Moments before he introduced David Jolly to the crowd at the St. Petersburg Marriott last night, former St. Pete Mayor Rick Baker displayed some comic chops, joking that he had just spoken on the phone with President Obama, who wanted to inform Alex Sink that "if she likes her home in Hillsborough County, she can keep her home in Hillsborough County."
It got big laughs, but it also telegraphed what very well could be the biggest obstacle from the Democrats dream of finally taking the district that has been controlled by Republicans for decades yet has also voted for Obama the last two election cycles.
Jolly won a decisive victory over Kathleen Peters and Mark Bircher last night, but now it really gets interesting. In his speech last night, Jolly gave cursory nods to flood insurance problems and the ills of Obamacare, but spent a considerable part of his 13-minute address in hammering home the fact that it was Washington Democrats who were attempting to cram down Pinellas County's throat an outsider with no roots in their community. Prepare to hear much more of that rhetoric over the next two months.
Well, Florida has a new Lieutenant Governor in the personage of one Carlos Lopez-Cantera, who currently has been serving as Miami-Dade County's Property Appraiser. The big question is, will we hear anything from Lopez-Cantera other than telling us why Rick Scott needs to be re-elected the rest of this year?
In case you've been on Mars in the past week, you may have missed the news that the International Indian Film Awards (IIFA) are coming to Tampa in April. A major production about the event was held yesterday at the Tampa Theater with much pomp and circumstance.
And speaking of the Tampa Theater, former Navy SEAL Marcus Luttrell, whose riveting memoir about a mission gone bad in Afghanistan Lone Survivor has now been made into a major motion picture, will be coming to speak there in March.