Win or lose, there is one thing republicans NEVER, NEVER, NEVER do: run liberals.

They will run anyone else. You can be:

a scam artist,

a fraudster

a bigot

a conspiracy clown

heck, you can even be accused of rape by multiple women.

(Or, in the case of the current GOP president, all of the above.)

They will run men who sexually harass women, assault women, and try to force women to carry a rapist’s baby to term. They will run a married doctor who had sex with his patients and then tried to get them to have abortions. They will run a man who abandoned his state and his wife to consort with a mistress. They will even rally around you if you turn out to be a serial child molester. (The GOP has never really had much of a problem when it comes to the molesting of children.)

But none of these men committed the cardinal sin: voting with the progressives in any instance.

If you are sensible about guns, supportive of women’s health, think health care is a right, or that workers should be treated with dignity and a fair wage, that is just a bridge too far. THAT is what passes for toxic in today’s GOP.

But here’s the other fact: they win.

They win because no matter how personally repulsive the candidate might be, the right-wing knows that they can always count on them to hurt people they don’t like. And that's what this is all about.

I might know a thing or two about Florida politics. I've watched the Democratic party lose and lose and lose for 20 years in a row now. We are the only state in the union that has more way more Democrats than Republicans, and yet we have ceded to the GOP complete control to run everything--and I mean f**king EVERYTHING!! Both legislative chambers, the governor’s office, and every executive statewide office. It's like we're Mississippi, except we aren't—they beat us. (A Democrat actually won Attorney General in Mississippi. Ours is freaking Pam Bondi.)

As a Florida Democrat, I know we do one thing very well: lose elections.

In fact, our specialty is losing elections that should have been a slam dunk.

Remember Rick Scott? The criminal whose company scammed millions from seniors and then had to pay $1 billion in fines for committing the largest Medicaid fraud in US history? I do. That was the least of what he did. He should have easily been framed, polarized, and made toxic. Instead, he won the govenorship. Twice.

How did he do it? Pretty freaking genius. He counted on the us, the Florida Democrats, to pick his opponent.

The first one we came up with was Alex Sink. A wishy-washy, self-loathing Democrat who referred to the ACA, Obama's signature accomplishment, as a "disaster." She soon clarified what she meant to seething Democrats. She told us that President Obama "failed us." Surprisingly, Dems didn’t rally to her and she lost.

Most people would call that a learning experience. The Florida Democratic leadership responded by trying to cram this loser AGAIN down our throats in a House district that Obama carried twice. She lost AGAIN, this time to a middle-aged GOP lobbyist who was in the process of divorcing his wife so he could bang his 27-year old girlfriend.

Rick Scott, for all his faults, always stayed true to his base. We never tried that. EVER. In 2004, we ran Alex Sink’s husband over liberal Janet Reno, and got creamed. In 2014, after Rick Scott f**ked up our state, liberals supported Nan Rich, but the Florida Dem leadership pushed hard for the former GOP governor, who many remembered as “chain-gang Charlie.” (Despite this, we tried to help him, but his campaign staff was horrible. Vetwife and I witnessed the idiotic decision to try to win over votes at the Villages over a Democratic rally packed with liberals.)

And now, I have read story after story about Gwen Graham running for governor. Gwen—f’ing-Graham. What hit me like a ton of bricks were the statements from Florida Democrats, who damn well should know better by now, that she has the best shot because—here we go again—she is a conservative Democrat who will somehow magically win over the rednecks. Yeah.

Before I rant, let me tell you a little about her.

Gwen Graham is the daughter of a popular Democratic governor. She won her congressional district in 2014, but only did one term. This is what she did in that short time:

She joined the GOP in voting to unseat Rep. Nancy Pelosi of California as House Democratic leader (this was her very first vote, BTW)

She voted against Democrats to approve the Keystone XL pipeline

She voted with the GOP to gut the Dodd-Frank financial reform law

She voted against President Obama to change the definition of a full-time employee from 30 hours to 40 hours, which would mean millions would not be eligible for employer-provided health insurance under the Affordable Care Act

She voted on keeping Guantanamo Bay, Cuba open

She voted with the GOP consistently to curb federal regulations

She voted against the enforcement of an Environmental Protection Agency clean water rule on streams and wetlands

She was one of only two Democrats to vote against the nuclear deal with Iran

What makes this list even worse is how she campaigned. She promised to fight for us, but instead, fought against us. Democrats, like me, who strongly supported her campaign, felt betrayed and horrified. Yet every time she was willing to throw all of us overboard to go after the very miniscule amount of GOP voters who might have considered switching. (To her credit, she is pro-choice and pro-Planned Parenthood, yet this fact guaranteed that even this tiny pool of red voters she was courting would always hate her.)

This is Gwen. This is the person who is supposed to be our best hope? This is the person we are supposed to get behind?

This has to stop. Seriously.

This is NOT the time. The cycle has to end here. NOW!

We need to have Democratic candidates who will stop being afraid of being Democrats !

Republicans sure as hell aren't ever afraid of being Republicans.

They will go on TV and tell their voters to their faces that they leaches and they need to lose their healthcare. Yeah, that’s awful, but at least they promise to make life suck for women and minorities more than you.

You can hate them for that, but also admire them at the same time. They stay true to their base no matter what. That is a hundred times better strategy than trying to run somebody who kowtows to the opponent’s party. The GOP never does that because it’s stupid, but here in Florida, Democrats try it every single damn election. Howz’ that been working out?

GOP-lite has never been a winning strategy. The right wing votes for the right wing. The left wing gets pissed off. The mythical fence-sitter doesn’t exist.

There’s a lot of good, proud Democrats running this year:

Andrew Gillum is the popular, liberal mayor of Tallahassee.

Patrick Murphy gave Rubio a run for his money.

Oh, I know … how about John Morgan??

Yeah, he has skeletons in his closet. So what? We elected Rick Scott and Donald Trump. Obviously, Floridians don’t give a sh** about that. But if you are from Florida, you know exactly who John Morgan is and how much he fights for the little guy. His “For the People" ads have blanketed the state for decades and people love him. There’s a John Morgan draft movement and I hope he takes it. He can actually win—and win big.

Anyone of these people would be great to ride the Trump backlash in 2018.

Or, we can do what we always do.

Democrats, you have a choice to make. You’ve made the same damn mistake for 20 years now. Let's just try running someone, just this once, who actually believes in their own party for a change. Then, watch what happens.

That is all.