Florida Governor Scott looking for new group to drug test after Court ruling. Here's a suggestion: Florida politicians.

Florida Governor Rick Scott (R)

A Florida District Judge has ruled that Florida Governor Rick Scott's legislation to drug test the poor is unconstitutional and must be stopped.  Judge Mary Scriven found that the legislation is essentially illegal search and seizure.

Furthermore, the testing of welfare recipients that has been done has found that the poor actually take drugs at a rate that is only 25% of the rest of the country.  Only 2% of the poor tested were actually found to be guilty and many of them  have denied it, bringing concerns about false positives in the testing.

It seems that Republican politicians rely heavily on stereotyping when considering new legislation.  Florida, like other Republican controlled states, has proven that our Republican leaders are not very smart and utilize fiction as fact.  The "welfare queen" who takes drugs and sleeps most of the day while relying on the government to pay for her every expense, is a reality in the minds of Republican leaders.  This is why Republicans must punish the poor, not only by requiring unnecessary drug testing, but also by denying expanded medicaid.  Republicans believe the poor lie about who they are when voting, so their voting rights must be challenged.  Republican leaders believe that the unemployed are just goofing off, so unemployment benefits must be stopped.  To Republicans the poor cannot be trusted.  They are low-life scum who are the scourge of society and Republicans believe it is their duty to eliminate them.

How much intelligence does it take to understand that the results of drug testing prove that the need for drug testing is completely unwarranted?  How much intelligence does it take to know that spending tax payer money on policies that offer nothing to society is not a good use of that money?  How much intelligence does it take to use federally offered money with no state cost, to expand medicaid to cover the helpless?  Apparently more than our Republican leaders possess.

So Governor Scott is not stopping his pet project and promises to appeal the ruling to a higher court.  He may even run on it.  Worse still, many Floridians agree with Scott that drug testing for welfare recipients should be policy in our state.  We forget that taking drugs requires money that welfare recipients do not have.  Some of us may have fallen for the "welfare queen" myth and lost the ability to reason because of our anger.

On the other hand, if Scott would like to find a group that is more likely to be hiding drug use while requesting government welfare for themselves, perhaps he should choose Corporate CEO's who receive tax advantages and government subsidies or Florida politicians like Trey Radel who take a government paycheck and like to snort.  At least the monied part of society can afford to take drugs and as long as the drug laws are written to target the poor, they are also the most likely group to get away with it.

Charlie Crist hoping to make Florida a little bluer the second time around

Charlie Crist

The hat of Charlie Crist got tossed into the political ring on Friday, November 1st as he announced his intention to run as a Democrat for Florida Governor.

This will not be the first time Mr. Crist has run for the office, having won the 2006 election and served as Florida governor from 2007-2010 as a Republican.

Mr. Crist has come full circle in the last couple of years as he has changed parties from Republican Governor of Florida to Independent in a failed run against Marco Rubio for Senator and then to a Democrat in his most recent appearance on the political scene.

Mr. Crist announced his support for President Obama during the 2012 elections and gave one of the presentations during the Democratic National Convention.  During that appearance, Mr. Crist announced that he "had not left the Republican party...the Republican party left him."  He emphasized that the changing ideology of the party no longer corresponded with his ideas of Republicanism.  He said that although there were differences in some of their political ideas, many of his matched many of President Obama's.

For example, he wants to focus on creating middle class jobs.  He believes it is important to our society and economy to build the infrastructure, improve roads and schools.  He does not want to revamp medicare or social security as most Republicans do, but instead wants to preserve and save medicare and social security.  He believes that the diversity of Florida's growing population is the future of America and must not be ignored.  He supports and will implement all aspects of the Affordable Care Act, giving some in Florida hope that expanded medicaid may have a chance of being implemented if he wins the governorship.  Mr. Crist describes himself as a fiscal conservative but a social moderate.

Some of the positions he took as a Republican have changed in recent months which one could say is to get more in line with the Democratic platform.  For example, as a Republican he opposed the Affordable Care Act but as a Democrat he now supports it.  He said he was pro-life as a Republican but is now pro-choice as a Democrat.  He was against same sex marriage as a Republican, but as a Democrat he now supports it.  This is not to criticize Mr. Crist.  People's ideas can change.

Does Charlie Crist have any chance of winning the Florida governorship from the incumbent Republican Governor Rick Scott?  You bet.  Mr. Scott had a very close race in 2010 with the Democrat Alex Sink.  Scott won over Sink by only 1 percentage point.  If Christ does only a little better than Sink did in 2010, he may win the 2014 election.  But Crist's advantage doesn't stop there.

Without even considering the fact that Mr. Crist was once already elected to the position and is a widely known and popular political figure, Mr Scott's popularity may be dwindling.  When polled during 2013, people in the PPP poll favor Crist over Scott.  Most recently the advantage to Crist was  50% to 38%.  Independents favored Crist by 57% to 33% for Scott.  Scott's approval rating in Florida is only 33% while his disapproval rating is 55%.  Most of the major polls favor Crist for Florida Governor by anywhere from 14% to 25% over Scott.

As a state, Florida has shown it can vote for Democrats in the national election and recently more and more voters here are starting to see the Tea Party Republicans as a bit too radical to get re-elected.  The Republican obstruction in the federal government and the radical nature of the new Republican party may be a big advantage to Democratic candidates in upcoming elections.

There's a very good possibility that Democrat Charlie Crist may be Florida's next Governor.