Showing posts with label Connie Mack IV. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Connie Mack IV. Show all posts

Friday, April 27, 2012

Syria bleeds while dithering O 'condemns' -Charles Krauthammer calls out Obama's ineffectual foreign policy on Syria that's unsatisfactory to GOP, Democrats AND our overseas allies

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Above, the segment that Channel 4 News in Sweden ran this morning on Syria, as the United States continues "to condemn."
How's that working out so far?
It’s time for President Obama to back up his rhetoric with firm action.




The Washington Post
While Syria burns
By Charles Krauthammer
Published: April 26, 2012
Last year President Obama ordered U.S. intervention in Libya under the grand new doctrine of “Responsibility to Protect.” Moammar Gaddafi was threatening a massacre in Benghazi. To stand by and do nothing “would have been a betrayal of who we are,” explained the president.
In the year since, the government of Syria has more than threatened massacres. It has carried them out. Nothing hypothetical about the disappearances, executions, indiscriminate shelling of populated neighborhoods. More than 9,000 are dead.
Read the rest of the column at:
http://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/while-syria-burns/2012/04/26/gIQAQUC0jT_story.html


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For more on Obama's failed foreign policy re Syria, see my previous posts on the subject:


April 29, 2011 blog post titled, Marco Rubio is crystal clear in Foreign Policy magazine - "How America Must Respond to the Massacre in Syria
http://hallandalebeachblog.blogspot.com/2011/04/marco-rubio-is-crystal-clear-in-foreign.html


March 20, 2011 titled, Marco Rubio on dithering O: “So if Russia doesn’t care and China doesn’t care and we care but won’t do anything about it, who’s it up to, the French?
http://hallandalebeachblog.blogspot.com/2011/03/marco-rubio-on-dithering-o-so-if-russia.html


It's completely impossible for me or any of my like-minded friends to think of any time since he's been in the U.S. Senate when 'nice guy' Bill Nelson has said anything nearly as pointed or effectively as what Rubio has done repeatedly on Syria since last year.


My vote for Senate will be FOR people with similar intelligent and articulate views and AGAINST someone who wants to be a U.S. Senator because they think it would be cool.
That completely eliminates Connie Mack IV and puts George LeMieux back in the U.S. Senate.


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http://www.foreignpolicy.com/


http://www.foreignaffairs.com/


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


http://www.heritage.org/

Sunday, January 22, 2012

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


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"
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!

Sunday, January 1, 2012

Florida voters shake their heads in wonder as Tampa Bay Times continues flogging their stories re their poll of "political insiders" -favoring incumbents in 2012. Surprise!


Florida voters shake their heads in wonder as Tampa Bay Times continues flogging their stories re their poll of "political insiders" -favoring incumbents in 2012. Surprise!



Political insiders say Sen. Bill Nelson likely to win third term
By Adam C. Smith, Times Political Editor
In Print: Sunday, December 25, 2011

http://www.tampabay.com/news/politics/stateroundup/political-insiders-say-sen-bill-nelson-likely-to-win-third-term/1207786

It's like a poll of national sports writers in Miami in the days before Super Bowl III that overwhelmingly favored the Baltimore Colts over the New York Jets, the Georgetown Hoyas over the Villanova Wildcats in the 1985 NCAA basketball tourney.
And how did you like last season's World Series between the Red Sox and the Phillies, the pre-ordained classic that never was?
Who actually had the Packers over the Steelers in the Super Bowl before the 2010 season started?
(You'll recall that my prediction before the game was spot-on.)

Dear reader of the blog, whose attention and time at this first post of the year I appreciate, please tell me when since 9/11 has there ever been a poll of elites and insiders in this country or this state or this county where the unexpected was accurately predicted?
Even when there were plenty of signs that something unexpected could well happen?
Precisely.

The sports analogy is nationally-known print sports writers and TV reporters appearing on nationally-syndicated sports talk radio shows of the sort that I have been listening to since I was a kid in the 1970's -just like I did with Tony Kornheiser's Washington, D.C.  radio program for WTEM-AM in the '90's before he was at ESPN- listening to them opine on the NCAA basketball tourney selections in the days before the tourney starts.


They're clearly eager to hear guests offering insight into possible upcoming upsets for the benefit of their listeners or viewers, but almost invariably, the host or co-hosts then ignore everything that's been said, heard and seen -and history- by then picking nothing but 'chalk,' i.e. picking nothing but the top-seeded teams.


Yes, despite every one's always saying that they want something unexpected, look what happens when "experts" are asked and results have consequences?

That's a pretty common 'phenomena' in contemporary U.S. sports media that you rarely hear anyone discuss or criticize, and it's political counterpart is equally common at almost every national and Florida-based newspaper and media website worth perusing, even the good ones.


It's a real buzz-kill, and in my opinion is one of the main reasons that few big political movements happen down here as spontaneously as they do in other parts of the country -the news media here really isn't interested in change, and cover and report accordingly, rather than let the narrative and natural ebb-and flow of events tell the tale.


This explains, in part, why the national news media write as if they would like Newt Gingrich to be finished after the Iowa Caucus this coming week, despite all the larger states he leads in, like Florida, for instance, despite less resources than Mitt Romney.

In short, the news media really doesn't want change, they just want the pretense that change could happen, which is why the voters who DO want big change are so frustrated by the news media's bias.
It's not just a political bias on the part of some reporters, though it IS that, but also a bias towards what they already know, understand and can explain, which is why so much political reporting is derivative to a nauseating degree.

That's another reason I'm in favor of having an election system like Louisiana's, where all the candidates run together and the general election is between the top two finishers, regardless of party affiliation.
(I know there's a name for this system but I'm too tired to think of the name of it.)

Now THAT would be fun and reward the voters with an election worth watching and get more sensible people in office, and be a handy tool for dealing with gerrymandering.
Imagine what gerrymandered districts would be like in South Florida under a system like this -less extremism of the left or right.


Florida voters across the state that I've been in touch with since this most recent post on the insider's poll continue to shake their heads in wonder as the old St. Petersburg Times and their reporters and columnists continue flogging a series of stories with a never-ending story-line about their poll of "political insiders" favoring incumbents in 2012.
Really?
Imagine that?

Of course they do!
And so do the state's print and electronic media thru their mostly bad and superficial coverage, too!
Which, of course, is part of the problem, no? 

The very same elites, "insiders" and news media that thought they would have Tea Party favorite Marco Rubio to play with -like a cat's toy- for a few months, with Rubio playing the role of well-chewed rubber mouse?


After all, hadn't these same forces already publicly proclaimed Charlie Crist a political genius, month-after-month, for 'splitting the difference,' despite the lack of any empirical evidence that held up to serious scrutiny, that he had fundamentally changed the broken and much-loathed political culture of Tallahassee, south Georgia's anti-Mayberry?
Yes.

Evidence, who needs tangible evidence that anything was changing for the better in Tallahassee when the state's news media was in love the way the Florida news media was in
full-thrall to Charlie Crist and his affable white hair in 2009 and early 2010?

Yes, Florida, the Sunshine State, where the then-formerly popular governor Crist lost that Senate GOP primary that the Sunshine State's Mainstream Media and political elites had considered a mere formality, having already been writing newspaper stories/columns and filing TV stories for months that took the position that he was "inevitable."


So "inevitable," in fact, that the state's news media actually started filing stories on whether Crist might soon be a GOP VP candidate, a pseudo-fact that because it was printed in Florida newspapers so often, started appearing more frequently in DC-based media, blogs and websites as well, where they didn't know any better.
(The Beltway pundits assumed the reporters here in Florida must know what they were talking about, and had some sources who knew it was true.)

And all of this MONTHS before the formality of an actual election
After all, the MSM and political elites would know, wouldn't they, they're "experts"?


And besides, as they were always keen on reminding us, Florida is SO important.
Except when it's not.
But they were 100% wrong and Marco Rubio trounced Crist in the GOP primary.

And then, not willing to accept the mandate of the people, the elites of both parties and many columnists and editorial boards decided that Crist should be given yet another chance to win, not just one, so millions were given to him by the comfortable status quo-types who reminded us over-and-over that despite his loss to Rubio, Crist was still the best candidate.

Then in November, Rubio trounced Crist for yet a second time, and made hapless Democratic Party nominee Kendrick Meek a third-place finisher in a three-way race, and a very bad third place at that.

Yes, Florida, the same state where the only statewide-elected Democrat in the FL Cabinet,
a multi-millionaire, former banking executive and longtime Democratic insider who was married to a wealthy attorney and former Democratic gubernatorial nominee, lost the gubernatorial race to a wealthy businessman who had never run for elective office before.


Losing in some part because she never did the one thing that all good elected officials must do -explain who they are, what they've done, what they are in favor of and against and why.
That is a necessity.


But Alex Sink and her political advisers and the Democratic Party, esp. the most liberal wind of that shrinking party, took all that for granted, as did most of the state's news media.

But finally someone started noticing what I had seen from the beginning -that she really was running for office in the worst possible way.
By late August and early September, reports started appearing in newspapers -but not on Miami-area TV- that her campaign had been done such a poor job of laying the groundwork explaining who she was and her stand on issues, that, surprise, there were still many voters who did not know that Alex Sink was a woman.

When you are running for governor of the fourth largest state in the country and three months before the general election, a sizable number of likely voters don't know what sex you are, you are poised for a bruising losing effort.
And that was when Rick Scott's TV campaign started in earnest of defining the woman who had been so blase that she and her staff thought that could wait until after the summer.

And the same elites and reporters were reporting for months that in a re-match now...
Sink would win.
But we don't have do-overs  a few months after the election, we just have the election.
Scott, a very flawed candidate, beat Sink, a very apathetic and blase candidate who didn't do the minimum required.

I ignore those stories for some of the same reasons that I voted against Sink, knowing that no matter how close the election might be or how much the news media, esp. the liberal news media in South Florida, wanted to play tail gunner for Sink and get Scott in a game of "gotcha," Sink was a seriously flawed person and candidate who was incapable of moving the football in Tallahassee and get the state out of its backwardness in so many areas.

Knowing that both branches of the state legislature are held by the GOP, and veto-proof if sink won, what could Sink possibly accomplish as governor given how  self-evident her personality and management flaws were?
She'd continually have been made a fool of as the legislature over-rode any vetoes she might made, even when I might have agreed with her reasoning.

To say the least, Alex Sink was not much of a gubernatorial candidate, and it's my guess that she would have been a terrible governor for the fourth-largest state in the country, even when she was right on the issue, because her personality and manner would NOT have worn well with residents.
In that election for governor between too very flawed candidates, we drew the well-meaning "Joker" who at least knew who he was, and we all have to live with that verdict for another three years.

Now, eleven months until the 2012 election, the same state "insiders" and experts I've described are alternately pre-ordaining Bill Nelson's re-election and/or the rise of some queer boomlet called the Connie Mack revolution.


To my way of thinking, where ideas -thoughtful and nuanced- really are important, Connie Mack is political 'fools gold' compared to Marco Rubio, who is Fort Knox in comparison, since as someone who supported Rubio from the beginning -even when state reporters were writing his premature obituary- I always knew that he was everything that Sink, Meek, Crist, Nelson and Mack are NOT.

In that comparison, to me, candidate Connie Mack is the small change you find in the shallow end of the hotel swimming pool while on summer vacation in North Carolina to escape the heat, humidity and boring existence of summertime South Florida.
(Asheville, North Carolina  1972 to be exact. A trip I've never forgotten: Mount Mitchell, Smokey Mountains, Stone Mountain, GA...)

Great for kids, like your two younger sisters, who race each other diving into the pool to get the quarters you throw, which amuses some of the other hotel guests around the pool otherwise zoning-out, but not really much to brag about for adults, or even teenagers paying close attention.

In short, there is no "there" there with Connie Mack IV.
Or any possibility of any upside that he would ever become the sort of thoughtful, savvy and sometimes counter-intuitive person that surprises you frequently with his principled stands representing the crazy-quilt of six different states cobbled into one that that is today's Florida, and able to cast important or even dire votes that will matter to this nation's future.


To me he's the personable but somewhat dis-connected high school homecoming king whose father is the mayor and largest developer in the area, and he's still milking the gravy train, occasionally doing the right thing, but not often enough to inspire either trust or respect.
To me, Connie Mack IV is NOT the answer to any reasonable question.


Like I've so often said on this blog about the city I live in, Hallandale Beach, and how it so thoroughly mis-managed to the detriment of the residents who want it to be MUCH BETTER now than it is, Mack's "An interpretive house of cards that falls apart at the slightest touch of rationality and evidence."


As for perpetually tone-deaf Alex Sink, the more things change...

Jetsetting Letter Misses Mark With Suffering Floridians
By Martin Merzer
Tuesday, December 27, 2011