In Scott vs. Crist, besieged voters had noses held
Well, Charlie Crist is finally a true Florida Democrat.
He earned his stripes by continuing the proud party tradition of losing.
Charlie did something extra special, though. He lost to a guy who no one thought could win.
To a guy with nicknames like "Shady Rick" and "The Least Popular Governor in America," thanks to approval ratings that rivaled stinkweed.
Democrats thought they could run a canned ham and beat Scott.
They found a ham all right. Charlie Crist has always thrived in the spotlight (as long as there was an electric fan nearby), feeling your pain and flashing his empathetic doe eyes to prove it.
Republican, Democrat, independent — Charlie has always been whatever you wanted him to be.
Except authentic — which was probably his biggest downfall.
Many Democrats simply couldn't wrap their arms around a guy who had spent his entire political career denouncing their values.
Crist's supporters claimed his transformation from Republican to independent to Democrat was all about evolution. It looked more like convenience — a guy who was running out of parties that would take him.
Who gets excited about being asked to the prom by a guy who has already been rejected by every other girl in school?
So a lot of Dems just stayed home.
I still think Democrats erred by not running ... you know, an actual Democrat.
Still, this loss wasn't all Charlie's fault. Or the Democratic Party's.
They were massively outspent. And Republicans surged everywhere Tuesday. It was a nationwide rebuttal of the status quo and President Barack Obama.
If anything, the fact that Scott won Florida by only 1 percentage point shows what a lousy candidate he was. Republicans in other states won by double digits.
This nation saw a tidal wave of conservative votes. Rick Scott barely rode back into office on a trickle.
Still, it was enough, thanks largely to the mountain of cash he spent on TV ads.
Gripe all you want about negative campaigning. It works. Especially if the message is nonstop.
If someone tells you you're fat and ugly 10 times a day for three months, you start to believe it, even if you look like Julia Roberts.
By the time Election Day rolled around, voters were convinced that the handsome Charlie was really just a fat, ugly cliché of a flip-flopping politician.
Rick Scott knew his weakness. It was himself. Scott simply couldn't buy likability. He couldn't make his own numbers go up. So he made Charlie's go down.
Scott also had job metrics that were hard to combat. The economy recovered. Jobs rebounded. Sure, the same thing happened in states red and blue throughout America. Still, Scott could accurately point to the stats and say: I told you so.
The other thing Scott offered in the final months was hope — hope for skeptical voters that maybe he wasn't really as bad as they thought.
After presiding over a term where he ravaged the environment and savaged public schools, Scott tried to reinvent himself. He proclaimed that, if re-elected, he would become the greenest governor ever. He would boost school funding to record highs and even become a bipartisan leader.
His pledges and promises stood in direct contrast to his record. Still, Scott knew voters weren't happy with either candidate. They were going to have to hold their noses and vote. So Scott gave them a reason to think he might not stink as badly next time around.
It will be interesting to see if Scott actually keeps his word.
His biggest donors aren't counting on it. The business interests that funded Scott's campaign don't want environmental regulations any more than they want ringworm.
They viewed his last-minute conversion to populist as an empty campaign promise meant to woo the masses. We'll see who was right ... if the softer, post-partisan side of Rick really shows up.
We'll also see if Democrats in this state can ever field candidates who truly resonate with voters.
Democrats have the numbers. What they don't have is a winning strategy.
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