A New Era Begins

BIM was honored recently to sit down with many of the local Democratic Party's activists and one Richard Lydecker, the new DEC Chairman.

BIM can only go off of words and actions. It seems to me, that so far, Mr. Lydecker is saying all the right things. He spoke of unifying around a solitary purpose, electing Democrats. This singular aim which should be the DECs main goal, is crucial because it should default & trump all the idiotic rivalries within the DEC. He spoke of bringing in big names such as CFO Sink and Sen. Nelson down to the DEC meetings to increase turnout. It'll be nice to get Sink in SoFla for once!

Overall, this relative neophyte to the local scene has his finger on what to do; he's either been coached up or naturally has common sense and a good political instinct. Hopefully, those that joined me at the meeting will listen, put aside all our egos and work together. I'm genuinely excited, but the first test, as Mr. Lydecker emphasized, is to elect Democrats to the Governor's Mansion, the Cabinet and for the State House, for which he said polling is being conducted to see where we put our resources into. I feel much better about where we're going in 2010 now than I did before.

Thankgiving

I thought the President's email was particularly touching this year and while I usually stray from propaganda for candidates I think this one is poignant and important enough to copy and use in full. Enjoy your Thanksgiving everyone.

Tomorrow, Thanksgiving Day, Americans across the country will sit down together, count our blessings, and give thanks for our families and our loved ones.

American families reflect the diversity of this great nation. No two are exactly alike, but there is a common thread they each share.

Our families are bound together through times of joy and times of grief. They shape us, support us, instill the values that guide us as individuals, and make possible all that we achieve.

So tomorrow, I'll be giving thanks for my family -- for all the wisdom, support, and love they have brought into my life.

But tomorrow is also a day to remember those who cannot sit down to break bread with those they love.

The soldier overseas holding down a lonely post and missing his kids. The sailor who left her home to serve a higher calling. The folks who must spend tomorrow apart from their families to work a second job, so they can keep food on the table or send a child to school.

We are grateful beyond words for the service and hard work of so many Americans who make our country great through their sacrifice. And this year, we know that far too many face a daily struggle that puts the comfort and security we all deserve painfully out of reach.

So when we gather tomorrow, let us also use the occasion to renew our commitment to building a more peaceful and prosperous future that every American family can enjoy.

It seems like a lifetime ago that a crowd met on a frigid February morning in Springfield, Illinois to set out on an improbable course to change our nation.

In the years since, Michelle and I have been blessed with the support and friendship of the millions of Americans who have come together to form this ongoing movement for change.

You have been there through victories and setbacks. You have given of yourselves beyond measure. You have enabled all that we have accomplished -- and you have had the courage to dream yet bigger dreams for what we can still achieve.

So in this season of thanks giving, I want to take a moment to express my gratitude to you, and my anticipation of the brighter future we are creating together.

With warmest wishes for a happy holiday season from my family to yours,

President Barack Obama

The GOP and Foreign Policy

Now on to bigger and better things.

Naked Politics reported a couple of interesting stories this week. First, our wonderful new Senator's first toe tap into the ocean of foreign policy is turning into a disaster.

Higher ups in the State Department are a little angry that he's ignoring Brazil, the cornerstone of capitalism in South America and perhaps America's strongest ally, for political points. He's blocking the Obama appointed new ambassador to that country.

"This continuing, prolonged vacancy sends an unintended signal that the United States does not consider Brazil an important relationship,'' the nine former assistant secretaries of state wrote in a letter to LeMieux, urging him to lift his opposition to nominee Tom Shannon.

Yikes. What's the real political game?

Shannon had triggered the ire of South Florida Cuban Americans who believed he wasn't tough enough on the Castro regime during his tenure as a former assistant secretary of state for Western Hemisphere affairs under President George W. Bush.

Shock in a GOP member pandering to the lowest elements of the Cuban exile community.

Here's the Senator himself:

"I feel like I have a role and a responsibility far greater than other senators do in terms of anything that deals with Latin America, and I take that job seriously,'' said LeMieux, who will be a "special guest" at a DC fundraiser Friday for Crist. "This is about the entire hemisphere. This is about Venezuela, El Salvador, Bolivia, Colombia and Brazil and Cuba and the role that Mr. Shannon played . . . and the role he will play. We are burning the midnight oil here to make sure I'm doing the best job I can for 18 million Floridians, and that's my motivation.''

Bloomberg News reports the extended hold could cost Boeing Inc. up to $7.5 billion.

Yes, Mr. Shannon is almost entirely responsible for so much of the Western world seeing the Bush Administration's screw you approach to diplomacy and running to the opposite spectrum. If LeMieux's really burning the midnight oil by doing this, then I'm glad this moron will be gone in a year.

But that's not all. Congresswoman Ileana Ros-Lehtinen who continues to embarrass herself by schilling for herself on Twitter also screwed up in foreign policy. She of the military comes first mentality found one General who didn't back down, pissed him off and then argued with him in Congress.

Apparently she's a disrespectful little shrill when people don't kiss her butt, even to Generals who have done more for our country than she could ever dream of.

Today's House Foreign Affairs Committee hearing was a highly-charged event -- but the real sparks flew when Rep. Ileana Ros-Lehtinen tussled with retired Gen. Barry McCaffrey.

McCaffrey raised the Miami Republican's hackles with his testimony that Cuba represents no risk to national security and the travel ban should be scrapped since it hurts longtime U.S. interests.

Them's fightin' words. He destroyed the one issue she has to run on and wave the bloody flag of the cuban revolution. Cuba's a national security threat to America? How?

But during questioning, he took exception to Ros-Lehtinen, whom he said appeared to question his national security credentials and called him "Mr. McCaffrey,'' rather than "General.''

"To refute the argument that I had offered to the committee, she seemed to be implying my lack of commitment to U.S. national security, which is a silly thing for her to do,'' McCaffrey told reporters after the hearing. "She stated a very carefully chosen way to denigrate my military credentials, which she is not authorized to do.''

You know he's worked for that title, much like a doctor works for theirs. I'm pretty sure most doctors don't like having their title left out in their professional careers. Alas, Ileana will surely hypocritically post how wonderful the military is next time to score political points, while insulting them for political gain at other times.

She said she had written down the questions she wanted to pose to McCaffrey and that "General'' appears in her handwritten notes.

Too bad her brain's apparently too small for her to be able to both write something and then verbalize it. It's clearly done intentionally and I'm glad the General spoke out.

But that's what the GOP offers going forward folks. Enjoy!

Continual Dysfunction

Apparently the Miami-Dade DEC isn't happy having just had a chair who had verbal diarrhea getting removed. They're not happy having largely being a dysfunctional organization since around the turn of this millennium. Old habits die hard but apparently old rivalries, orchestrated events by party insider's from the Steering Committee, former candidates and DEC club presidents and the like, never die. In a widely circulated letter that I hear has reached the new DEC chair himself, individuals such as former Congressional Candidate Dave Patlak, Democrats of South Dade Club President Bob Goldstein, State Committeeman and former candidate for the Florida Democratic Party Chair Bret Berlin and a host of others are discussing the authority of Karen Thurman to remove and appoint a new DEC Chair.

The original letter comes from Dave Patlak, a longtime activist who ran for Congress in 2006 and Commissioner in 2004 as well as running for DEC Chair in 2008 to replace Joe Garcia. In it he questions whether the FDP can appoint a non-DEC member as Chairman.

He writes: "If there is not a properly appointed Chair, then a vacancy exists to be filled by an election called by the 1st Vice Chair within 45 days of the vacancy, correct?"

Kristin Wipior the current credentials chair responded to him "Richard has been a new member candidate since July." Chairman Lydecker had been sworn in the previous week.

Patlak continues by stating: " If you determine he is not a properly appointed DEC member, then you as 1st Vice Chair, should assume the duties of the Chair and convene an election for a new Chair"

Liz Collins has since continued this line of reasoning and blamed DEC Chaiman Lydecker for being "exclusive" by saying: "I see that this maley of coruption and exculsiveness will continue. It seems that he has choosen those individules that he will acknowledge as leaders of the PARTY."

Patlak's former position of Vice Chair for Outreach is now held by Henry Crespo who has also actively been attempting at undermining the brand new chair.

It seems as though some are already planning to destabilize a possible foundation for the DEC. The Party has received a large sum of money in just days since Chiszar's removal but it seems that the continued allegiances and rivalries have morphed and that many of the same characters move about while the local party continues to be dysfunctional at best. I wonder how much of this jockeying for positions and attempts to clarify the position of Mr.Lydecker are not at all for party interests but instead for the short sighted personal gain of certain individuals. It seems as though if you'd want to attempt to please the party and to help it, you'd try to end the bickering and cooperate with the FDP's lead.

Instead of some calling for this guy's head, they should see that he's already fund-raising and attempting to get some bearing as to where to move from here on out, and give him a chance. A united DEC it seems to me would be of utmost usefulness. Instead, the same old attempts to rise up in the career ladder and to injure one another rather than developing strategies to defeat the GOP seems to still be the mantra within the DEC. I hear Karen Thurman will be in town around the time of the next DEC meeting and I strongly hope she lays out some of the plans the state has so as to show what the state's strategy for this cycle is. Maybe this will calm some of this new found opposition down and allow for a reasonable time period before judgments about Chairman Lydecker are made.

Final Edition

As Blue in Miami posted earlier today, The FDP has removed Miami Dade DEC Chairman BJ Chiszar. Beth Reinhardt has a couple more details and the letter of removal on her Naked Politics blog and the FDP is not being polite about it!

Thurman's spokesman, Eric Jotkoff, said the timing is incidental and the complaints against Chiszar have been mounting for months. He's been in the post for about one year.

"He has engaged in activities that injured the name and status of the Florida Democratic Party,'' Jotkoff said. "Not only has he not been able to hold a single meeting with a quorum but repeatedly done things like try to sell access to our voter file to state House candidates and repeatedly been rude and overbearing toward the staff and to elected officials...We have huge election coming up in 2010 and we need a successful Democratic party down there."

Again as I reported earlier today. The rest is from Naked Politics:

Thurman is replacing Chiszar with Richard Lydecker, a Miami attorney who is little-known among Democratic activists but apparently has ties to Sen. Bill Nelson, former Miami Mayor Manny Diaz and Chief Financial Officer Alex Sink.

Here's the letter from Thurman to Chiszar: Download Letters of Removal for Miami-Dade DEC Chair B J Chiszar