Decision 2006

Recently the Gubernatorial Primaries occurred in Florida this week and that has really been the talk of the area. Being that I am a journalist and former elected official, I have to be a pundit and give my take on some of the elections that took place.

First, the race for governor. George W. Bush’s little brother Jeb is currently the Governor of Florida and due to term limits this is his last term. Now he has public ally said that he will not be running to succeed his brother in the White House. So a part of his legacy as the only Republican Governor of the state to be re-elected since Reconstruction, he wants to make sure that he is picking the successor to his office.

The Republican side saw four candidates. The two main candidates were actually both elected members of the current Governor’s Cabinet. Tom Gallagher, the state Chief Financial Officer and Charlie Crist, the State Attorney General. The latter candidate was endorsed by the governor and touted his experience as the reason that voters should choose him. Florida voters decisively chose Crist as the Republican Nominee with a whopping sixty-four percent of the vote. The campaign went pretty much as expected with not much dirt being dished by either candidate.

The Democratic side was much less of a high profile race than the 2002 campaign but interesting nevertheless. Current U.S. House Member Jim Davis was up against State Senator Rod Smith. This was the best match up due to the fact that both candidates had experience and were pretty well funded. Jim Davis having served on the National level was a bit more polished than Rod Smith and came with the help of high name recognition in South Florida. Davis also had the luxury of being endorsed by most Florida Congressional Delegation members. Smith however, brought the North and Central Florida to the table and was able to boast of having most of the state legislature on his side. Up until the last days of the election Davis constantly held a double digit lead. But that’s where it got interesting. In the last 10 days of the election the Smith camp rallied forward in the polls and closed the lead to within 6 points. It was like they (the Smith Campaign) were rabid dogs. They truly made it happen. Although Jim Davis took the Democratic Nomination, he had forty-seven percent of the vote to Rod Smith’s forty-one percent. Smith’s group really pulled the votes out of thin air. They get the award for best campaign during the election.

Now Jim Davis and Charlie Crist have already begun taking shots at each other in preparation for the November primary. Florida has been leaning heavily Republican lately so Charlie Crist is favored to win. However, hard work from Rhea Chiles (the widow of former Governor Lawton Chiles), former Governor Buddy McKay, former Governor and Senator Bob Graham and current U.S. Senator Bill Nelson give Davis a fighting chance. This is sure to be a great race. Although my eye is on the Connecticut General Election which it seems like Joe Lieberman is favored to win.

The other interesting race in Florida was for Florida House District 15. That was the election I lost four years ago. Audrey Gibson was the incumbent and Reggie Fullwood was a quazi-incumbent as a sitting member of City Council. The race was pretty dirty. Signs saying no to Fullwood, him attacking her record and her attacking him on his campaign contributions were all par for the course on this one. Even another member of council got involved and opposed her best friend and area Congressional Representative. At the end of the day, I was glad that my race never got that ugly.

It’s sad that when we (African-Americans) run against each other we can’t keep it to the issues. We get dirty, personal and just mean. We loose life long friendships and when we can’t find the dirt that we need we just lie. I remember during my election one of the candidates had it out that I had a kid out of wedlock and that I was behind on child support. Of course I have no kids but just to come up with something so far fetched shows the levels we’ll stoop to for our purposes. Politics is a dirty game and maybe I’ll get involved again but we have to make sure that it is not so nasty where people stop wanting to seek elected office.

Finally what shocked me the most about the election is the fact that so many people did not vote. There was only a fifteen percent voter turnout. Even though, I made sure that my staff and six other people got to the polls, I spoke to with at least ten other people the next day who said that forgot to vote. These were intelligent well educated people. In fact one friend who is in college said, “Well no one came on campus to tell us about the election”.

The one of the few rights that we have that cannot be compromised in this country is the right to vote. After the election of 2000, I cannot see how anyone would take voting for granted. I mean we had thousands of votes that were not counted and the will of the majority of the people was usurped. We have to bond together to say, regardless of what the outcome is our voice will be heard and we will vote. If we don’t then the sacrifices that our ancestors made would truly be in vain.