Legacy Candidate Scott Andringa Running to Succeed Father as County Court Judge

Atty. R. Scott Andringa

By Spartacus Thrace

R. Scott Andringa is already running for county court judge, even though the 2012 election is almost two years away.  He is running for the seat currently occupied by his father.

Among the elected officials in Pinellas County up for election in 2012 is Judge of the County Court, Group 2, a seat currently occupied by Henry J. “Hank” Andringa, who is expected to retire in 2012.  Until now, there has been considerable speculation as to who might run for this seat when it becomes vacant.  That speculation ended December 13, 2010 when, with little fanfare, Andringa’s son, Attorney R. Scott Andringa, announced that he has entered the race to succeed his father when the next election is held, on November 6, 2012.

Robert Scott Andringa is a 1986 graduate of St. Petersburg High School, a 1990 graduate of Florida State University, and a 1992 graduate of Stetson Law School.  He was admitted to the practice of law in Florida in 1993.  He has worked as a prosecutor from 1993 to 2004 for the 6th Judicial Circuit in New Port Richey and from 2004 to 2006 in the 16th Judicial Circuit in Plantation Key.  He is a solo practitioner doing business in Largo, Florida as R. Scott Andringa, Esquire, LLC, and Suncoast Arbitration & Mediation, Inc., handling administrative, civil, and criminal cases.  He has been admitted to practice by The Florida Bar, the U.S. Middle District of Florida, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 11th Circuit, and the U.S. Supreme Court.  He also is a Florida Supreme Court-certified mediator in Circuit Civil, County, Family and Foreclosure cases.

Conservative Hope: Sen. George LeMieux Addresses the PCREC

By Spartacus Thrace

On Monday evening, November 8, 2010, outgoing United States Senator George LeMieux addressed the Pinellas County Republican Executive Committee (PCREC).  LeMieux, who had been appointed by Gov. Charlie Crist to complete the remaining term of Sen. Mel Martinez, spoke about some of his experiences in the Senate and how important it was to send the right people to Congress.  He criticized the Democrat-dominated Senate for its passage of  regulation that did not address the underlying problems that brought about the financial crisis, passage of Obamacare and the false promises of its proponents, and the Senate’s adjournment without addressing next year’s taxes.  LeMieux also addressed the looming national debt crisis facing the United States, telling his audience that “it’s worth than you think” and that failure of Democrats and Republicans to act will lead to a crisis similar to what Greece is experiencing.   LeMieux told his audience that there is nothing that Americans cannot do, that it is not our people who are broken — it is our government that is broken.  He told those assembled that they need to send the right people, “problem-solvers,” to Washington who will do their jobs and come home home and live under the laws they passed, and he praised his successor, incoming Senator Marco Rubio, as one of the right people to send to the Senate.

Here is Senator LeMieux’s speech in its entirety, divided into two 10-minute segments [Hat-tip to the PCREC]:

Exit question:  Will George LeMieux run for the United States Senate in 2012?

The PCREC: Fired Up and Ready To Go

COMMENTARY 

By Spartacus Thrace 

A little over a year ago, the radical Lefties in the media and the Democratic Party declared the Republican Party roadkill in the wake of Marxist Barack Obama’s 52.92% to 45.66% victory over an erratic and clueless RINO named John McCain. Even before the election, media whores and political hacks were writing the GOP’s obituary, declaring that the Republican Party was a dead party walking, doomed to permanent irrelevancy, awaiting political execution at the hands of the voters on election day. One such hack, a former advisor to President Bill Clinton who also worked on the Hillary Clinton campaign named Sid Blumenthal even had a book published in early 2008, and wrote a follow-up commentary published in the Leftist media, smugly titled “The Strange Death of Republican America and 40 More Years: How the Democrats Will Rule the Next Generation.” As recently as May 2009, the Leftists in the media were gleefully publishing articles with headlines such as “Republicans in Distress: Is the Party Over?” and otherwise amusing themselves by mocking Republicans. But then, to paraphrase the President’s radical close friend and spiritual guide Rev. Jeremiah Wright,  the chickens that are the grim reality of what it means to be ruled by Obama and his fellow statists came home to roost.  No longer demoralized, the Republicans are returning to their conservative roots and spoiling for the fight against the statists.

The Last Straw — It’s Time for Crist to Quit the Senate Race

COMMENTARY

By Spartacus Thrace

(JANUARY 11, 2010 UPDATE) — It wasn’t even close.  Marco Rubio has today defeated Charlie Crist 106-54 in a straw poll held in Pinellas County, home of Charlie Crist. The poll, conducted by the Pinellas County Republican Executive Committee among 177 of its members in attendance, was a test of Crist’s strength among the Republican base and among long-time Crist stalwarts. Crist’s overwhelming loss to Rubio is being delared by the media as a major symbolic blow to Crist’s efforts to secure the Republican nomination for Senate on August 24th. Conservatives are hailing the result as proof that Crist is seen as a RINO (Republican In Name Only) even in his home county and that Crist is an obstacle to reforming government in accordance with conservative principles. A video provided by the PCREC shows the reaction of the crowd as the results were read by PCREC Chairman JJ Beyrouti (hat-tip to PCREC):

Charlie Crist

(January 9, 2010) — On Monday, January 11, 2010, Governor Charlie Crist will be facing a straw poll among Republicans in his home county at the meeting of the Pinellas County Republican Executive Committee (PCREC).  If Crist fails to achieve anything less than an overwhelming victory against his main challenger Marco Rubio it will be a failure for Crist.  If Crist is resoundingly rejected by those very Republicans who nurtured his brilliant political career since its inception, it will could signal a political Waterloo on Florida’s August 24 Primary Day for a man who has set his sights as far as the White House.

Crist knows all of this, and his obvious concern about the straw poll was shown when he and (now-former) Chairman of the Republican Party of Florida Jim Greer crashed the PCREC meeting in October.  Ominously, the crowd of about 200 Republicans attending that meeting was polite towards Crist and his friend, but not enthusiastic.

Local straw polls do not necessarily correlate to what the rest of the voters in that political party are thinking, nor do they indicate what voters outside that party will do on Election Day, but they are significant in other ways.  If, for instance, one candidate consistently loses straw polls held by local executive committees across the state while another candidate for the same office consistently wins them, it is a fair indicator that the losing candidate will do poorly in a closed primary because the people who vote in these straw polls tend to be the most influential people in that party.  That is the situation that Crist is in today, having lost handily to Rubio in straw polls all over the state, and it’s now time for Crist to rethink his Senate candidacy.

Rise of the Florida Tea Party Challenges Republicans

By Le Corbeaunoir

Florida Tea Party

The Florida Tea Party has registered with the Florida Secretary of State’s Division of Elections and is now an officially-recognized political party in the State of Florida.

The party, which registered in August, is chaired by Frederic B. O’Neal, a self-described “Reagan Democrat” who recently changed his party registration from Democrat to Tea Party in order to become the chair.

O’Neal is a Windermere, Florida attorney who presently represents the Sons of Confederate Veterans, a group wanting a “Confederate Heritage” specialty license plate that features the Confederate flag. That proposal died in legislative committee — apparently because the lawmakers thought it was too politically incorrect to deal with — and O’Neal has filed a lawsuit on behalf of the Veterans against members of the legislative committee and against the Florida Department of Highway Safety and Motor Vehicles (DHSMV). A federal judge has dismissed the portion of the suit against the legislators on the basis of legislative immunity but left the portion against the DHSMV standing. O’Neal is more widely known for his representation of high-profile tax protesters such as political consultant and radio talk show host Doug Guetzloe.

Sen. Paula Dockery

The “TEA” in Tea “Party” is an acronym for “Taxed Enough Already,” although the new party has an agenda that is broader than mere tax reform and at election time will be targeting those state senators who supported SunRail and supporting politicians who opposed it such as Paula Dockery in her campaign for the Republican nomination for governor. There has also been some media speculation that Marco Rubio might jump to the Tea Party if he fails to win the Republican Party nomination for U.S. Senate, but Republican insiders think that unlikely.  That may become more likely, however, if the Tea Party movement grows in strength to a point where it can have a statistical impact on election results.