and the curious descend on Giglio to see Costa Concordia shipwreck for themselves and opine on its future

2012-01-22T17:34:00.002-05:00

Euronews video: Tourists, "amateur detectives" and the curious continue to descend on Giglio to see the Costa Concordia shipwreck for themselves, and opine on its future. Death toll now stands at thirteen. http://youtu.be/2ISKK6XDqTM

On Thursday I got the chance to watch Aftonbladet TV's LIVE streaming of the disaster site for about a half-hour or so, and was quite amazed at how LITTLE was actually happening in the early afternoon, their time.
It was very odd and no doubt a bit distressing for family members to observe. I emailed the URL out to some of you and would include it here but it's no longer operating.

Aftonbladet TV video: Video of the Costa Concordia and computer graphics depicting various options that may be employed to salvage and tow the ship
away to safety. January 2012.
http://www.aftonbladet.se/webbtv/nyheter/olyckor/article14233903.ab

Euronews video: Decision on Costa Concordia salvage operation imminent. January 22, 2012. http://youtu.be/HoeoO4jR8ms

See more videos of, on and near the ship at:
http://www.aftonbladet.se/webbtv/nyheter/olyckor/

For a discussion of how society's norms have changed since the Titanic disaster 100 years ago, see

PJTV video: Costa Concordia disaster: Women and Children First?
http://www.pjtv.com/s/G43TMNA

-----
http://www.aftonbladet.se/

Newt Gingrich's delicious win in South Carolina will soon flood Florida with Beltway reporters who will ask hard questions about state's Romney-loving GOP Establishment -unlike FL's own MSM

2012-01-22T04:53:00.000-05:00

Winning Our Future video: Reagan campaign manager Ed Rollins: Mitt Romney Wasn't Conservative Until He Ran For President. January 21, 2012.
http://youtu.be/qvM64Wl5yNo

Being a Newt Gingrich supporter who expected last night's result- and who predicted as much to many of you weeks ago in emails- and feeling and thinking as I do, I can hardly wait until we start seeing something that's been strangely missing from campaign coverage in Florida.

What's been MIA are fact-filled articles and columns in Florida newspapers, segments on evening network TV newscasts, and pithy posts on knowing nationally-read blogs, on what Florida's GOP Establishment of elected officials and pooh-bahs who endorsed John Huntsman and Rick Perry for president -or desperately wished for Jeb Bush!- are going to be doing over the next ten days to try to rehabilitate their greatly-damaged reputation and image within the state, given how badly that has worked out for some of them.

Especially some of the unctuous ones I, well, personally dislike, many of whom have that whole Silver Spoon thing going on that makes them seem even more phony and detached from reality than you-know-who.

Will they now suck-up to and salute the GOP Beltway/Northeast Establishment and now support Mitt Romney?
Well, what do you think?!!!

And speaking of Silver Spoons, or more factually, Sons of Silver Spoons, when are we going to start seeing some in-depth newspaper articles and columns in the Miami Herald, Tampa Tribune, Tampa Bay Times, Tallahassee Democrat, Orlando Sentinel -i.e. the Florida Mainstream Media that creates the state's Conventional Wisdom out of froth that's so often wrong- on what Mitt Romney supporters like Lighter-than-Lite Connie Mack the Quatro are going to ACTUALLY DO to turn around Romney's slumping prospects here?

No, not what his father, the former Florida Senator with the same name will strongly suggest, what will the young U.S. Senate wannabe Quatro himself DO?

You know, something concrete and tangible to prove that they are not all just well-known drones in the state's not-too-bright and all-too self-serving political hype machine that is also Home Sweet Home along the I-4 Corridor?
Something besides just recommending that he spend more money on ads?
Hmm-m...

(I mean, if Mack's really that formidable a candidate, and those polls numbers we've seen for weeks aren't just name ID numbers, as I've always argued they were, we ought to start seeing something from him right away, right?
And not just in the usual places?!
Me, well, as you know from my past posts, I think Mack has a glass jaw and I will NOT vote for him. I greatly prefer Adam Hasner hands down.)

Some of us will be watching very, very carefully.

The state's journos better figure it out damn quick, because with a few exceptions I can name, it's crystal clear that the vast majority of Florida-based TV and print reporters WONT suddenly develop a spine and become responsible.

WON'T be forthright enough to question the previously-swallowed Conventional Wisdom of the Romney "Inevitability" argument," or write articles that dare to ask in their headlines "Can Connie Mack IV actually help deliver Florida for Romney, or will he fail?," there is a veritable army of print and TV reporters based in the Beltway and the Northeast U.S. that are about to start invading the Sunshine State on Monday morning to do just that, and ask questions the state's journos have largely refused to ask, despite the fact that it's low-hanging fruit indeed.

And if you think the Beltway/Northeast MSM won't take advantage of the chance to get away from cold weather for a week, forget it...

Excerpt from the iconic early 1980's Florida Dept. of Tourism TV ad - "When You Need It Bad We've Got It Good"

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OxB0kjqO6SI

Old-style tourism ad rules!!

This was by far the most-successful tourism campaign for the state ever.
When I was attending IU, there wasn't anyone I knew there who didn't know this ad and who couldn't sing or hum the jingle.

Which, naturally enough, leads to this classic that was marketing genius...
every week.

CBS-TV's The Jackie Gleason Show -open (color, late 1960's)
http://youtu.be/E4b_-iwJwic
Yes, back when South Florida seemed magical and sophisticated to 7-year old me living in Memphis!

A must-read! As Romney forces & GOP Establishment fear Gingrich's breakthrough in South Carolina, Wash. Post examines S.C. voters' daily media consumption for its electoral & social portent

2012-01-21T04:48:00.002-05:00

The Washington Post
By Evelio Contreras, Marc Fisher, Kat Downs and Jon Cohen
January 20, 2012
-----
Below, the everyday media world of three South Carolina voters who are avid news consumers...
Prepare to see this effort copied by newspapers and TV stations across the country!

The Washington Post
Polarized news market has altered the political process in South Carolina primary

By Marc Fisher
January 20, 2012

LAURENS, S.C. — Once upon a time — oh, about two presidential elections ago — Dianne Belsom would get up in the morning and read the paper, taking in news stories about candidates and campaigns. Some stuff she agreed with, some she didn’t.

This morning, Belsom wakes in her splendidly restored pink Victorian on Main Street in this rural South Carolina town, makes coffee and settles in at her desktop to fire up Facebook. There on her news feed are more than 100 stories that some of her 460 friends have posted since Belsom went to bed eight hours ago.

Read the rest of the article at
http://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/in-south-carolina-a-window-on-an-ideologically-polarized-news-market/2012/01/11/gIQA2ygPDQ_story.html

This article accompanies a quiz on the Washington Post's website to measure the reader's daily media consumption.
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http://www.washingtonpost.com/politics

N.Y. Times reporter Jeff Zeleny's nonsensical comment re size of Newt Gingrich's GA-6 district is early leader for dopiest political comment of 2012; but it's only January and this is Florida, so...

2012-01-21T01:23:00.000-05:00

Above, Jeff Zeleny of the New York Times on PBS' Washington Week in Review. January 20, 2012 photo by South Beach Hoosier

So, did you see "it" tonight, in my case, as I was doing some cleaning around the house?
The "it" I refer to was Jeff Zeleny of the New York Times putting his foot firmly into his mouth via a nonsensical comment on tonight's episode of PBS' Washington Week in Review, about, of all things, the size of Newt Gingrich's Georgia congressional district in the 1990's.

Zeleny stated, among other things, in a condescending tone, that it was a "small district."
WTF?
Now I realize that when you're a guest on TV, even PBS, there's great pressure to sound both articulate and clever, and NOT be the anchor that drags the whole show down but...

Congrats to Zeleny, as his comment, three weeks into a new year, is already the leading candidate for the dopiest political comment of the year.
Not that there won't be lots of candidates here in Florida and coast-to-coast nationally who will battle him for the title, which went unrewarded last year due to an oversight of mine -a mistakenly deleted email.

Gingrich's suburban Atlanta CD of the 1990's was the same constituent size as everyone else's in the GA delegation, per the law and per the Georgia legislature redistricting.
But it was NOT the district he'd first been elected to, and he did NOT even benefit from being the House Speaker, since the district he'd formerly represented was carved-out by the Georgia legislature almost two years BEFORE the House Republicans retook the House after more than forty years in the political wilderness, when Gingrich was rewarded for his efforts by being voted Speaker after having previously been the House Minority Whip.

Or, to quote Wikipedia as it currently exists, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Newt_Gingrich

As a result of the 1990 United States Census, Georgia picked up an additional seat for the 1992 U.S. House elections. However, the Democratic-controlled Georgia General Assembly eliminated the district that Gingrich represented, splitting its territory among three neighboring districts. Much of the southern portion of Gingrich's district, including his home in Carrollton, was drawn into the Columbus-based 3rd District, represented by five-term Democrat Richard Ray. At the same time, the Assembly created a new, heavily Republican 6th District in Fulton and Cobb counties in the wealthy northern suburbs of Atlanta—an area that Gingrich had never represented. However, Gingrich sold his home in Carrollton and moved to Marietta in the new 6th...

(Of course, I already knew this before I double-checked my facts since I knew someone
very sharp from Richard Ray's staff, a Legislative Assistant named Lee Culpepper, who, like me, was very involved with Democratic Leadership Council (DLC) activities on the Hill when Oklahoma congressman Dave McCurdy was running things.
Last I heard, Lee was a lobbyist for the National Restaurant Association, and one of the top lobbyists in Washington. Congressman Ray's staff and office, friendly and whip-smart, was also one of those popular Capitol Hill offices that featured a variation of the usual state marketing device, one that never got old -free food.
Ray's office was never lacking for courtesy packs of peanuts, courtesy of Georgia peanut farmers and the Georgia Peanut Commission, and as a frequent peanut eater, I can tell you without exception, they were damn good peanuts, too!
Johnny Isakson, currently Georgia's junior U.S. Senator, was elected in a special election to succeed Newt as GA-6's rep after he'd resigned from Congress in 1999.)

That Zeleny would somehow imagine that the physical size of a congressional district is a measure of or has a direct correlation to... well, what exactly?
He didn't make any sense before or after his comment, so was that just a brain freeze on his
part, and his mouth kept going, or did he have some genius comment he'd been sitting on all week to drop on us?

If Zeleny is right about whatever this idea of his is that he never quite articulated, than by his own logic, the Congressional representatives of large urban cities that scrunch and compact Minorities together -for the sole purpose of making it next-to-impossible for anyone else to win an election, short of the incumbents's death or their imprisonment- is what exactly, suspect?

Manhattan, Los Angeles, Detroit, Chicago, Philadelphia, Baltimore, Atlanta, Miami...
I do so much hope that Zeleny will enlighten us as to his great idea, once he can spit it out intelligently.

Yes, the Democrats running the House of Representatives did try to pour millions into the district in order to defeat Gingrich, after all, he more than any other single individual is directly responsible for ethically-challenged Jim Wright going from Speaker of the House of Representatives to a former member of the House to, ultimately, someone charged with a crime. http://todlindberg.net/?p=20
Gingrich did have a close election or two, but he never lost once he got elected.
Fact.

In case you'd forgotten whom I was talking about...

,
Bernard Goldberg: NYT Reporter's 'Enchanted' Question of Obama 'Fits Our Metrosexual Times'
http://youtu.be/HpN8dmRUNT8

http://hotair.com/archives/2009/04/29/nyt-reporter-to-obama-what-is-it-about-the-office-thats-enchanted-you/

Meanwhile, it's great that as ethical misconduct and crony capitalism among Congress continues to be a troubling issue for voters of either party, Zeleny and his colleagues on the WWR panel completely ignored the spectacle of President Obama and wannabe-felon Charles Rangel together at a NYC fundraiser Thursday night.
http://campaign2012.washingtonexaminer.com/blogs/beltway-confidential/obama-fundraises-once-censured-rangel/325656

Yes, the same powerful person who helped craft the tax laws of this country is the same person who forgot for years that he owned multiple homes, forgot to pay taxes, and who forgot...
But you know what Rangell never forgot to play?
The race card.

-----
http://www.pbs.org/weta/washingtonweek/

http://hotair.com/

Do common sense & logic ever intersect in transportation planning? I ask because of the "Radical change proposed for Dulles Rail Project" and well, experience in South Florida

2012-01-20T03:00:00.002-05:00

Just some policy considerations to think about in the new year as plans, great and small, are proposed as solutions to real-world problems here in Hallandale Beach, Broward County, South Florida and the United States... and where you readers out there in the blogosphere live, from Stockholm to Santa Monica, Notting Hill to Sydney.

First, since some of you newer readers don't already know, I worked in Washington, D.C, and lived there and in Arlington County from 1988-2003, where I probably rode the Washington Metro (WMATA) about 12 times a week. This, after a few years of constantly riding the CTA's El into downtown Chicago when I lived in Evanston and Wilmette.

At one point, I lived just a few blocks from the end of the El line at Linden Avenue.

Great in the morning, not so much when coming home in evening rush hour!

http://www.transitchicago.com/assets/1/purpleline_schedules/Linden.pdf

http://maps.google.com/maps?q=112+Linden+ave+Wilmette+IL&hl=en&t=h&hnear=112+Linden+Ave,+Wilmette,+Illinois+60091&z=16&vpsrc=0

I lived right near Lake Michigan at the first house off of Sheridan Road, DIRECTLY across the street from this beautiful site, officially called The Baha'i House of Worship for North America, but which everyone just called The Baha'i Temple.

This is what I looked at from my bedroom window on the south side of the street, and especially at night, it was an amazing sight I never tired of: http://flickr.com/photos/tags/bahaihouseofworship/

http://www.bahai.us/bahai-temple/

View Larger Map

So, all that said, kudos are very much in order for unsuck dc metro blog, who on Tuesday wrote a spot-on Beltway version http://unsuckdcmetro.blogspot.com/2012/01/we-can-put-man-on-moon-but.html of a typical South Florida transit snail's-pace story that South Florida resident Matthew Gissen first made public in 2007 in the Miami Herald.
That was a story of epic Miami-Dade County govt. failure that I followed closely and looked at for myself every time I had some free time while in downtown Miami.
I finally mentioned it on my blog almost three years ago:

http://hallandalebeachblog.blogspot.com/2009/01/bullet-proof-newspapers-good-copbad.html

Similarly, Thursday, over at the GreaterGreaterWashington blog, consistently one of the best public policy blogs in the country, has a great post by Dan Malouff that bears careful reading, as well as the reader comments, since it has a very learned audience.

Dulles Metro must go to Dulles Airport

http://greatergreaterwashington.org/post/13404/dulles-metro-must-go-to-dulles-airport/

Malouff's post on the preposterous plan -suggested by a supposed responsible party who actually has a vote on the matter- re the Washington Metrorail's overdue line to Dulles Airport actually NOT going to the airport, is a direct response to this bit of news, which I first heard about here: http://wtop.com/?nid=120&sid=2711431

I was dumbstruck.

This sort of "planning" is something that we know about in South Florida, given the often, to be kind, counter-intuitive way things are done here.

Now in most parts of the country, creating a sensible rail option from scratch, a route from the downtown business or legal community to the nearby airport is usually a no-brainer, unless there are physical or geographical barriers that make costs prohibitive at the beginning.

Frankly, it's often part of the price to be paid for enlisting the help of the business community in getting legislation or a referendum for the system actually passed.

(Then again, they and their employees actually use it)

But as I written here and mentioned in some of the conferences and forums on transit that I've attended down here over the past eight years, in 1970's greater Miami, a rail connection to the airport, for whatever reason, wasn't deemed important enough a priority to make it actually happen, despite how ridiculous that sounds to read all these years alter.

And it has a direct correlation to why certain things are STILL the way they are in greater Miami, and from my perspective, someone who knew where almost everything was in Miami because I'd been there, most of them are for the worse.

Like building sports arenas and stadiums in areas far from population centers that make it easy for fans throughout South Florida to get to and from them easily via rail or train.

That's why getting from Flagler Street, Brickell Avenue or Biscayne Blvd. to Miami International Airport (MIA), then and now, is NOT as simple as paying for a ticket, hopping onto a train and sitting down and reading the newspaper or listening to your iPad for a few minutes, or simply look out the window, like I could in Washington, Chicago and Baltimore on my way to Reagan National, O'Hare and BWI.

That, plus the power of the South Florida taxi cab industry, which showered Dade County commissioners with campaign contributions, and was NOT interested in having customers cut out the middle-man -them!

Here in Broward County, at some point during the 15 years I was working in the Washington, D.C. area and living in Arlington County -near the Ballston Metro station- the Tri-Rail system constructed an "Airport" train station that's NOT actually at Hollywood/Ft. Lauderdale International Airport, but rather in nearby Dania, where you have to wait and catch a bus to actually get to the airport.

But then consider where I live -South Florida.

Here, taxpayers are forever hearing stories from their elected state legislators about their travel hardships, and, I guess, we are supposed to just shrug our collective shoulders and look the other way as these legislators myriad and continual ethical shortcomings and flights of fancy are done after taxpayers have routinely pay $800 for them to take round-trip, non-refundable flights between this area and no, not Los Angeles or Seattle, but to Tallahassee.

And as some of you out there in the blogosphere know independently and some from my having shared articles about it with you over the years via email, some of these state legislators actually have the audacity to publicly complain and bitch to not only local news media about their travails, but also to the FAA, whether about the paucity of airline flights or the size of those planes.

It's not the fault of South Florida taxpayers that the state capital is NOT centrally located, but rather in what is, essentially, southwestern Georgia.

This sort of bitching is so embarrassing, and only makes the Banana Republic rubric applied to Florida harder to shake.

In his post, Malouff reiterates certain basic fundamentals that I believe hold true for concerned taxpayers and chastened activists, no matter where they live, to have any degree of faith and confidence in govt. planning, and transportation planning in particular.

Two sentences in particular resonate for anyone like me who has gone to lots of public meetings in South Florida, esp. about transportation policy & process, and emerged hours later shaking their head.

Cutting so many corners that you don't achieve your goal is not cost savings, it's failure.

The absolute minimum requirement for a Metro line to Dulles Airport must be that it actually reaches Dulles Airport. Period.

He's 100% right.

Plus ça change, plus c'est la même chose.

-----

http://www.governing.com/

http://www.governing.com/topics/transportation-infrastructure

http://www.sun-sentinel.com/topic/travel/transportation/public-transportation/T51001001.topic

http://www.transitmiami.com/

Transit Miami is one of the most widely-read blogs in South Florida, especially among people interested in public policy, or, who are, themselves, policy makers. Lots and lots of very educated people who know their way around a City/County Hall and who ALWAYS vote.

Like me.

Newt Gingrich plays hardball, tells truth, electrifies South Carolina GOP debate re education policy, govt. benefits, war on terrorism, Pakistan; the post-debate spin on Sean Hannity Show

2012-01-17T14:39:00.000-05:00

Newt Gingrich campaign video: Newt on Education: Return Power to Parents. January 17, 2012. http://youtu.be/6Gc-x-tZ2bQ

Newt Gingrich campaign video: Newt: "99 Weeks is an Associate Degree". January 17, 2012. http://youtu.be/2Xr72U1jdtE

Newt Gingrich campaign video: Newt Gingrich to Juan Williams: Americans Want Paychecks, Not Government Food Stamps. January 17, 2012.
http://youtu.be/4c1-22w2G7M

Newt Gingrich campaign video: Newt Plan for America's Enemies: Kill Them. January 17, 2011. http://youtu.be/50WYM-1SjQQ

Newt Gingrich campaign video: Newt Gingrich's appearance on Fox News Channel's Sean Hannity Show after the debate. January 17, 2012.
http://youtu.be/NTDP5-7OTj4

All videos are from the January 16, 2012 Republican Presidential debate held at North Myrtle Beach, South Carolina sponsored by Fox News Channel, The Wall Street Journal and the South Carolina Republican Party.

National Journal: Newt Gingrich on Mitt Romney: Why Nominate a Loser?, January 16, 2012. http://bcove.me/afa4zld8

National Journal
CAMPAIGN 2012
Gingrich on Romney: Why Nominate a Loser?
Former speaker says past defeats show Romney, Santorum are unelectable
By Sarah Huisenga
Updated: January 17, 2012 | 1:03 p.m.
January 16, 2012 | 5:32 p.m.
http://www.nationaljournal.com/2012-presidential-campaign/gingrich-on-romney-why-nominate-a-loser--20120116

The Florida GOP Presidential primary is two weeks from today and I will be voting for Newt Gingrich.
I received my new voter's registration card in the mail on Saturday, exactly eleven days after visiting the Broward Supervisor of Elections HQ in Ft. Lauderdale to do the paperwork to change my party registration.

-----
More information on Newt Gingrich at:

http://www.newt.org/

http://www.youtube.com/user/ngingrich

http://twitter.com/newtgingrich

Please stick to your guns on stronger ethics and do everything in your power to prevent Mayor Resnick & Co. from beginning the race to the bottom of the ethics barrel in Broward

2012-01-15T14:57:00.000-05:00

Above, looking NW at the Broward County Government HQ at 115 S. Andrews Avenue, Ft. Lauderdale, FL. January 3, 2012 photo by South Beach Hoosier.

Below is a copy of an email that I sent Friday morning to Broward County Commissioners Suzanne Gunzburger, Barbara Sharief and Chip LaMarca, along with Broward's Inspector General John W. Scott, with a cc to Robert Wechsler, one of the national voices for ethics and transparency in local and state government in the U.S. at cityethics.org, where he blogs on what's going on -or isn't- at http://www.cityethics.org/Blog-RobWechsler

I later sent a copy of it to selected people I know in Broward, South Florida and Tallahassee who have a strong interest in the issue of stronger ethics at the local level in Florida, where most of the corruption currently exists for the most obvious of reasons -opportunity, lack of oversight, morally-compromised and beholden city attorneys, and lack of adequate press coverage.

The same group whom I sent a copy of my previous posts last Sunday about Wilton Manors mayor Gary Resnick and Cooper City mayor Debby Eisinger, whom in my opinion, thru their own words and actions, have come to personify the anti-ethics reform crowd in this county.
Apparently, nothing can be allowed to stand that threatens their perceived power in their respective fiefdoms.

Broward cities need tougher ethics laws, not self-serving pols like Gary Resnick & Debby Eisinger, whom we need like more bad restaurants, more ruined-views of the beach... -NOT at all! http://hallandalebeachblog.blogspot.com/2012/01/broward-cities-need-tougher-ethics-laws.html

My coda to "Broward cities need tougher ethics laws, not self-serving pols"; Debby Eisinger's curious fact pattern

http://hallandalebeachblog.blogspot.com/2012/01/my-coda-to-broward-cities-need-tougher.html

From my perspective, to put it bluntly, this issue will go a long way towards deciding, before this year's elections, whether or not Broward County's civic activists and organizations are actually prepared to 'walk-the-walk' and get actively engaged, or whether it will be yet another completely uninspiring example of them collectively taking-a-powder, and shying-away from the issue and opportunity to both say and do the right thing for the larger Broward community.

In other words, being a real 'player' in the community who has earned their reputation from actually doing something more than sending out press releases, holding press conferences or taking the side of the real estate/development and business establishment in every fight.

And do I even have to mention here how laughably preposterous objective and well-informed people here view individuals and groups who continually and blindly take the side of the local Broward Democratic Party's top honchos, and the way the party does business?

Especially given what a laughingstock so many of them have made of themselves over the past ten years, given how dependent so many of them are on lobbying local, county and School Board officials?
They are walking-and-talking conflicts-of-interest, unable to separate the personal from the professional and hoping to deal with others with a similar personality.

In my opinion, there are a lot of civic, professional, ethnic community and business groups in South Florida, and Broward County in particular, that want to be taken seriously by the public at large and the press corps, but who seem to have gotten a little too comfortable over the past few years sitting on the sidelines, when it would've been better for everyone involved to have had them actively engaged on community issues that were outside their usual or parochial bailiwick.

I've mentioned the name of some of them to those of you whom I communicate with fairly regularly, and as you more regular readers to the blog know, I was personally less-than- thrilled at the apathy shown in Broward by some of these same groups when the official Florida Senate congressional and legislative redistricting meeting finally hit town.

Nobody had the foresight to actually host a pre-meeting get-together so that open-minded citizens could get an overview of what they would later see presented, and what other options were reasonable that were in compliance with the FairDistricts requirements that Florida voters overwhelming approved.
Instead of seizing the opportunity that was just sitting there, these Broward groups, individually and collectively, did NOTHING.

Simply put, it's time for them to get off the sidelines and cowboy up, or risk becoming superfluous to what takes place in the future.
I'm not the only one who's paying close attention to see who does what.
Just saying...

-----

Per Brittany Wallman's to-the-point Broward Politics blog post of Thursday,
Wilton Manors' Resnick seeks to undo parts of new ethics code, on Jan. 31 ballot
http://weblogs.sun-sentinel.com/news/politics/broward/blog/2012/01/wilton_manors_resnick_seeks_to.html
I merely reiterate to you all what I wrote Sunday -
Broward cities need tougher ethics laws...
http://hallandalebeachblog.blogspot.com/2012/01/broward-cities-need-tougher-ethics-laws.html

Having read her story that included this newest grab-bag of excuses offered up by Mayor Resnick, I will make arrangements next week to try to speak to you all for just a few minutes to let you know why I believe that standing silent in the face of this frontal assault on the new ethics rules is a losing proposition for everyone in Broward County who wants this area to not obly have a higher Quality-of-Life, but a higher quality of civic life, too.

Lower standards might be why some businesses choose to relocate to some foreign countries, but lower standards and the perception that some municipal elected officials in Broward have an upside-down understanding of what public service is, should never allow that to become SELF-SERVICE.

But that seems to be exactly what Mayor Resnick desires for himself.
Me, I don't think the people of his city or this county actually owe him a certain economic position in life, nor do I believe that a city should be allowed to simply opt-out so that that their mayor and his pals can ignore laws he finds personally constricting economically.

I know what side of this ethics fight that I'm on, and having attended those early morning Broward Ethics Comm. meetings, I'm equally happy if not more so to let everyone I know learn what sorts of characters are behind this effort, and the sorts of damnable, self-serving excuses that are being trotted-out to try to justify this insulting end-run around a standard that actually means something.

Mr. Scott, IF you need a Broward citizen to make a formal complaint to you in order to get your office officially involved in this matter, I'm only too happy to volunteer.
Frankly, given what I've seen and heard first-hand from attending those Ethics Comm. meetings, often dumbstruck at the transparent early attempts by some members to water-down anything that had any teeth to speak of, it'll be my pleasure.

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Since I wrote this on Friday and Monday is a holiday, I'll post any received email comments, official or otherwise, later in the week to give people some time to formulate their own thoughts. But you're welcome to respond here on the blog, too, of course.