Dear Florida Democratic Party,

I really can’t anymore. Day after day, my Twitter feed, email inbox, and Facebook newsfeed are covered with constant attacks from you against our Republican Governor Rick Scott. Whether it’s bashing him for a weak economic recovery in Florida spearheaded by the creation of minimum wage jobs, his lengthy list of administration officials that have resigned, been fired, or left the administration, to bashing his well-known fraud filled corporate career before he became governor, every day seems to bring forth another attack. Yes Florida Democratic Party, we get it. Our governor is arguably the worst and least popular in the country and an even worse human being with a track record marked with failure after failure, embarrassment after embarrassment, and top down economic policies that leave middle and working class Floridians in the dark.

Throughout this entire election cycle thus far, specifically since former Republican and self-proclaimed pro-life, anti-tax, pro-gun Reagan Conservative and Jeb Bush Republican,Charlie Crist got into this race, the FDP’s entire strategy has been to remind Floridians of the reasons why Rick Scott and his Republican minions are the wrong choice for Florida. The problem is that strategy hasn’t worked in the past (see: Alex Sink 2010) and isn’t working now, as the latest polls tell us. As we’ve reported at The Florida Squeeze, Charlie Crist’s numbers have been slipping ever since his announcement. The latest poll out of St. Leo University has Crist’s lead down to just four points, while back in December it was up to twelve. While Crist has at times tried to talk about issues, the party simply has not.

We’ve already had a failed gubernatorial candidate attempt to focus their statewide campaign on negative campaigning in Florida. In 2010, Alex Sink ran from her base, attempting to capture the middle and moderate voters in Florida. She focused her campaign on lecturing Floridians why Rick Scott was the wrong choice, instead of telling us why she was the right one. In 2012, Governor Mitt Romney ran a presidential campaign devoted to telling America and the world that President Obama was the wrong choice for America- that his socialist policies were going to ruin the country, hurt the economy, and bring down the republic without explaining to the American people what exactly he would do differently or in the least, what policy ideas he would bring to the table to spur job growth and restore our economy. The American people resoundingly rejected Mitt Romney, and Floridians elected Rick Scott, a corporate criminal, whose company received the largest fine for medicare fraud in American history.



I have a simple request FDP. Would you please do us a favor, that is if winning the Governor’s mansion is your actual goal rather taking any and all sorts of corporate dollars (Disney, Sugar, Gambling) and start talking about SOLUTIONS, IDEAS and POLICIES that separate us from the Republican overlord and his minions that have had a stranglehold over the Sunshine State? Issues like, holding the line against school vouchers, fighting for a living wage, paid sick leave, HSR, medicaid expansion and repealing Stand Your Ground. Or might you be afraid to travel down that road because, at the this point, the presumptive Democratic nominee for Governor, was a once a Republican, who was then funded by the same corporate interests that you decry daily? In fairness, Crist is trying to re-position himself as a “populist” but his prior record doesn’t match his rhetoric and the party itself doesn’t have any positive rhetoric of the sort. The FDP is rapidly becoming the party of no ideas, just empty rhetoric telling us how awful the other side is without attempting to present any evidence that shows we are better.

When given the choice to vote for something or against something, the Florida voter has repeatedly proven they choose the former. It is about time Florida Democrats learned this lesson.

Signed,

Disgruntled Democrats Fed Up With Losing Statewide Elections

JS

@JustinSnyderFL