Days of Wine and Roses

See the people walking down the street
Fall in line just watching all their feet
They don't know where they wanna go
But they're walking in time
--We Got the Beat, The Go-Go's

A different fragrance that makes your way
and they call it, Charlie
Kind of free, kind of "wow", Charlie
--Charlie jingle, Bobby Short

So vote once, vote tuh-wice, for Bill McKay
... you middle-class honkies
--The Candidate (1972)

vanity of vanities; all is vanity
--Ecclesiastes 1:2
_________________

It was with heavy heart we went to the polls today -- hopefully your elections proved more motivational. There was nothing less exciting than the prospects which awaited: Alex Sink for Governor and Kendrick Meek, Senator -- how could my party do this to me?

Fully three auto calls from Alex today: "Ah, need YEW . . ." . Sorry Alex, I can do nothing for you. You are sunk, in my opinion. Rick Scott shall beat you, and the inadequate Kendrick will suck votes from Charlie Crist, to the benefit of the inadequate Republican, Mark Rubio. Ex-Prez Clinton asked you to drop out, but ego wouldn't allow it.

Maybe the Democratic Party wouldn't allow it. It was your stock Democratic ticket: You got your woman, and your black person. Except neither was a winner. As our own Pushing Rope said, "Meek's hysterical moderate progressive" stance was ridiculous, as there ain't no such animal. One does not attenuate progressivism, Kendrick, one goes whole hog. India Arie sang it nicely: Either it is or isn't.

The Democrats seemed to be betting on your average voter, who checks what's on his voter's registration card or, if he's really bold, defects for the better-looking candidate.

"I think it would be great to have a woman governor," said Kathleen Sabol, a 24-year-old artist from Orlando. "And I don't trust what's-his-name [Scott]" (Bill Clinton Appears with Meek). Yup, that's about the size of it for most folks. Me, I'd rather have the best qualified candidate regardless of demographic, but that is kind of old-fashioned think, I 'spose.

Ms. Sink was a perfect visual replicant of popular former Governor Bob Graham. You would have to live in the South for a while to understand what is meant by, she had The Look. Trust me, she did. Still, it's not enough, and even the party faithful knew it would be an uphill battle.

To continue with Mr. Clinton's recent thinking, where is a cohesive platform for the Democrats? It has gone missing, like a good State secret. Passing a local elementary school yesterday cars were assaulted by the meaningless shrieking of schoolchildren waving placards in what their teacher must have thought was a great way to get them inducted into the world of voting. The placards had hoo-ah messages about their school, a perfect mirroring of what they shall do some 15 years hence. Sound and Fury, signifying nothing.

Since there is nothing good to share with you from today's election, I will instead catch you up on what happened in RangerAgainstWar's little dust up in our recent Netroots election -- the news, while not good, is elucidating:


Ranger's Campaign:

First, we've been very remiss in not thanking each and every one of you who kindly took the time to vote for RAW in the last Netroots election. We did not place last, but we did not win. We also learned a thing or two about the politics of political blogging (such as it is) in Florida.

We learned that there is no bona fide Florida Netroots Community, but there is a group called the Florida Progressive Coalition (FPC) which administers the awards under the rubric of the Democrat Party. This group consisted of 67 members headed by Mr. Kenneth Quinnell who oversaw the FPC blog and made occasional entries of local interest. (Mr. Quinnell was also the erstwhile new media director of the now-failed run of Kendrick Meek.)

When we won their Best National Blog award in 2008, it was with evident displeasure that Mr. Quinnell conceded the award, and not before requisitioning a re-balloting of which we were not informed (but happened to stumble upon, so that we were able to solicit re-votes.) Why a second ballot was called for our category we do not know.

It is evident, however, that most of the politically-oriented Democratic blogs in Florida emanate from various vested interests, and are professional, funded and/or group efforts. The exceptions we know of are RAW, LitBrit and Mustang Bobby -- that's about it.

What has happened since '08 is that the special interests now stuff the ballot box for their groups. So it is that someone like Florida State Senator Al Lawson won in five categories. His blog is not that good, but he does have that many contacts and campaign workers. You may check out this year's winners for yourself and decide if you think they offer better value.

We feel like we imagine Al Gore did, except there are no hanging chads . . . only the purported results of an e-pro survey released by Mr. Quinnell to us after several spurned requests (results were never announced on-site.) Ranger suspects that our critical take on now-President Obama was not received well by the lockstep party members. It actually went over like a lead balloon. C'est la vie.

So now, friends, you know the rest of the story. Politics is a nasty business.

We'll keep on giving 'em hell, though, even if we don't get any more shiny dog tags.