LOCAL and Florida Politics

[spenser1058]

While we await the results of the recounts here in Florida, it's a good time to note some of the great things that happened both here and elsewhere for Democrats and democracy in general. We picked up 3 seats in the Florida House locally  (including West Orange and a portion of Seminole), and the Orange County Commission is majority blue for the first time in ages (plus ALL of the commissioners are women!) Perhaps most importantly is Amendment 4 passed, restoring the right to vote potentially to 1.4 million Floridians.

James Fallows in The Atlantic looks at some other good news out there, particularly on the battle to preserve our democracy.

https://www.theatlantic.com/notes/2018/11/after-election-renewal-begins/575563/

Whatever happens with the recounts, we have much to celebrate. For all those who voted, knocked on doors, made contributions and phone banked, great job!

Edited November 13, 2018 by spenser1058

[prahaboheme]

7 hours ago, spenser1058 said:

While we await the results of the recounts here in Florida, it's a good time to note some of the great things that happened both here and elsewhere for Democrats and democracy in general. We picked up 3 seats in the Florida House locally  (including West Orange and a portion of Seminole), and the Orange County Commission is majority blue for the first time in ages (plus ALL of the commissioners are women!) Perhaps most importantly is Amendment 4 passed, restoring the right to vote potentially to 1.4 million Floridians.

James Fallows in The Atlantic looks at some other good news out there, particularly on the battle to preserve our democracy.

https://www.theatlantic.com/notes/2018/11/after-election-renewal-begins/575563/

Whatever happens with the recounts, we have much to celebrate. For all those who voted, knocked on doors, made contributions and phone banked, great job!

Republicans attempting to create a false narrative of voter fraud, because they recognize they cannot win on their increasingly narrow perception of reality, is the real win (regardless of the FL outcome).

The 2020 Senate race looks absolutely abysmal for Republicans.  No reason to encourage them to gain some level of decorum now.

 

[Dale]

Sounds like if they keep counting, in Broward, DeSantis and Scott are going to end up winning in a landslide. 

[jrs2]

29 minutes ago, Dale said:

Sounds like if they keep counting, in Broward, DeSantis and Scott are going to end up winning in a landslide. 

didn't the same thing happen in PA during the 2016 presidential election and the Obama appointee federal judge overseeing it cut off the recount when the Dems saw that it wasn't going their way, rather, in the opposite direction?  A far cry from the narrative that Prahaboheme was pushing in the prior post above.

[Dale]

15 minutes ago, jrs2 said:

didn't the same thing happen in PA during the 2016 presidential election and the Obama appointee federal judge overseeing it cut off the recount when the Dems saw that it wasn't going their way, rather, in the opposite direction?  A far cry from the narrative that Prahaboheme was pushing in the prior post above.

They still think it was Bush who was trying to steal 2000.

[prahaboheme]

How silly to demonize a fair election process (hardly shocking though).

[Dale]

1 hour ago, prahaboheme said:

How silly to demonize a fair election process (hardly shocking though).

The referee is still counting out Bill Nelson ...

12 ... 13 ... 14 ... 15 ...

[dcluley98]

Pretty sure nothing is going to change and DeSantis and Scott are going to win. That's fine and what should happen if votes are counted right. For Scott to say he doesn't want to recount and file lawsuits is ridiculous. Why wouldn't somebody want to correctly count the votes? 

Edited November 18, 2018 by dcluley98

[Dale]

1 hour ago, dcluley98 said:

Pretty sure nothing is going to change and DeSantis and Scott are going to win. That's fine and what should happen if votes are counted right. For Scott to say he doesn't want to recount and file lawsuits is ridiculous. Why wouldn't somebody want to correctly count the votes? 

I think Scott objected to Broward missing the voting deadline by days.

[aent]

1 hour ago, dcluley98 said:

Pretty sure nothing is going to change and DeSantis and Scott are going to win. That's fine and what should happen if votes are counted right. For Scott to say he doesn't want to recount and file lawsuits is ridiculous. Why wouldn't somebody want to correctly count the votes? 

And the concern is about voter fraud, ya know, like counting votes twice like they attempted to do in Broward County this weekend.

[dcluley98]

You mean like in Bay County where they let them email them in because of the hurricane? Scott doesn't seem to be too concerned about that because the votes were in his favor. Typical selective application of "justice". 

Edited November 18, 2018 by dcluley98

[Dale]

15 minutes ago, dcluley98 said:

You mean like in Bay County where they let them email them in because of the hurricane? Scott doesn't seem to be too concerned about that because the votes were in his favor. Typical selective application of "justice". 

I love the Panhandle. Looks like it saved Florida from Broward and Palm Beach again.

[aent]

12 minutes ago, dcluley98 said:

You mean like in Bay County where they let them email them in because of the hurricane? Scott doesn't seem to be too concerned about that because the votes were in his favor. Typical selective application of "justice". 

I haven't heard of much of a fight on that, but that was a total of 147 votes. It was no doubt a mistake, but it was by [local] election officials on saying that was permissible in light of a huge natural disaster that destroyed tons of homes and made areas impassable, and brought people out of town who were too late to request a proper mail ballot... it wasn't trying to count them twice, failing to submit results of the recount because your numbers went down, etc... very different things

 

And to be even more fair, Bay County followed the protocols for overseas military ballots where mail service would be difficult, so they followed some sort of process with a natural disaster messing things up. Yes, they should have gotten it approved by the state, but thats semantics, its not double counting votes, refusing to submit vote counts, refusing to submit results of the recount when it went in the wrong direction, etc.

Edited November 18, 2018 by aent

[JFW657]

1 hour ago, Dale said:

I love the Panhandle. Looks like it saved Florida from Broward and Palm Beach again.

Yeah, thanks to those dumb rednecks we've still got an immoral criminal who should've been in prison years ago making policy for our state.

How great. 

[Dale]

14 minutes ago, JFW657 said:

Yeah, thanks to those dumb rednecks we've still got an immoral criminal who should've been in prison years ago making policy for our state.

How great. 

Stop pretending that you prize integrity in a candidate and be thankful that Florida’s economy is humming along.

[JFW657]

11 minutes ago, Dale said:

Stop pretending that you prize integrity in a candidate and be thankful that Florida’s economy is humming along.

I never vote for Republican criminals and thugs like Rick Scott and Donald Trump, so I'm not pretending to prize integrity. I actually do.

We could put a reasonably intelligent 12 year old in charge of Florida's economy and it would still hum along. Stop giving the credit for it to Scott or the Repugnants in the State Legislature who've probably done more to stifle economic development than they have to encourage it. 

Had they opened their closed eyes and their closed little conservative minds and accepted Medicaid expansion a few years ago, we'd have thousands more jobs in the medical and medical supply industry right now.

Not to mention a healthier population.

[nite owℓ]

On 11/12/2018 at 2:35 PM, jrs2 said:

I told everyone here I felt that Trump was controlled opposition to appease a large segment of society that was getting fed up with the "system" or the "establishment."  I still believe that. 

But at what cost? Was it really worth cutting off the country's nose to spite it's face? What an unnecessary stain on this country's history.

[aent]

8 hours ago, JFW657 said:

I never vote for Republican criminals and thugs like Rick Scott and Donald Trump, so I'm not pretending to prize integrity. I actually do.

 

But did you vote for Democrat criminals like Hilary and Gillum?

 

8 hours ago, JFW657 said:

Had they opened their closed eyes and their closed little conservative minds and accepted Medicaid expansion a few years ago, we'd have thousands more jobs in the medical and medical supply industry right now.

 

How does Medicaid expansion magically create more doctors and facilities? Every hospital I've been to seems to have waits for beds, shortages of doctors, and it takes a loong time as is to get an appointment even with great insurance. If you want to create more jobs, you have to create jobs, not expand welfare programs. Remove legislation that protects incumbent hospitals from competition (certificate of need requirements for new hospitals), and same for the institutions that train new medical professionals (heavy lobbying on both sides to prevent UCF from opening a dental school, even with a private donor paying for the facilities, and creating more doctors no doubt would improve access to healthcare and reduce prices). If we had doctors sitting around, unable to find jobs, you'd be right, but thats not the scenario we have at all. Any redirection of doctors now is taking away healthcare from someone to give it to someone else.

[Dale]

50 minutes ago, aent said:

But did you vote for Democrat criminals like Hilary and Gillum?

 

How does Medicaid expansion magically create more doctors and facilities? Every hospital I've been to seems to have waits for beds, shortages of doctors, and it takes a loong time as is to get an appointment even with great insurance. If you want to create more jobs, you have to create jobs, not expand welfare programs. Remove legislation that protects incumbent hospitals from competition (certificate of need requirements for new hospitals), and same for the institutions that train new medical professionals (heavy lobbying on both sides to prevent UCF from opening a dental school, even with a private donor paying for the facilities, and creating more doctors no doubt would improve access to healthcare and reduce prices). If we had doctors sitting around, unable to find jobs, you'd be right, but thats not the scenario we have at all. Any redirection of doctors now is taking away healthcare from someone to give it to someone else.

It’s magic!

[jrs2]

7 hours ago, nite owℓ said:

But at what cost? Was it really worth cutting off the country's nose to spite it's face? What an unnecessary stain on this country's history.

The people that are really in control, like socialists, do not care about nationalism and other similar notions of "country".  They just care about maintaining power by controlling the banking system and overall foreign policy of many countries.  As for the arguments for or against Trump's ideology, that's a focus for the masses, whether it's Trump or Obama for that matter.  But on that note, the "cutting off of the nose" just depends on one's perspective.  It's a perceived "stain" for only the left.  But that's the whole point...they want there to be a left and right always battling while they sit back and gloat.  Don't you think it's a little odd how all of these elections keep coming down to the wire?

[JFW657]

1 hour ago, aent said:

But did you vote for Democrat criminals like Hilary and Gillum?

How does Medicaid expansion magically create more doctors and facilities? Every hospital I've been to seems to have waits for beds, shortages of doctors, and it takes a loong time as is to get an appointment even with great insurance. If you want to create more jobs, you have to create jobs, not expand welfare programs. Remove legislation that protects incumbent hospitals from competition (certificate of need requirements for new hospitals), and same for the institutions that train new medical professionals (heavy lobbying on both sides to prevent UCF from opening a dental school, even with a private donor paying for the facilities, and creating more doctors no doubt would improve access to healthcare and reduce prices). If we had doctors sitting around, unable to find jobs, you'd be right, but thats not the scenario we have at all. Any redirection of doctors now is taking away healthcare from someone to give it to someone else.

Since neither Hillary Clinton nor Andrew Gillum are criminals, your point is moot. Rick Scott ran a corporation that defrauded taxpayers out of billions of dollars by over billing Medicare and Medicaid. The idea that he didn't know what was going on is laughable. Everyone who is being honest with themselves knows that Donald Trump and his family are mired in political and financial entanglements with Russia. Trump himself almost certainly evaded paying untold millions in taxes and has probably obstructed justice on several occasions since taking office. 

Any petty little instances of things like accepting a Broadway theater ticket or some email server nonsense that was blown thousands of times out of proportion by the rwnj propaganda and character assassination machine, pale in comparison to the actual real crimes committed by the likes of Scott and Trump.

As for the relationship between jobs and Medicaid expansion, it's pretty simple. Had Scott and his gang of GOP thugs in the State Legislature not stood in the way, the federal dollars coming in would have freed up hospitals' operating revenue for things like building expanded facilities, which would have created construction jobs as well new health care jobs. Also taken into consideration was the expanded market for medical services and equipment supply companies and all the attendant jobs that would have come with them. And of course, there is always a ripple effect in any economy when you create more jobs and free up money that people no longer have to save for or spend on health care. Money that can be spent at other local businesses, which in turn creates even more jobs.

Forbes: On Obamacare's 6th Birthday, Medicaid Expansion Creates Jobs, Saves Money

https://www.forbes.com/sites/brucejapsen/2016/03/23/acas-medicaid-expansion-created-jobs-saved-state-dollars/#61c2ab9c5e54

South Florida Business Journal: Medicaid expansion would create 71,300 Florida jobs, Families USA says

https://www.bizjournals.com/southflorida/news/2013/02/20/medicaid-expansion-would-create-71300.html

US News & World Report: Medicaid Expansion Will Create Jobs While Extending Care

https://www.usnews.com/debate-club/is-medicaid-expansion-good-for-the-states/medicaid-expansion-will-create-jobs-while-extending-care

Too bad for Florida we missed out on all that extra economic success we could have enjoyed but didn't thanks to the goobers in the panhandle who keep putting criminals like Scott and the irresponsible GOP State Legislature in office who stand in the way of it for the sake of their narrow social and political agenda.

[prahaboheme]

This election did not come down to the wire. If we’ve learned anything it’s that Florida’s unique position as the swing state that tips an election one way or another is no longer relevant.

 

[Dale]

Modest proposal: go back to voting the way we used to do it. There is an Election Day. Everybody votes on that day. No early voting. No voting by email. No provisional ballots. No motor-voter registration. Certainly no late voting. 

Given that a vote is an imposition on another, seems to me that we should make it harder to vote, not easier.

 

[spenser1058]

As we celebrate Seminole County's march towards becoming ever more purple (thanks, SemDems!), it seems their local Republican leadership is getting cranky:

http://orlando-politics.com/2018/11/17/-seminole-county-party-boss-townsend-blocks-new-republican-members-from-joining-county-chapter/

From Orlando Politics

Seminole is following what seems to be a nationwide trend of suburban counties switching to the blue side.

Along with Florida's seventh largest county shifting blue in the recent midterms at the top of the ticket (Duval/Jacksonville), we can see the path forward for 2020.

The challenge is going to be that the retiree counties (like Sumter, Citrus, Hernando) are rapidly expanding with new residents who are likely to vote and register Republican. Democrats ignore these voters at their peril. The party has to bring these newest Floridians into the community by emphasizing services they want and need (along with our longstanding commitment to protect Medicare) to gain their trust. Off to The Villages we go!

[Dale]

There is always a ‘path’ for Democrats. No matter the demographic trends that appear to portend a Democrat advantage, voters still tend Republican on the national, and Republicans maintain a hammerlock at the state level.