Florida Politics - Campaigns & Elections. Lobbying & Government.

Mitch PerryJanuary 18, 2016

Happy MLK Jr. Day, everybody. We’re 30 years into this day being a national holiday, and yet not even 40 percent of American businesses give the day off to their employees. Last night (at the very inconvenient hour of 9 p.m.) the three Democratic contenders for president debated in Charleston, South Carolina, two weeks before the […]

Mitch PerryJanuary 12, 2016

OK, let’s not pretend that anyone out there is really all that interested, much less excited, that Barack Obama will deliver his final State of the Union address tonight. I would say that it’s an antiquated relic that the country has transcended, and in fact, last year’s SOTU was the least viewed since 2000. Having […]

Mitch PerryJanuary 11, 2016

Good morning, everyone. What a weekend it’s been. On Saturday, I saw “The Revenant,” the quasi-true story of Mountain Man Hugh Glass, who was part of an expedition attacked by Indians in 1823. He was nearly torn to pieces by a bear near present-day Lemmon, S.D., and left for dead by two companions. Then there […]

Mitch PerryJanuary 10, 2016

The deadline to sign up to to get on the Affordable Care Act in 2016 ends in three weeks, which is why Health & Human Services Secretary Sylvia Burwell was in Tampa on Sunday. Burrell addressed the congregation at New Mt. Zion Baptist Church in the V.M. Ybor neighborhood of Tampa, where she was joined […]

A.G. GancarskiJanuary 9, 2016

An interesting email exchange between Republican Jacksonville Mayor Lenny Curry and Democratic Tampa Mayor Bob Buckhorn in recent days concerned a subject salient to Curry: “how to be a Republican mayor.” Buckhorn emailed Curry Monday: “Sounds like you have a lot going on in Jax. Came across this and thought you would be interested. Not sure I subscribe to […]

Mitch PerryJanuary 8, 2016

The popular perception is that the Democratic Party as a whole stopped debating gun control after Al Gore lost his home state of Tennessee and Bill Clinton‘s Arkansas in the 2000 election. Looking back on that perspective 16 years later, it’s evident that yes, they did stop debating the issue nationally, but that it doesn’t […]

Mitch PerryJanuary 6, 2016

Since we don’t know who the presidential nominees are yet, it’s insanely premature to speculate on who might be the vice-presidential candidates, right? Of course not. Actually, the reason I’m even thinking of this today is that my original story idea for this column is being banked for a future story. But I thought about […]

Mitch PerryDecember 30, 2015

As first said by Greek philosopher Heraclitus, in the universe change is the only constant. Nowhere was that more applicable than in Tampa Bay during the past 12 months. From the much-ballyhooed dismissal of MaryEllen Elia as Hillsborough County School Board District superintendent to redistricting and the rising (and falling) fortunes for hizzoner Bob Buckhorn, many of the leading […]

Associated PressDecember 21, 2015

More than five years after the Deepwater Horizon oil drilling rig exploded off the Louisiana coast, killing 11 workers and sending more than 134 million gallons of oil into the Gulf of Mexico, a portion of the billions of dollars in settlement money with oil giant BP and others is slowly starting to reach 23 […]

Peter SchorschDecember 17, 2015

As much as we would like to think otherwise, in politics, not everyone can be a winner. To put it another way, as Judge Smails did in the eminently quotable “Caddyshack”: “The world needs ditch-diggers, too.” Few will disagree that 2015 was a particularly fertile political year, one that produced a bumper crop of political disappointments. That’s what […]

Tag: Bob Buckhorn

Mitch Perry Report for 1.18.16 — Clinton and Sanders clash in Charleston

Mitch Perry Report for 1.12.16 — SOTU time, baby!

Mitch Perry Report for 1.11.16 – R.I.P. , David Bowie

HHS Secretary Sylvia Burwell visits Tampa to tout ACA

In emails Bob Buckhorn, Lenny Curry discuss “how to be a Republican mayor”

Mitch Perry Report for 1.8.16 — No, Obama still isn’t going to take away the guns

Mitch Perry Report for 1.6.15 – Are Nikki Haley and Julian Castro top picks for VP?

Mitch Perry’s Top 10 stories of 2015 in Hillsborough politics

Florida counties have different plans for oil spill funds

Peter Schorsch: The 5 most disappointing Florida politicians of 2015