Starting to heat up

So, after getting the AFL-CIO endorsements and Red to Blue endorsements, South Florida's three challengers did well financially and kept pace with the incumbents.

Now the GOP is making national moves besides President Bush fundraising for the Balarts. The Miami Herald's Naked Politics Blog says that House GOP Whip Roy Blunt added the Balarts to the Regain our Majority Program.

"Regaining our Republican majority is a battle all House Republicans are invested in, and through ROMP we put our campaign dollars where our mouths are," Blunt said in a release. "We can each play a critical role in getting our message out, and ROMP is an important component of helping our members and candidates do just that this fall."

They'll benefit from an upcoming July 16 fundraiser.

I think the GOP is well aware of what's happening locally here. I remember being told a prominent state GOP official in 2005 that the GOP would "Hold their office seats for another 20 years because the memory of Fidel would linger". I think they are counting too much on that and are not looking at the changing electoral landscape, the fact that other nationalities won't vote for them as usual with true candidates sizing them up. Even locally it could get real ugly for the GOP.