Florida GOP women push 'Send the Dems Packing'

Republican women in the fourth largest state in the U.S. are definitely fired up as the 2010 election season approaches. That was evident when the Florida Federation of Republican Women meeting in January drew a record-breaking number of participants. These women have come up with a slew of creative ideas; the latest is ‘Send the Dems Packing.’

The graphic for 'Send the Dems Packing and Charlie Too' was created for events organized by Florida's GOP women. It is a very catchy graphic.The idea is to show up with boxes at various Democrat incumbents’ offices in Tallahassee and bid them farewell. In a news release on Friday, Jenny Whitaker, president of one of the largest groups in Florida, announced a ‘Send the Dems Packing’ meetup at Rep. Allen Boyd, Jr.’s office in Tallahassee. That event is scheduled for Thursday, Aug. 5, from 11:30 a.m.-1:00 p.m.

Whitaker’s Big Bend Republican Women club spans all of District 2, comprising 16 counties, 11,000 square miles and a 4.5 hour drive from one end to the other. Whitaker said, “We knew that Boyd’s seat was very vulnerable this year, especially after his vote for ObamaCare which went directly against what the people in this district wanted. But as we continue to promote this rally, we are getting even more excited and optimistic about a Republican victory in November. People are ready to get rid of Allen Boyd and put the right person in his seat.”

Other Democrat seats being targeted are held by Debbie Wasserman-Schultz, Alan Grayson and Ron Klein. FFRW has a ‘Farewell to Congressman Klein’ notice posted for a rally at Klein’s office in Boca Raton on Thursday, August 5, from 11:30 a.m.-1:30 p.m.

Those who are targeted are pretty much Democrat Party hardliners. Boyd claims he is a Blue Dog ‘conservative,’ but the nonpartisan site Open Congress said he has voted with his party 96 percent of the time. That includes casting a vote for ObamaCare, the most liberal piece of legislation passed in our lifetime with an unknown price tag because the Congressional Budget Office could not cost out items like discretionary spending.

Alan Grayson votes along party lines 98 percent of the time. Ron Klein also has a 98 percent party line vote rating. Debbie Wasserman-Schultz votes 99 percent with Democrats. Wasserman-Schultz came under fire at a townhall about health insurance when she attempted to spin the mandate to buy health insurance. Like other Democrats, she took the ‘it’s not a mandate, you’re just in a different tax bracket’ approach once the Obama administration figured out the mandate was, as many Republicans said, unconstitutional.

These congressmen have supported bills like the money pit known as HR 1388 (a volunteer, feel-good bill), the outrageous tax increase disguised as Cap and Trade (Hr 2454) and ObamaCare. They also raised the minimum wage in a down economy. All they had to do was check Franklin Delano Roosevelt’s records and they’d have seen low wage earners always lose jobs when the minimum wage is raised.

Besides that, the Democrat administration has officially taken the side of a foreign nation in the illegal alien battle, supporting the positions of Mexico and other foreign nations who disagree with Arizona’s new immigration bill. That is also unconstitutional, but no one appears to mind.

Other than Congress, another politician has a political target on his back—Gov. Charlie Crist. Once he went back on his promise and entered the US Senate race as an independent running against former Speaker of the House Marco Rubio, FFRW president Cindy Graves issued an official statement.

Chastising Crist for his actions as well as a lackluster performance as governor, Graves said, “The lack of integrity you have shown is astounding and has only become more aggressive since the first hint of it in 2008.” Graves was alluding to Crist’s premature endorsement of Sen. John McCain in the 2008 Primary. An endorsement like that by the de facto head of the party before the primary is frowned upon and viewed as dishonorable since there were a number of viable Republican candidates running.

At the January meeting, GOP women vowed to turn out Democrats who will go down in history as part of the most wasteful, most uninformed Congress in U.S. history, creating a record deficit and admitting publicly they do not read the bills they pass.

Judy O’Donnell, campaign chair for FFRW, said, “Our state organization has targeted 5 key races throughout the state to concentrate our ‘Send the Dems Packing’ initiative on,  and August 5, several of our clubs will be hosting rallies as part of this initiative. As we get closer to the election in November, we plan to have even more!”

(Commentary by Kay B. Day/July 30, 2010)

[Disclosure: Kay B. Day recently joined the Duval County Republican Women's Club.]