Florida Politics - Campaigns & Elections. Lobbying & Government.

Martin DyckmanMarch 14, 2017

An enduring lesson on what freedom of speech should mean to a college campus was taught more than a half-century ago by one of my favorite professors at Florida State University, Lewis M. Killian. I hadn’t taken his class or even met him at the time but something I had written was a hot discussion […]

Martin DyckmanNovember 18, 2016

When the news flashed on Facebook before the election that Queen Elizabeth II had offered to take us back, some people failed to recognize it as one of Andy Borowitz‘s deft satires from the New Yorker. And some, I’m sure, now wish it were true. Afterward, a friend in Britain wrote to offer refuge — […]

Guest AuthorNovember 2, 2016

Tuesday, Nov. 8, is Game Day! The election is just days away and the news is all abuzz this morning about “rigged” elections, sexual-assault allegations, FBI investigations, unpaid taxes, and more emails. Just when you might have thought that the soap opera that is the 2016 presidential election could not get any crazier, well, here […]

Guest AuthorJune 3, 2016

“History, despite its wrenching pain, cannot be unlived, but if faced with courage, need not be lived again.” — Maya Angelou. In 1977, before VCRs became ubiquitous, “Roots” seized America by the throat — and never let go. Over eight nights, the trailblazing TV miniseries chronicled the struggle of kidnapped African Kunta Kinte and his descendants […]

Guest AuthorMay 4, 2016

Have you ever watched a Fox News Watters World segment where the host randomly asks simple questions of passersby and gets inaccurate and inane answers? It is similar in format to the old Jay Walking segments that Jay Leno used to do with similar results. At first I wondered just how many people had to […]

Darryl PaulsonApril 14, 2016

Here are a few basic facts about the electoral-college system. First, very few voters understand how it works. Second, most voters hate the system. Third, the system is almost impossible to change. Those who drafted the Constitution had little trust in democracy. James Madison, in The Federalist Papers, wrote that unfettered majorities tend toward “tyranny.” […]

Darryl PaulsonApril 13, 2016

Here are a few basic facts about the electoral-college system. First, very few voters understand how it works. Second, most voters hate the system. Third, the system is almost impossible to change. Those who drafted the Constitution had little trust in democracy. James Madison, in The Federalist Papers, wrote that unfettered majorities tend toward “tyranny.” […]

Martin DyckmanMarch 23, 2016

In 1789, as the new United States of America was just taking root, Thomas Jefferson wrote to a friend that “If I could not go to heaven but with a party, I would not go there at all.” The quotation is making one of its frequent rounds on the Internet. The remark was ironic, if […]

Guest AuthorMarch 1, 2016

The most repeated phrase of late on social media and on talking-head shows is, “This election is unlike anything ever before!” Each time I hear it I have to chuckle. Is it just a sign of our times that we think ourselves so special that everything we do has to be the biggest or […]

Martin DyckmanFebruary 17, 2016

Mitch McConnell couldn’t even wait until Justice Antonin Scalia‘s corpse was cold before exploiting his death for partisan politics. The oleaginous majority leader means to keep the seat empty, no matter the likelihood of that paralyzing the sharply divided Supreme Court for a year, on the chance that voters might elect a Republican president to […]

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Grade D+ written on an exam paper

Martin Dyckman: Memory of FSU professor’s enduring lesson on free speech, tolerance

Martin Dyckman: Our ‘flawed’ Electoral College, mistrusting the people

Gerrod Lambrecht: Are you ready for some football … I mean election?

Darryl E. Owens: ‘Roots’ reminds America’s past haunts our present, future perfect union

Ed Moore: Young Americans need to learn about the country’s history, values

Darryl Paulson: Voters don’t understand or like the Electoral College

Darryl Paulson: Voters don’t understand or like the Electoral College

Martin Dyckman: Smart Republicans need to start thinking, acting on their own

Ed Moore: Is this an election unlike any seen before?

Martin Dyckman: Refusing to approve Obama nominee could hurt the Party of No in November