There were several major shake-ups in the Scott administration over Thanksgiving break, with several key department heads stepping down. The one I am excited about is Herschel Vinyard, who until last week headed up the state’s Department of Environmental Protection. Perhaps the thing that was never really understood about Vinyard was the fact he is a defense contractor – military defense, NOT environmental – which always seemed an odd choice. He is credited with lowering the wait-time for permitting and in doing so, has almost completely gutted everything about the DEP that kept our water safe. He oversaw record few litigation cases, record number of permits, and overall, left little evidence that he did anything to help the environment. During his tenure, a number of private companies had to step up and sue the state in order to stop huge water permits from moving forward. While I am sure he will be replaced with someone just as bad, I say good riddance to this bad apple. – KB@BurnettKaty
81 year-old Rhana Bazzini started walking from Sarasota on October 13 in support of an amendment to the U.S. Constitution that states “corporations are not people and money is not speech.” This is a 400 mile walk that will be completed this week in Tallahassee. Inspired by 89-year-old Granny D, who walked across the country for campaign finance reform in 1999, the 81-year-old will arrive with fellow marchers Harvard Law Professor Lawrence Lessig (MayDay PAC), Former Green Party Presidential Candidate David Cobb (Move To Amend), John Bonifaz (Free Speech for People) and hundreds more at the Tallahassee state capitol on December 3 at 10 am for a press conference. In this era where citizen participation and awareness sometimes wanes, Bazzini’s march is certainly a standpoint event. – KK@kkfla737
Along the lines of our recent discussions about white working class voters and the struggles of Democrats, National Journal had this excellent article about how this applies to 2016 that you just might have missed over the holiday weekend. – KK@kkfla737
The Florida Squeeze 
Vinyard proved himself to be no friend of FL’s environment and natural resources. Of course he was an inappropriate choice, but that SOP for Rick Scott. What needs happen now is holding Scott’s feet to the flame to deliver on all the flowery promises and pledges he made during the campaign, word for word! In addition, environmental activists need to closely monitor the actual spending of the Amendment 1 doc stamp funds, without any reduction of funds designated to these purposes prior to the election, but in ADDITION to those currently budgeted funds. The Repubs are famous (or infamous, actually) for their shell games to circumvent the will of the people passed via constitutional amendments. You know, Jeb’s devious plans and such. It is nothing less than outrageous the deceit with which these legislators and GOP governors have treated the citizens of Florida for going on twenty years! I think the Democratic legislators and activists need to draw a line in the sand, and make it clear that their backroom sneaking dealings, a violation of FL’s Sunshine laws, will no longer be tolerated! If Scott welches on his promised actions, we must lobby those colluding with him to produce, or get out of office! As Scott’s unfit to serve patronage appointees flee the ship like rats, we need to make it clear that appointing Republican contributors who haven’t a clue is not acceptable, and poses a danger to the best interests of all Floridians!
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At what point did journalists become experts on voting behavior?
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