Senate candidate Hasner suggests LeMieux owns piece of ‘Durbin Tax’

The blogosphere is ablaze again; flame of the day is the ‘Durbin Tax,’ an amendment to the Dodd-Frank financial regulations bill.

Anyway, US Senate candidate Adam Hasner (R) is reminding voters that Sen. George LeMieux (R) who was appointed by then Gov. Charlie Crist (NPA) actually voted for what Hasner said was the “liberal Democrat Senator Durbin’s Debit Card Tax.’

LeMieux got the Senate seat because he and Crist were longtime allies and because another senator stepped down.

The fee or tax is a direct result of Durbin’s legislation; no doubt about that. That’s one reason everyone was so confused when Durbin started foaming at the mouth about Bank of America charging customers to use plastic cash. BoA now has a $5 monthly fee for most debit card users.

Hasner also pointed out the majority of Senate Republicans voted against the bill.

The bill will also, in my opinion, make credit harder for young people to obtain.

Numerous media have run stories about Durbin’s amendment and its negative impact on banks and consumers.

At the moment, Real Clear Politics has incumbent Nelson’s seat listed as a tossup. Nelson, however, is ahead of all Republican challengers in a theoretical matchup based on averages of all polls. One polling company cited, Public Policy Polling, routinely discloses an association with the Democratic Party.

A Quinnipiac Poll taken 9/14-19 has Nelson up by only 9 against any Republican challenger. That poll sampled more than 1000 registered voters, so it’s probably the poll I would take most seriously.

That poll is one reason I see the 2012 Senate race as tilting Republican.

Nelson is currently enjoying a honeymoon period because he has no challenger within his own party. His numbers will drop once the GOP nominee tackles the Democrat’s voting record. Matters like the reauthorization of the Serve America Act (expanded, costing billions), ObamaCare(costing hundreds of billions or trillions), and the bill containing the Durbin amendment (costing BoA customers that $5 a month and there are plenty more revenue options within)—Nelson will have to answer to his constituents and the many other bills he helped pass.

Sarah Rumpf, a blogger from Orlando, has commentary on LeMieux’s voting record—one of his most questionable votes aligned with Democrats in favor of the complex, poorly written, consumer unfriendly Food Safety Modernization Act. LeMieux wasn’t there for very long, so his voting record isn’t as deep as the Democrat senator’s.

Rumpf is supporting Hasner in the GOP Primary.

Col. Mike McCalister is also running in the GOP Primary. One PPP poll taken in late September shows him doing better against Nelson than the other GOP contenders. McCalister has some solid support from a number of the GOP women I know.

I’d guarantee you Nelson and his fellow Dems will pull out all the stops to hold on to the Senate seat. I believe liberals will conduct an all-out war against the Republican challenger, complete with character assassination.

Therefore as we Floridians contemplate our candidate, perhaps we should take a very hard look at these candidates because whatever they have voted for, claimed to have done or actually did in the past will be powerful ammo for the Democrats.

In this political climate and government battered economy, the US Senate seat for Florida could, with the right candidate, end up in the GOP column. Hopefully my fellow Republicans realize the risk and the opportunity before us.

(Analysis by Kay B. Day/Oct. 5, 2011)

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