Two wrongs don’t make a right, but these two women might.

By Chris Ingram

Principled grassroots conservatives have a chance to send the moneyed muckety-mucks a message this weekend at the RPOF meeting in Orlando when they vote for the replacement of disgraced former chairman Jim Greer.

The message is clear: Sharon Day is the only principled conservative in this race. Add to that that her primary opponent John Thrasher is Read the rest of this entry »

The governor visits the Fair

By Chris Ingram

It was a sunny day in Tampa. The wind wasn’t as brisk as it had been the day before, but it was windy enough to spread the smell of cow dung, cotton candy, and corn dogs around the midway of the Florida State Fair.

There were more muckety-mucks gathered on the Fairgrounds this fine February morning than there would be gathered the rest of the week. Muckety-muck types preferring Starbucks and Berns to elephant ears and deep-fried Snicker bars don’t come to the fair unless there is a good reason.

So in fact, the political elite from the Tampa Bay region had gathered at this unlikely location for what seemed to them a very good reason: Read the rest of this entry »

Now the sewage is starting to back up

By Chris Ingram

A few weeks ago when Jim Greer finally announced his resignation I pledged that I wouldn’t write any further columns about Greer. But good golly, if you’ve been reading the papers about the Delmar Johnson saga, you’ve got to know it’s taking a lot of restraint to honor my pledge.

Unfortunately, no one (other than Paula Dockery) including Governor Crist, Attorney General McCollum, or either of the main candidates for state party chairman are giving any indication as to how they will ensure this kind of fiasco (which started with Too-Tan Charlie) will never happen again. That’s because there is a void in real leadership in the Fla. GOP which is due to the fact that no one in a position of leadership has any  Read the rest of this entry »

Media-Economics professor says journalists create little value

By Robert G. Picard

Oxford, England – Journalists like to think of their work in moral or even sacred terms. With each new layoff or paper closing, they tell themselves that no business model could adequately compensate the holy work of enriching democratic society, speaking truth to power, and comforting the afflicted.
 
Actually, journalists deserve low pay.
 
Wages are compensation for value creation. And journalists simply aren’t creating much value these days. Read the rest of this entry »

Not irreverent, but a worthy “view” no-less

By Laura Tillinghast

The last scheduled night launch of the manned space flight program as we know it is tonight (tomorrow morning) at 4:39 a.m.  If you live in Florida, set your alarms, go outside, and look East for the blaze in the sky.  If you are really adventurous, get in your cars, drive to Titusville and pull off anywhere along US-1, turn on the AM radio and listen to mission control as it launches.

View of Space Shuttle from Cocoa Beach, Fla. in 2007

There are just four more scheduled shuttle launches this year – all day launches – then the shuttle program ends forever.  Tickets to view from NASA galleries go on sale 4-6 weeks prior to launch and are pricey, but again, you can watch from US-1 as well.  The new NASA budget does not fund Read the rest of this entry »

 There is a House in Washington…

by Tom Bortnyk

Thursday, the U.S. House of Representatives passed a bill to reinstate “PAYGO”, the pay-as-you-go spending policy that requires expenditures to be financed with currently existing, rather than borrowed funds. On the surface, this appears to be a fiscally responsible guideline; during the Clinton years, PAYGO helped control the deficit and, coupled with the economic boom and a number of other factors, lead to the budget surplus.

But dig a little deeper and you’ll find that nothing about this bill addresses Read the rest of this entry »

Where is the leadership? Where is the outrage? Is the BOCC in bed with Kevin White? Who elected these people? Oh wait, we did.

By Chris Ingram

Are any of my Tampa friends as outraged as I am that the BOCC let Kevin White have a “do-over?” Where’s the outrage (and accountability?) What kind of message do you think the commissioners are sending to our kids that they let this little piece of Read the rest of this entry »

Republicans will steal from you too, so don’t feel too confident around GOPers either

By Chris Ingram

Facing dwindling poll numbers following the Obama-care fiasco, President Obama is now attempting to fool Americans into believing his Number One concern is jobs and the economy – as opposed to socialism and a government take-over of 1/5th of our economy. O-say-anything-Bama is also touting his concern over the federal debt – which is the Number One peril facing America’s future and its children.

Suddenly, Obama thinks fiscal stewardship, responsible government, and controlled spending are a bright idea. Of course, he’s full of Read the rest of this entry »