Category: Florida

Dear Bill Kristol …

Posted on Comments

PLEASE SHUT THE HELL UP ABOUT CHRIS CHRISTIE!

Seriously, you’re starting to piss me off here, with your . . . idiotic assertion that the 37 percent of Florida straw-poll delegates who voted for Herman Cain were voting for “none of the above.”

Did you notice that little . . . pause, Bill?

Kind of a hint, buddy. Because any liberal would have said “racist assertion” instead of “idiotic assertion,” and I’m giving you the benefit of the doubt, knowing that your college roommate was Alan Keyes.

Trust me when I say that I understand perfectly well why the Beltway commentariat has a problem taking Herman seriously. To start with the obvious: His campaign is unprecedented. The man has never been elected to anything, and the last guy we elected president with no previous political experience was Ike. 

Being Supreme Allied Commander is probably better preparation for the presidency than being CEO of Godfather’s Pizza. I get that.

I’ve called Herman Cain “Steve Forbes with charisma,” and I think maybe part of the problem you pundit types have with Herman is that you don’t trust charisma. This is why you were willing to say polite things about that hopeless dud Pawlenty and have such warm praise for the charisma-deficient Mitch Daniels yet constantly low-rate Cain.

Also, as a successful businessman, Herman Cain has an instinctive distrust of know-it-all advisers — he wants to do things his way —  so his staff is noticeably lacking in well-known campaign operatives, speechwriters, etc.

I get that, too. And trust me when I say that, as someone who has followed the Cain campaign closely for nine months now, I’ve heard lots of complaints about opportunities missed because of subpar staff work by Team Herman. The phrase “amateur hour” has become sadly familiar, and has been often heard from people who enthusiastically support Cain, but grind their teeth at the unreturned phone calls, the haphazard advance work, etc., etc.

All of these caveats aside, however, Herman Cain has three things: A compelling rags-to-riches narrative, an optimistic pro-business message and more charisma than anyone else in the GOP field.

So how about, instead of pining for Chris Christie or some other “acceptable” candidate, you start trying to figure out what you can do to help Herman Cain win this thing? Because you are underestimating the risk of your own embarrassment if Christie is foolish enough to listen to your pleadings, gets in the race, and then Herman beats him, too.

Don’t laugh, Bill. All those guys who jumped on the Perry bandwagon last month probably would have laughed if I had told them Cain would stomp their guy to smithereens in the Florida straw poll.

They’re not laughing now, are they?

HERMAN CAIN FOR PRESIDENT
Because He Keeps Making Fools of
All the ‘Experts’ Who Say He Can’t Win

UPDATE: Et tu, Insty?

Buzzard Bait: Rick Perry’s Immigration Blunder Took Him From Hero to Zero

Posted on Comments

Donald Douglas at American Power links an important story from the Los Angeles Times:

Perry has “a surprisingly tin ear” on the immigration issue, said Tony Fabrizio, a Republican strategist who is unaligned in the presidential contest.
To most Republicans, denying tuition subsidies to illegal immigrants “is a question of fairness,” said Fabrizio. He added that Perry, in portraying his critics as heartless, is making Republican voters wonder whether he shares their values. . . .
Charlie Gerow, a Republican consultant from Harrisburg, Pa., said initial excitement over Perry’s entry into the 2012 race had entered a new phase.
“People were looking for something different,” he said. “Now it’s a question of what [Perry’s candidacy] is going to look like when it’s examined under the microscope.”

Yes, we have “entered a new phase,” the phase where talking heads on the Sunday morning shows will be discussing the first draft of Rick Perry’s political obituary. Didn’t I try to warn everybody about the “Phantom Menace”?

Don’t doubt my Jedi senses on this one, folks. I’m getting spooky vibes.  . . .
Yeah, I know political journalists aren’t supposed to believe in “omens.” Still, there’s something vaguely . . . hinky about the way Perry’s stealth campaign has been operating here in Iowa.
Call me crazy. Attribute my forebodings of doom to irrational prejudice. Say what you will, and I don’t care, but I felt a need to put on the record my instinctive sense that there’s something fundamentally wrong about the Perry campaign.

That was on Aug. 9, four days before Perry officially announced.

Now here we are, six weeks later, and the Perry bandwagon is inarguably in the ditch — thanks to Perry’s own “tin ear” blundering and the triumph of my man Herman Cain:

The Georgia businessman won more votes than the Republican primary’s frontrunners — Texas Gov. Rick Perry and former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney — combined.

Where is my vindication? Where are those who scoffed at my prophetic foresight? And why haven’t you hit my freaking tip jar?

UPDATE: Straw-poll delegate tells Politico: “We can get that liberal guilt trip stuff from someone else.” They also interview state Rep. Scott Plakon, whose Friday night endorsement of Herman Cain was described as “crucial” by Cain spokeswoman Ellen Carmichael.

ORLANDO GOP STRAW POLL RESULTS UPDATE: Herman Cain Beats Rick Perry

Posted on Comments

We will have results of the important crucial life-or-death world-historical cosmos-shifting Florida Republican P5 Straw Poll within mere moments.

UPDATE: HERMAN CAIN WINS WITH 37.1%

UPDATE II: The St. Petersburg Times calls the results a “stunning upset,” as Rick Perry finished a distant second with less than 16%!

UPDATE III: Dave Weigel:

By failing so convincingly, Perry’s ensured that the weekend’s “trouble for frontrunner narrative” will be plated in gold and frozen in amber.

Or as he put it earlier: “shadows of vultures” are all over the Perry campaign.

UPDATE IV: The results, with nearly 2,700 delegates voting:

CAIN . . . . . . . . . . . 37.1%
PERRY . . . . . . . . . 15.4%
ROMNEY . . . . . . . 14.7%
SANTORUM . . . . 10.9%
PAUL . . . . . . . . . .  10.4%
GINGRICH . . . . . . 8.4%
HUNTSMAN . . . . 2.3%
BACHMANN . . . . 1.5%

“A total embarrassment for Perry,” says Allapundit.

UPDATE V: Just got off the phone with Cain campaign spokeswoman Ellen Carmichael, who informs me that the candidate is flying back to Atlanta to prepare for a trip to New York, where he will appear Monday on Fox & Friends to promote his new book, This Is Herman Cain!

A quick survey of headlines:

Cain upsets Perry at Florida straw poll
— USA Today

Cain wins GOP straw poll; result could
carry weight in presidential race
— Tampa Tribune

Hermain Cain wins Florida
straw poll in stunning victory
— Miami Herald

He’s definitely come a long way since the days of “Herman Who?”

UPDATE VI: Here’s one to save for your scrapbook, kids:

The link is to Seth McLaughlin’s Washington Times story:

ORLANDO — Former Godfather Pizza CEO Herman Cain won the Presidency 5 straw poll here Saturday, delivering a blow to Texas Gov. Rick Perry’s frontrunner status and a victory for a candidate who has struggled to transform his grassroots popularity into strong showings in national polls. . . .

UPDATE VII: Don Surber of the Charleston (W.Va.) Daily Mail:

Reeling from poor performances by Rick Perry in the CNN and Fox News debates, conservatives flocked to the Godfather — Herman Cain — as he swept today’s Florida Straw Poll with 37% of the vote. Trailing badly were Rick Perry 15%, Mitt Romney 14%, Rick Santorum 11%, Ron Paul 10%, Newt Gingrich 9%, Jon Huntsman 2%, and Michele Bachmann 2%.

Permit me humbly to suggest that this puts a decisive end to all that Chris Christie talk. I mean, how bad would it look if Republicans brought in a new candidate because they were afraid a black man might win the nomination?

UPDATE VIII: Press release from the Cain campaign:

Cain Sweeps Presidency 5 Poll,
Garners Florida Endorsement
(Orlando, FL)- Republican presidential candidate Herman Cain swept the Republican Party of Florida’s “Presidency 5” straw poll today in Orlando, capping off his strongest fundraising and grassroots week since the establishment of his campaign in May 2011. . . .
This week, Governor Rick Scott pointed out that the winner of the Presidency 5 straw poll would go on to win the nomination. He explained that former Presidents Ronald Reagan and George Bush, plus 1995 GOP nominee Bob Dole all won Florida straw polls.
“Thank you to the Republican voters for this incredible honor of being named the winner of the Presidency 5 straw poll in Florida today,” Cain said. “This is a sign of our growing momentum and my candidacy that cannot be ignored. I will continue to share my message of ‘common sense solutions’ across this country and look forward to spending more time in Florida, a critical state for both the nomination and the general election.”
On Friday evening, Scott Plakon, the Americans for Prosperity- Florida Legislator of the Year who represents the state’s 37th district, endorsed Herman Cain in front of more than 1,000 cheering supporters at the Rosen Center in Orlando, Fla. Scott is best known as the sponsor of the Florida Health Care Freedom Act, slated to be Amendment 1 on Florida’s 2012 general election ballot.
“I’m proud to support Herman Cain. Our country is suffering right now from bad ideas, bad policies and bad leadership. Herman Cain has the right ideas, the right policies and is a proven business and conservative leader,” Scott explained. “Over the last few days at the Orange County Convention Center, I’ve seen him connect with Florida voters like few candidates I’ve ever seen. I look forward to working with Herman Cain to see him win Florida and to become the next President of the United States.”
In addition to being named the victor of Thursday night’s FOX News/ Google/ RPOF Republican presidential candidate debate and the straw poll, Cain spent the entire week in Florida, touring the Sunshine State on his nationwide “Common Sense Solutions Bus Tour,” addressing CPAC Florida and speaking at the Presidency 5 festivities.

I’m told that people trying to make online donations at Herman Cain’s Web site have reported difficulty getting through because the traffic is so heavy. So while you’re waiting, how about hitting my tip jar instead?

PREVIOUSLY:


CAIN-MANIA IN ORLANDO?
UPDATE: 7 Standing Ovations for Cain; Vultures Circle Perry’s ‘Sunshine Special’?

Posted on Comments

Supporters greet Herman Cain’s bus in Orlando.(Photo: Katrina Trinko)

Last night I talked to Sarah Rumpf, the “Sunshine State Sarah” blogger who is a delegate to the Florida GOP gathering in Orlando that will announce the results of a crucial straw-poll vote this afternoon.

Sarah was eager to tell me about how state Rep. Scott Plakon, chosen as Florida “Legislator of the Year” by Americans for Prosperity, had decided to endorse Herman Cain after Thursday’s debate. I re-Tweeted her news, but didn’t jump right on doing a blog about it, because it didn’t seem like any kind of gigantic shocking exclusive.

Well, stupid me! Here’s Byron York’s scoop from Orlando:

There’s no scientific polling, but talks with dozens of delegates who will vote in today’s Florida straw poll suggest that many are making last-minute decisions to vote for Herman Cain.
What seems to be happening is this: A lot of delegates came to Orlando planning to vote for Rick Perry. But Perry’s poor performance at Thursday night’s Fox News-Google debate gave them pause and re-opened the question of whom they will support. And many of the conservatives who were attracted to Perry will, when asked for a second choice, naturally gravitate to Cain, who, it just happens, had a particularly good debate on Thursday. So with Perry not commanding the loyalty he did just 48 hours ago, Cain appears to be picking up support.

Wow, did I completely miss an exclusive or what? York’s account closely matches what Sarah told me last night: Perry’s supporters at the GOP event seemed demoralized Friday, while Cain’s supporters were fired up.

We don’t yet know how this will translate to straw-poll votes — the result will be announced about 5 p.m. ET today — but I’m kicking myself for not going with Sarah’s report when she first told me about it.

UPDATE: My friend Ruth Malhotra also reports from Orlando:

This is significant in that Malhotra is a longtime Romney supporter, so if she’s seeing a shift toward Cain, that’s basically objective.

UPDATE II: Katrina Trinko of National Review reports from Orlando:

Allahpundit notes an ironic point:

If [Rick Perry] done well at the debate, this straw poll wouldn’t even be worth blogging: Romney’s not actively competing (although he’ll be on the ballot) whereas Perry’s spent a bunch of money to make a splash in a crucial primary state.

And speaking at a breakfast meeting this morning, Perry actually raised the stakes: “I have all my hopes on Florida.”

Why am I reminded of Ed Muskie and the “Sunshine Special”?

UPDATE III: Press release from the Cain campaign:

For Immediate Release:
Saturday, September 24, 2011

For More Information:
Ellen Carmichael, (678) 601-2772
[email protected]

Plakon Endorses Cain
(Orlando, FL)- Republican presidential candidate Herman Cain received the endorsement of Florida state representative and noted conservative leader Scott Plakon today in a room of more than 1,000 supporters at the Rosen Center in Orlando, Fla.
Plakon, who represents Florida’s 27th district, was named the Americans for Prosperity- Florida Legislator of Year in 2011 and is known for his sponsorship of Florida’s Healthcare and Freedom Act.
Cain has been widely touted as the winner of last night’s Fox News/ Google/ RPOF debate in Orlando. He addressed CPAC Florida today and continued on his nationwide bus tour throughout the Sunshine State.

Dave Weigel: “The shadows of vultures have been all over the Perry campaign since the debate.”

Memo From the National Affairs Desk: Republican Nightmare Campaign Tour

Posted on Comments

“Empty feelings present themselves, and grief enters our lives on a deeper level, deeper than we ever imagined. This depressive stage feels as though it will last forever.”
— Professor William Jacobson

“The only thing worse than going out on the campaign trail and getting hauled around in a booze-frenzy from one speech to another is having to come back to Washington and write about it.”
— Hunter S. Thompson, Fear and Loathing: On the Campaign Trail ’72

Yesterday afternoon my editor at The American Spectator called, wondering if I was in Orlando, and my answer was a long explanation of “no.” As I had explained at some length Sunday, the requisite trip to Ohio after the Tampa debate spoiled my plan to spend two uninterrupted weeks covering the campaign in Florida, and simultaneously deprived me of funding necessary to return in time for the Orlando debate.

Keeping Mrs. Other McCain happy is Job One, the Ohio trip was an inescapable duty, and so I had to cover last night’s debate from here in my basement office and skip CPAC Florida. This feels like abject professional failure, and the only way to recover my sense of dignity and purpose is to get back on the road as soon as possible. So please hit the freaking tip jar. Speaking of abject failure . . .

Perry’s Awful Night
— John Tabin, The American Spectator

Perry Delivers an Unsteady
Performance at Republican Debate
— PBS Newshour

Web verdict on Perry: Brutal
— Politico

Wow, Rick Perry really stunk it up in Orlando, didn’t he? Continue reading Memo From the National Affairs Desk: Republican Nightmare Campaign Tour →

ORLANDO DEBATE: Open Thread UPDATE: ‘You Don’t Have a Heart’

Posted on Comments

Nine Republican candidates will be debating in Orlando, Florida (Fox News , 9 p.m.) tonight and, rather than live-blogging, I’ll be aggregating and occasionally updating.

Karl Rove has “handicapped” the debate.

Thad McCotter is dropping out of the GOP race, after being repeatedly excluded from the debates.

UPDATE 9:25 p.m. ET: After the first commercial break, I think Herman Cain’s winning decisively so far. (Because I said so, that’s why.)

UPDATE 9:35 p.m. ET: Herman Cain just proposed eliminating the Environmental Protection Agency. Also, he correctly pronounced Chile: Chee-LAY.

He was praising Chile’s private retirement program, but I think he was also showing off the fact that he knows how to pronounce Chee-LAY.

UPDATE 11:15 p.m. ET: Frank Luntz couldn’t get his video clips to play during the focus group, but said that Perry’s “you have no heart” comment about illegal immigration was very badly received. Rick Santorum’s retort to Perry was very sharp. Overall, Mitt Romney was perceived as the winner, and Brett Baier had positive things to say about Herman Cain’s performance. (Chee-LAY!)  Also: Gary Johnson’s dogs.

UPDATE 11:40 p.m. ET: Allahpundit on Perry’s “you don’t have a heart” moment:

Perry’s answer is a transparent dodge, of course, and Santorum rightly calls him on it.  The question isn’t whether children of illegals should be educated, it’s whether they should be subsidized by taxpayers with in-state tuition rates.

Here’s the video:

The Prisoner on Flight 1884

Posted on Comments

The National Affairs Desk, 4 p.m., Sept. 13, 2011

“Shortly after the election-night returns [in the 1972 Florida Democratic primary] showed Muskie hopelessly mired in fourth place behind Wallace, Humphrey, and Jackson, the Man from Maine called an emergency staff meeting and announced he was quitting the race. This stirred up a certain amount of panic and general anger among the staff people, who eventually persuaded Big Ed to at least get himself under control before talking to any reporters. He agreed to go out and play golf the next day, while the top-level staffers got together and tried to find some alternative.
“This was the reality behind the story, widely published the next day, that Muskie had decided to ‘change his whole style’ and start talking like the Fighting Liberal he really was at heart. He would move on to Illinois and Wisconsin with new zeal . . . and his staff people were so happy with this decision to finally ‘take off the gloves’ that they had agreed to work without pay until the day after the big Victory Party in Wisconsin.
“It took about a week for the story of Muskie’s attempt to quit the race to leak out to the press, but it was not an easy thing to confirm. One of the most frustrating realities of this goddamn twisted business is the situation where somebody says, ‘I’ll only answer your question if you promise not to print it.’
“Everybody I talked to about the Muskie story seemed to know all the details – but there was no point trying to check it out, they said, because it came from ‘somebody who was at the meeting’ and he ‘obviously can’t talk about it.’
“Of course not. Only a lunatic would risk getting fired from his un-salaried job on the Muskie campaign several days before the crucial Wisconsin primary.”
— Hunter S. Thompson, Fear and Loathing: On the Campaign Trail ‘72

PHILADELPHIA                              
We took off from Tampa International Airport at noon sharp, some 90-odd passengers aboard a U.S.  Airways 737, including the prisoner who sat handcuffed in 25F, the right-side window seat in the rearmost row.  A plainclothes law enforcement officer — federal marshal? sheriff’s deputy? homicide detective? — sat in 25D, the aisle seat.

Nobody sat in 25E, for obvious reasons.

What crime had the prisoner committed?  I didn’t dare ask. But whatever it was, somebody wanted this guy transported to  Philadelphia ASAP, which was why he shared my pleasant flight on U.S. Airways, three rows behind me in the tail end of the big Boeing jet.

Our flight was only about three-quarters full, so even though my ticket was for seat 6E — a center seat on the right side, just a couple rows behind first class — I was able to opt for 22C, an aisle seat on the left, way in the back. I always prefer an aisle seat, and this flight was sufficiently underbooked that I got extra room because seat 22B was empty.  All in all, then, it was a nearly ideal flight experience in terms of 21st-century commercial air travel.

Did the prisoner in seat 25F fully appreciate this? Probably not.

Interstate fugitives don’t usually collect many frequent flyer miles, and so the guy in handcuffs probably had no frame of reference — overbooked planes, delayed departures, missed connections, long layovers — with which to compare his involuntary trip to Philly.

Meanwhile, the guy in 22A (the window seat next to me) was reading A Clockwork Orange while I was reading Hunter S. Thompson’s account of the 1972 campaign. Both are tales of twisted madness, but only one of those stories is fiction. And covering the current presidential campaign confirms every insight Thompson had about “this goddamn twisted business” of political journalism. Continue reading The Prisoner on Flight 1884 →

No Time for Final Wisdom in Tampa

Posted on Comments

TV satellite trucks in front of Monday night’s debate venue.

TAMPA, Fla.
My flight boards at 11:30 a.m. for the return flight home, and so there’s no time now for any elaborate explanation of what happened here during the CNN/Tea Party Express debate. Here’s a quick survey of headlines at Memeorandum:

Perry Wears a Bull’s-Eye at G.O.P. Debate
— New York Times 

Bachmann: ‘I’m offended’
— Politico

Romney’s Win
— Weekly Standard

The frontrunner has no clothes
— Washington Post

The general consensus of the national press corps seems to be that, whoever won last night’s debate, Rick Perry definitely lost. And who am  I to argue with the general consensus? My own take on the debate — which I finished at 1 a.m. in an Ybor City taco joint — is online at The American Spectator:

Rick Perry came into last night’s debate here with a target on his back, leading in the polls only a month after his late entry into the Republican presidential campaign. His fellow GOP candidates fired at the Texas governor all night, but it wasn’t until Minnesota Rep. Michele Bachmann said the phrase “innocent little 12-year-old girls” that he suffered any serious wound.
Bachmann’s poignant phrase was used in reference to Perry’s controversial 2007 executive order mandating that every sixth-grade girl in Texas get vaccinated with Gardasil, a new drug to prevent the sexually transmitted disease human papilloma virus (HPV). Perry’s decision was subsequently voided by the Texas legislature, and he has said he regrets trying to implement it by executive order, but continues to defend it as “making a difference in young people’s lives,” as he said during Monday’s debate.
Bachmann drew cheers from the Tea Party audience when she said Perry’s decision “to have innocent little 12-year-old girls be forced to have a government injection through an executive order is just flat out wrong.” And she also implied that Perry’s decision was corrupt, mentioning his former chief of staff’s position as a lobbyist for Merck, the company that makes Gardasil and a contributor to Perry’s gubernatorial campaign. Perry responded by pointing out that Merck donated a mere $5,000 to his campaign, out of $30 million he raised. “If you’re saying that I can be bought for $5,000, I’m offended,” Perry said, to which Bachmann replied: “I’m offended for all the little girls and the parents who didn’t have a choice.” . . .

Read the whole thing. My friend Ali Akbar, who was in the debate hall, said that three women he talked to who supported Perry before the debate had changed their minds after the debate. It seems that the Gardasil issue really hurts with the Mommy Vote. But there’s no time to think about what that means right now, so you’ll have to hash it out amongst yourselves in the comments.

That flight out of Tampa International Airport won’t wait for the final wisdom and there’s only time now for the most important sentence in the English language: Hit the freaking tip jar!

Conservative Action Fund treasurer Shaun McCutcheon, Republican consultant Ali Akbar and former Georgia congressional candidate Ray McKinney at the Ybor City taco joint after the debate.

PREVIOUSLY: