THE HOLLOW DONKEY:

Democrats' state meeting shows party in bad shape (FLORIDA TODAY, 12/04/03)

Florida Democrats are starting their three-day state convention today in Orlando, the focus of which will be the appearance of the nine Democrats running for the White House.

The event will draw the national news media eager to recall the 2000 presidential debacle, and there will be lots of optimistic talk by party leaders about prospects for the coming election year.

But the Democrats' few days in the sunshine will mask a Florida organization in woeful shape.

Even the most gung-ho stalwarts know the party is barely hanging on, a situation that will deteriorate even further unless Democrats read and take to heart the highly successful playbook of Florida Republicans. [...]

The party's impotence is evident in Brevard County, where it once was dominant but is now on life support. In six state legislative races here in 2002 -- two for the Senate, four for the House -- the party could field only two credible candidates.

Many Republicans had no Democratic opposition, and two who did faced Democrats with arrest records -- one for selling LSD, and the other for writing bad checks.

Currently, only two Democrats in Brevard hold major elective office. They are County Commissioners Nancy Higgs and Jackie Colon. Statewide, the outlook is not one to cause Democrats to start singing "Happy days are here again."

The GOP controls the governor's mansion and all constitutional offices. It also has a large majority in the Legislature, where Republicans outnumber Democrats 81-39 in the House and 26-14 in the Senate.

W's defense need go no further South than Maryland--which, by the way, just elected a Republican governor--that's pretty ugly.

Posted by Orrin Judd at December 5, 2003 7:55 PM