If the Republican National Committee had its way, Florida voters would spend today doing anything but voting. The party's national pols told Florida to hold its primary March 6, and then told Sunshine State voters to like it or else.
You know how well folks around here react to that stuff, so the Republican-controlled state Legislature said, and I'm paraphrasing here, "pfffffffffftttt " and decided the state will vote when it darn well pleases.
Registered Republicans decided they'd be darn well pleased to vote today. So be it.
There's no reason why the fourth-largest state in the union shouldn't have considerable say in shaping the national election conversation, and that's what will happen once voting is done here.
"I would agree with that notion," Hillsborough County Republican chairman Art Wood said. "What has made it special here is the intensity of the two front-runners, and I think that shows (the Legislature was right). But can I answer that for sure after August?"
He laughed nervously. At least it sounded nervous.
"They tried to spread the primaries out all over the calendar so they wouldn't be clumped together and we wouldn't have a prolonged dry spell with little media coverage," Wood said. "They were very, very disappointed when Florida broke ranks."
Yes, the state is guilty of throwing a wrench into the RNC's game plan. The plan was whacked though.
On the old schedule, eight other states would have held caucuses or primaries between now and March 6, when Florida was scheduled to vote on Super Tuesday with 10 other states. By moving up its date, Florida was able to accommodate two debates and much more individual time from the candidates.
That's not too much to ask for a state that has proven pivotal in presidential politics. It's happening again, too.
Of course, a big part of the turn is Romney's blitz of attack ads. Money talks, or at least lets the candidate buy TV air time and then talk.
Beyond the ads, though, voters got to watch candidates on the stump. If they had been trying to fit Florida in during a whirlwind dash through Super Tuesday states, we might never have heard Gingrich tell folks on the Space Coast of his plan to colonize the moon.
There are about 4 million registered Republican voters in Florida, far more than Iowa, New Hampshire and South Carolina combined. Moving up the primary has the risk of making the state look like a brat on the national scene, but so be it.
We can't always say this about elections in Florida, but the state got it right this time.
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