Politics

Florida advocates for liberalizing marijuana laws  felt the rush on Nov. 6 when two states, Colorado and Washington, legalized marijuana and Massachusetts approved its use for medical purposes.

So they really like their chances for their own proposed measures, two for medical and one for out-and-out legalization.

Things are changing in Tallahassee, but how much?

Republicans have lost their supermajority control of the Florida Legislature after Democrats made modest gains in both chambers in this month's elections.

What will that mean for future policy decisions and the state's unpopular governor Rick Scott?  

Why will 2013 be his most important year, and is Florida's former Gov. Charlie Crist breathing down Scott's neck? Will Crist go after his old job?

Just this week, news circulated that former leaders of the Florida Republican Party have admitted that Florida's voting law was aimed at suppressing the vote this year during President Obama's reelection.

Democrats in the U.S. House are clamoring for a federal investigation.

For the fourth year in a row, state lawmakers are going to take a stab at passing a law that would ban texting while driving all around the state.

State Sen. Nancy Detert, R-Venice, has introduced the ban: Senate Bill 52. Her bill was among a small list of bills that have been introduced already for the upcoming Florida Legislative session, which starts in March 2013.

The Latino vote was one of the most talked about voting blocs this year, mostly because this demographic helped propel President Obama into his second term in office this year -- especially in important swing states such as Florida and New Mexico.

Florida's Judicial Qualifications Commission has filed some new charges against former Miami-Dade County Judge Ana Pando.

Pando, who resigned from the bench after losing her primary campaign in August, has been under investigation for using her prestige and judicial stationery to revive a dissolved corporation headed by a friend of hers.

The whole idea behind the voting law state legislators passed in 2011 was to discourage Democratic voters.

That's the bottom line in a Palm Beach Post story by Dara Kam and John Lantigua. Although the law was presented as an urgently needed defense against voter fraud, sources including former Republican Gov. Charlie Crist and former state GOP Chairman Jim Greer and some Republican campaign consultants tell the Post a very different story:

A look into the City of Miami's finances this year shows the city failed to meet its own financial rules and benchmarks.

According to The Miami Herald, "Miami failed to comply with eight of its 13 financial standards in the 2010-11 budget year, according to an internal audit published late last month."

Among the shortcomings:

The proposal to build mega-casinos in South Florida never made it to a final vote in the last session of the Florida Legislature. Now it looks like the issue may not be coming up again for at least another year.

Senate President Don Gaetz is setting up a new committee to examine Florida gambling which he says is both over- and under-regulated. But Gaetz is considered an opponent of gambling and he's in no hurry to pass a casino gambling bill.

Former Gov. Charlie Crist is taking fire from the Republican press release machine now that speculation is growing that he'll challenge Gov. Rick Scott as a Democrat in 2014.

The AP and Sarasota Herald-Tribune suggest there's an angry personal element to this that transcends ordinary politics, probably because Crist was once a Republican governor and the darling of his party. But now he's a cheating rat.