Darryl PaulsonNear the end of his term as governor, when his name was being floated as a possible vice president on the McCain ticket, Charlie Crist visited Israel to help enhance his foreign policy credentials. One of the Israeli newspapers ran the headline “Christ is Coming.”
It wasn’t Christ, but Crist, who was coming, and now many Democrats are looking to him to resurrect the Florida Democratic Party.
Like any political candidate, Crist will have to evaluate his strengths and weaknesses as a candidate. His greatest strength is his extraordinary name recognition. Crist won’t have to spend a penny to get voters to remember his name in the 2014 race for governor.
His name and face are already plastered all over the state on billboards and commercials. That name recognition will be a great help in raising campaign money.
Being known is one thing; being liked is something else. A recent Quinnipiac Poll found that Crist had a 48 percent favorable rating, while 31 percent viewed him unfavorably. Gov. Rick Scott can only dream of ratings like that.
As I have told many reporters, “pound for pound, Charlie has greater political skills than anyone in Florida politics.” People who meet Crist feel like he is their friend. The fact that so many call him Charlie attests to the personal skills he brings to the table.
As great as his political skills are, Crist is not invincible. One need only to look at his performance in the 2010 U.S. Senate race.
Starting out with a 30-point lead in the Republican primary against Marco Rubio, the Crist campaign fell apart so badly that Crist dropped out of the Republican primary and ran as an Independent. Rubio pulled off one of the greatest upsets in Florida political history by defeating Crist and Democratic opponent Kendrick Meek.
We know the standard arguments against Crist. First, he is a flip-flopper.
As someone who defeated his GOP primary opponent in the 2006 governor’s race by running as the “true conservative” and “a Ronald Reagan, Jeb Bush Republican,” he quickly abandoned his party and the principles he campaigned on.
The Florida Republican Party puts out a daily email, “This Day in Cristory,” which reminds voters of all of the Crist low-lights. One of the recent emails highlighted “the Crist crash v. The Scott surge.” Under Crist, unemployment in Florida rose to more than 11 percent. In the Scott administration, the unemployment rate has almost been cut in half and more than 800,000 jobs have been created.
Prominent Democrats such as Alex Sink and Tampa Mayor Bob Buckhorn have criticized the notion of Crist as the Democratic nominee. Sink has said that a Crist campaign would be “a disaster.” On a recent TV program, Buckhorn lamented that “I’m frustrated that our bench is not deeper than it is, the fact that we could conceivably wind up with a candidate who one or two years ago was saying something entirely different than where he is today.”
In addition to those criticisms of Crist, I think there are two other issues that will determine his viability as a Democratic candidate.
First, Crist appears to be a serial office seeker. He runs for an office, but never stays. He was elected to the Florida Senate and then abandoned that position to run unsuccessfully for the U.S. Senate.
He then served a term as education commissioner in the cabinet, followed by a term as attorney general and then a term as governor before running for the U.S. Senate. He is becoming “one and out Charlie.”
The greatest problem Crist faces, in my view, is why would voters elect Crist to the same position he abandoned four years ago. Almost everyone believes that Crist would have won a second term as governor in 2010 if he ran. Why would anyone give up being chief executive of the fourth largest state, a position where Crist could have greatly influenced public policy and developed a national reputation, for a position as the least ranking member of the dysfunctional U.S. Senate?
Until Crist can answer these last two questions, Florida voters will be reluctant to cast their vote for Crist. I know I am.
