Happy New Year to one and all out there on the Internet!
It's great to be back in this regular space after essentially a two-break at the end of the year to celebrate the holidays and read as many top 10 lists as humanly possible.
But it's a big week in politics: Rick Scott is inaugurated on Tuesday, and the new Congress, which includes 63 more House Republicans and 6 more U.S. GOP U.S. Senators, gets to work on Wednesday.
And of course, the race for Tampa mayor and city council seriously begins to happen now, as we observed the first casualty of the season yesterday, when former Tampa Police captain Marion Lewis said his continuing litigation against the city for having him fired for running against Pam Iorio in 2007 is forcing him out of the race.
(Speaking of the mayor's race, we'll repeat what I wrote in a blog post late last week: CL will host its own mayoral debate here in our warehouse offices on February 10).
Statewide, along with Charlie Crist, the entire Florida cabinet is now out of power. That includes outgoing Lieutenant Governor Jeff Kottkamp, who cost the state over a million dollars for his own travel the past four years, prompting CL to question the value of such a position.
On the national scene, those new House Republicans are already speaking boldly about their goals in the upcoming Congress, including not voting to raise the ceiling on the national debt in March.
And how 'bout that Darrell Issa?, who you may not know well now, but if has anything to do with it you'll be seeing a lot more of on your cable television screens and in your national news sections of your local paper soon.
the report here.
This article appears in Dec 30, 2010 – Jan 5, 2011.