A fool and his money are soon parted: Charlie Crist is keeping GOP money

Charlie Crist opened his new headquarters today. During his speech to about 100 supporters a lone heckler asked about the money Crist received as a Republican. 

The Buzz: The standout moment came when a heckler started shouting at Crist (around 3:10 into clip), "What about the guys who gave you money when you were a Republican?!"

"I'm going to keep it!" Crist cheerfully responded, drawing roars of approval. Check out his wink right after.

Charlie Crist is just so much like Arlen Specter. He is not in politics for the people, he is doing it all for himself. Since he had zero chance of winning the Republican nomination, he decides to run as an independent (and using the Republican’s donors money to boot) because it is all about getting elected.

Frankly, it serves Charlie’s Republican donors right, that he is keeping their money. This is a man who embraced one of the largest spending packages in history at a time the nation could least afford it. That is supposed to be conservative? You get what you pay for, and in this case these donors paid for a snake in the grass.

Ed Morrissey at Hot Air offers a friendly warning to anyone who might still want to vote for Crist. 

So, we’ll see more clips like this of Crist happily keeping money donated to him under ultimately false pretenses. It’s a useful lesson to taxpayers about how Charlie sees their money. 

Sound advice!

Via: Memeorandum

Via: The Buzz

Via: Hot Air

Will the real Charlie Crist please stand up?

Marco Rubio was hammering away at Charlie Crist’s conservative bonafides all throughout the Republican primary. So successful was Rubio’s message that Crist abandoned all hope of wining the Republican nomination and is now running as an independent.

Now that Crist is an independent, and free of having to pretend he is a conservative, Crist is saying some interesting things.  First he tells National Review Online how happy he is as an independent. 

 “[Lieberman] told me that [going independent] is the most liberating thing,” Crist says. “He was right. I’m much happier now, to be perfectly candid.” 

Asked on Meet the Press if he would support a Democrat as leader of the Senate, the happier new independent Crist said he would be open to the idea stating: 

"I might not vote for either one," Crist said of which party's member he might support as majority leader. "I'm going to vote for who I think is going to be best for the people of Florida. If is happens to be a Democrat, so be it. If it happens to be a Republican, so be it." […] 

"When I'm an independent, I'm going to do what's I think is in the best interests of my people, and that's my decision," he explained. "And that's what I'm going to do for Floridians," Crist said And that's what people want, they don't want you to have to go with either Democrats or Republicans, you have to go with your gut and with your heart." 

This sounds so high minded, if you can believe any of it.  Here is the link to the Crist vs. Rubio debate on Fox Sunday. Listen to it and ask yourself does any of that jive with the Charlie Crist of today? 

I understand that people can change their political views.  I have changed some of mine over the years. There is usually some sort of epiphany that brings you to a new understanding. In the case of Charlie Crist, the only epiphany I can see since last month was his abysmal poll numbers.

Electing people like Crist is like taking a leap into the great unknown. Since they have no ideological core or principles, you have no idea how they will vote in the future.

Via: Memeorandum

Via: National Review

Via: The Hill

Charlie Crist announces he will run as an Independent

New York Times: MIAMI — Gov. Charlie Crist announced Thursday that he will run independently for the United States Senate, giving Florida a race that will once again make the state a gawk-worthy stage of American politics, where the country's desires, fears and conflicts play out.

Mr. Crist told supporters in his home town of St. Petersburg that his decision to leave the Republican party is "the right thing for America" and "the right thing for Florida."

"My decision to run for the U.S. Senate as a candidate without party affiliation says more about our nation and our state than it says about me," Mr. Crist said. "Unfortunately our political system is broken. I think we need a new tone in Washington." […] 

Did anyone really need a crystal ball to see this coming? Charlie Crist is basically doing exactly what Arlen Specter did, but without the blunt admission. For Crist and Specter it is all about keeping themselves employed on the public dime.

Polling data shows that Rubio is more than capable of beating the Democrat Kendrick Meek. If Charlie Crist really believes that America needs a new tone in Washington, then he should have stepped aside and allowed Rubio to bring it.  By running as an independent, Crist is turning an easy GOP pick up into a crapshoot. Hopefully Florida voters will reject this self-serving opportunist.

Via: Memeorandum

Via: The New York Times

Via: Rasmussen

RINO Charlie Crist shows his horn, vetoes teachers tenure bill

As if Marco Rubio wasn’t kicking Charlie Crist’s butt bad enough.  Today RINO Governor Charlie Crist vetoed a bill that would have tied teacher’s raises to student’s performance and end tenure for new hires.

St. Petersburg Times: […] Calling it "significantly flawed," Crist decried Senate Bill 6, which would link teacher pay to student test scores and eliminate tenure for all new hires, as both overreaching and too vague.

"We must start over," he said.[…]

Crist's noontime announcement came as little surprise. Although he initially voiced support for the bill, he had distanced himself as protests mounted. He insisted his decision was not influenced by his faltering primary race for the U.S. Senate.[…] 

"This bill has deeply and negatively affected the morale of our teachers, our parents and our students," Crist said. "They are not confident in our system because they do not believe their voices were heard."

Under the bill, half of a teacher's evaluation would depend on their students' learning gains. Good gains would equal positive evaluations and pay raises, which teachers said failed to factor the work that doesn't show up on tests — and ignores other forces that affect kids.

Tenure would have been out of the question for new teachers, which Crist highlighted in his problems with the bill.[…]

Clearly this maneuver will do nothing to help Charlie Crist catch up to Marco Rubio in the Republican primary. I think we should consider this veto as a telling sign that Charlie Crist will try to run as an independent in the general election.

Quinnipiac: Gov. Crist leads Meek 48 - 34 percent in a general election matchup, while Rubio's margin over the Democrat is just 42 - 38 percent, the independent Quinnipiac (KWIN-uh-pe-ack) University survey finds. 

If Crist were to file as an independent for the general election, he would get 32 percent of the vote, compared to Rubio's 30 percent and Meek's 24 percent. 

Another indication that Crist may go the independent route is that there is a rumor that the Florida Education Association might be running attack ad against Rubio for Crist. 

The Shark Tank: There are rumors of a deal in place between the Florida Education Association (FEA) and Charlie Crist for the union to run one million dollars of attack ads against Marco Rubio, Crist’s opponent in the U.S. Senate primary.  This would be in violation of FEC laws, as campaigns cannot coordinate with 501c non-profit organizations.  Call us cynical, but we must inquire- was this whole legislative spectacle orchestrated from the get-go by the Governor and other interested parties to allow Crist to play the role of the hero by intervening at the height of this drama and veto this largely unpopular measure- thus winning him the support of the teacher’s union (at least temporarily), and enabling him to be viewed as an independent maverick who bucks his own party, making himself more appealing to centrists and Democrats?  Inquiring minds want to know. 

Shades of Arlene Sepecter, do anything to get elected.

Via: Memeorandum

Via: St. Petersburg Times

Via: Quinnipiac

Via: The Shark Tank 

Full Video: Marco Rubio Vs. Charlie Crist on Fox News Sunday

From the opening remarks, I think Rubio captures the sentiment of the nation perfectly. Crist used his opportunity to immediately attack Rubio. Even without the attack, are we really just looking for public servants or are we looking for people who yank the country back to its slightly center right position?

Notice that Rubio looks at Crist when he answers the charges against him, while Crist only looks at Chris Wallace when making the charges, very telling.

Crist’s defense of the stimulus sounds like it could have been spoken from any Democrat. It did take me aback that Crist admits that if he were a senator he would have voted for the stimulus. Is embracing the devil as winning strategy in honesty or is it a desperate man with few options?

This debate can be summed up as Compassionate Conservative [Crist] vs. Commonsense Conservative [Rubio] or in the short form Bush vs. Palin.  Given the task ahead of repealing ObamaCare, the Compassionate Conservative seems so risky. Will such Republicans actually repeal ObamaCare or will they be misguided by compassion based arguments to simply trim around the edges of ObamaCare? To me this is the choice that Florida voters must decide.

Via: Memeorandum

Via: The New York Times

H/T: The Right Scoop

Rubio leads Crist 60-28 and Crist harps about a back wax

Talk about being beaten like a rented mule. The numbers against Crist are staggering. 

From Public Policy Polling: Rubio now leads Crist 60-28, including a staggering 71-17 lead with conservatives. Crist has a 49-36 advantage with party moderates, but they account for just 31% of likely primary voters compared to 65% who describe themselves as conservative. 

Rubio is benefiting from a widely held sentiment among Florida GOP voters that Congressional Republicans are too liberal and that Crist would add to the problem. 41% of them think that the party leadership in Washington is too liberal, and with those folks Rubio holds an 83-10 lead. 50% think that Crist himself is too liberal and with those voters Rubio's advantage expands even wider to 90-5.

It also looks like it's too late for Crist to audible and make another run for Governor. GOP voters say they'd prefer likely nominee Bill McCollum over Crist by a 49-35 margin. In fact Republicans generally just want Crist to go away- 56% say they'd like him out of office a year from now to 19% who'd like to see him continue as Governor and only 14% who want him in the Senate.[MORE] 

With numbers like these is it any wonder that Charlie Crist is now scrapping the bottom of the barrel with his attacks?  Check this out this exchange between Greta Van Susteren and Crist [emphasis mine] 

CRIST: Because he's trying to pawn himself off as a fiscal conservative. And yet just in reason weeks, two weeks ago it has come out in news accounts he had a Republican Party of Florida credit card that he charged $130 haircut, or maybe it was a back wax -- we are not sure what all he got at that place.

VAN SUSTEREN: Wait a second, stop. A back wax? Wait a second.

CRIST: I don't know what it was, you know?

VAN SUSTEREN: I know, but was there a suggestion it was for a back wax or are you being flip?

CRIST: I don't know what it was. Initially we were told it was a haircut. And then he said it wasn't a haircut. Then he had the gall to go on Neil Cavuto's show and said it was his money. It was a credit card from the Republican Party. It was party donors' money.

The detachment from reality is stunning to me. And to try to say that you're a fiscal conservative, yet you spend $130 for maybe a haircut and maybe other things, I don't know what you do at a salon we you are a guy.

I get my haircut for $11 from a guy named Carl the Barber in St. Petersburg, Florida where I grew up. And to me that's real fiscal conservatism...

That is a pretty funny thing for Crist to say when there is a long-standing rumor that he is gay and he tans himself until he looks like a Butterball on Thanksgiving.  Well, as the saying goes, desperate times call for desperate measures.

Via: Memeorandum

Via: Public Policy Polling

Via: Fox News