Graham makes his presidential race official
Sen. Bob Graham made his presidential race official Thursday, creating a campaign committee to begin collecting contributions. ''I intend to be the Democratic nominee for president,'' said the Florida Democrat in a statement. ``I am the best prepared to lead, and the most able to win.''  

Lightning puts hole in wing of plane carrying Florida governor
Gov. Jeb Bush's plane was struck by a bolt of lightning today that was powerful enough to leave a hole in one of the wings. Bush's twin-engine Beechcraft King Air safely completed a trip from Tallahassee to Orlando and none of the seven people aboard was hurt, said Alia Faraj, a spokeswoman for the governor.

Florida inmate Amos King executed for 1977 slaying
STARKE — Amos King, maintaining his innocence to the end, was executed Wednesday by lethal injection for the rape and murder of a Tarpon Springs woman almost 26 years ago. King, 48, was condemned for the 1977 killing of Natalie Brady, 68, who lived near a Tarpon Springs corrections center where King was a work-release inmate. He then set fire to her home. ...

The governor's loyalty
The National Governors Association is a very exclusive club. Membership is limited to 50, and every one has to win a state election. The members, now split 26-24 between Republicans and Democrats, tend to be all for one and one for all for the good of their states.
Except one. Gov. Bush is the club malcontent. Other members generally agree that they need more help from Washington to pay for Medicaid, homeland security and President Bush's "No Child Left Behind" school law. Collectively, states face a $30 billion shortage in this year's budgets and $82 billion next year. Instead of hitting up President Bush for a handout, Gov. Bush says, they should be helping him reform Medicaid and Medicare. Anything else, he preaches, amounts to "big government."
That's a pretty bossy attitude to take with 49 people who seem to understand who voted for them, and why. It's also premature to make the comment while President Bush's plans are incomplete. He heard that his original ideas won't work and won't fly in Congress.
It's not the first time Gov. Bush has blasted his peers. In April, he accused other governors of putting state interests ahead of his brother's agenda, calling the NGA a "complaining, negative organization."...

Nova Southeastern to receive part of state library collection
TALLAHASSEE — More than 350,000 volumes from the state library will be moved to Nova Southeastern University in a deal that was already being criticized before it was announced Tuesday.
Gov. Jeb Bush, who is trying to save money during a tight budget year, angrily defended the decision to move the state library's circulating collection to the private university outside Fort Lauderdale.
"I personally took a lot of grief from people who accuse me of not having a sense of history, which I'm offended by to be honest with you because I think my tenure as governor has shown the exact opposite," Bush said. ...
Anger meets Bush plan to relocate books
Librarians and scholars hope to keep the state library's books from moving to a south Florida college...
Jeb plays tiddlywinks with clams and books
The governor knows best. He always knows best.
For instance, he knows more about inspecting clams than clam inspectors. He knows he wants to cut the department that oversees such matters from 54 to three. He knows that the people who complain are just "grumpy" because they are "outside their comfort zone."
The governor also knows Florida doesn't really need a state library. We'll shut the danged thing down, fire its staff and give away part of the collection down to some podunk private school in Fort Lauderdale. Anybody who complains is "not thinking outside the box." ...
Shelve the state library move
With even Republican lawmakers adding their voices to the public's protests, Gov. Jeb Bush saw how poorly his bean counters had served him with their plot to close the state library. But the fallback plan revealed Tuesday is scarcely better and should be just as unwelcome in the Legislature...
Group to seek court order to keep library in Tallahassee
TALLAHASSEE -- A coalition of historians, librarians and genealogists from across Florida is banding together to seek a court order to stop Gov. Jeb Bush's plan to break up the century-old State Library in Tallahassee and donate most of its books to a private university in South Florida.
The coalition, which includes nearly a dozen groups from the Society of Florida Archivists to the Florida Trust For Historic Preservation, has agreed to seek a legal restraining order to keep the state from giving away a collection of more than 300,000 books to Nova Southeastern University....
Bush wants to give library's collection to Nova
A deal announced Tuesday between Gov. Jeb Bush and Nova Southeastern University would give the private college Florida's $10 million State Library circulating collection - along with $5 million to move and maintain it.
Library: It's up to lawmakers
Gov. Jeb Bush's anywhere-but-Tallahassee relocation plan for the State Library says less about innovation than about his naked contempt for the capital.

Licensing works fine, board says
Regulators of engineers say privatized system costlier than in-house work
The state board charged with regulating engineers is balking at privatizing its licensing system, saying it can do the job in-house for a fraction of the cost.

Ex-officials call for campaign finance reforms
CLEARWATER -- Fed up with money dominating Florida politics, former state Attorney General Bob Butterworth and former Comptroller Bob Milligan are considering leading a citizens' initiative to change campaign finance laws.

Dyer sworn in as mayor
Buddy Dyer was sworn in today as Orlando's new mayor....

Pinellas County warns parents of problems if FCAT is missed
LARGO — Pinellas County school officials issued a letter that principals can send to parents which discusses the potential problems that could result from a boycott of the upcoming Florida Comprehensive Assessment Test. The letter is a response to a flood of phone calls by parents wondering what could happen if their children don't take the FCAT, which starts Monday...
Official's boycott of FCAT ignites furor
Many parents are asking schools what the implications would be if their children also skipped the test...
Education tests go only one way
No accountability for state Board of Education. ...

Cabinet shifts $307 million into land account to shield from XGR
TALLAHASSEE — Gov. Jeb Bush and the Florida Cabinet agreed to shift $307 million from a reserve into a state land-buying account Tuesday, a move designed to prevent state lawmakers from using the cash to help balance the budget.
Bush wants to eventually use the money to help with Everglades restoration. ...

War could affect state budget
TALLAHASSEE -- Bracing Floridians for the likelihood that the nation will be at war with Iraq within 30 days, Gov. Jeb Bush said Wednesday he is considering supplemental spending requests for homeland security and potential cuts in other areas of the proposed state budget...
Governor weighs more cuts to cope with impact of war
His own brother, President Bush, is poised for war, but Gov. Jeb Bush said Wednesday that the conflict with Iraq threatens to worsen Florida's financial woes.

Bush budget worries youth agencies
Programs that serve troubled teens are protesting the governor's proposals that would drastically reduce their funding...

Brogan to leave office, begin work as FAU president next week
BOCA RATON — Lt. Gov. Frank Brogan will start his new role as president of Florida Atlantic University early next week, resigning his current post just as the annual legislative session is beginning, university officials said Wednesday. Brogan said he would sign his contract with the university Monday morning. A 9 a.m. telephone conference by the Board of Governors will make his new post official, said George Zoley, president of the university's trustees.Gov. ...

Probe to examine $42,000 paid to Catanese's wife
By Larry Keller, Palm Beach Post Staff Writer
Investigators want to know if a decorating bill and a Corvette for FAU's ex-president are linked. ...

Bush appeals to Graham, Nelson for Estrada support
MIAMI — Gov. Jeb Bush has asked Florida's two Democratic senators to support Hispanic judicial nominee Miguel Estrada, saying the path Estrada has taken since coming to the United States epitomizes "the American dream."
Bush sent identical letters to Sens. Bob Graham and Bill Nelson, urging the Democrats to support Estrada's nomination to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia, a court generally considered as a gateway to a future Supreme Court appointment. ...
Nelson says he'll back D.C. court nominee
By Larry Lipman, Palm Beach Post Washington Bureau
Breaking ranks with his Democratic colleagues, Florida Sen. Bill Nelson announced he'll vote to confirm Miguel Estrada. ...

Crist questions Big Oil about prices; speaks to FTC, other AGs
TALLAHASSEE — The threat of war with Iraq, a two-month strike in Venezuela and a cold winter are driving up world gas prices up, representatives of the nation's largest oil companies told Attorney General Charlie Crist on Tuesday.
Crist questioned officials from six companies, asking for an explanation of how pricing works in the petroleum industry as part of a general, but so far informal, inquiry into why gas prices in Florida have risen to their highest February level ever. ...

USF fires professor indicted on terrorism charges
TAMPA — A Palestinian professor charged with leading the U.S. operations of a Middle Eastern terrorist group was fired Wednesday by the University of South Florida. Sami Al-Arian, who had been suspended since shortly after the 2001 terrorist attacks, violated university policy, USF president Judy Genshaft said...
Al-Arian calls self 'prisoner of conscience,' victim of hysteria
TAMPA — A jailed University of South Florida professor accused of leading the U.S. operations of a Palestinian terrorist group said Monday that he is a "prisoner of conscience" and the victim of post-Sept. 11 hysteria.
Sami Al-Arian made those charges in his first statement since his arrest last week. His 17-year-old daughter read it to reporters outside the courthouse after his scheduled detention hearing had been postponed until next month. Supporters rallied nearby as she spoke. ...
Al-Arian denies terrorist ties
A University of South Florida professor charged with helping finance suicide bombers and shootings in Israel was fired Wednesday, accused of using his tenured job to support terrorism...

Business community concerned about transportation funding
TALLAHASSEE — A coalition of advocates for improving transportation, including the Florida Chamber of Commerce, said Wednesday that they're worried that lawmakers may raid the state's transportation trust fund to balance the budget. It urged them not to...

Officials: Southeast has more childhood asthma case
TAMPA — The number of childhood asthma cases in the Southeast is outpacing those in other parts of the country, federal officials said. An estimated 821,000 children across the Southeast had at least one asthma attack in 2000, according to Environmental Protection Agency deputy regional director Stan Meiburg, "which is higher than in other regions."...

Presidential candidates converge on AFL-CIO meeting in Florida
HOLLYWOOD — Four Democratic presidential candidates vying for the party's nomination made their pitch to labor leaders Monday, converging in Florida to appeal to a key constituent group.
Sens. John Edwards of North Carolina and Joe Lieberman of Connecticut, Rep. Richard Gephardt of Missouri and former Sen. Carol Moseley-Braun of Illinois met privately with leaders of the AFL-CIO during the start of the labor union's executive council meetings at the Diplomat Hotel. ...

Judge: US dragging its feet on Hungarian Holocaust papers
MIAMI — The federal government is moving too slowly on a request by Hungarian Jews to examine Holocaust Commission records about a Nazi gold train commandeered by U.S. troops, a judge said Wednesday. The Hungarian Jews are suing the government, saying that the United States illegally sold or distributed the contents of the train seized in 1945 days after the Allied victory over the Germans in World War II...

Molly Ivins: How did we get into the North Korean mess?
AUSTIN, Texas — When we need a laugh in grim times, we count on our Attorney General John Ashcroft, the Whoopi Goldberg of the Bush administration. This week, Ashcroft took time off from tracking down terrorists in order to bust 55 people for selling for selling rolling papers, pipes and other drug paraphernalia. Nice to see a man who's got his priorities straight...
Molly Ivins: Don't try to save your pension with duct tape
AUSTIN, Texas — You ain't no John Snow when it comes to pensions. Snow, our new treasury secretary, was CEO of the railroad company CSX Corp. and got a platinum parachute when he bailed. He gets $2.47 million a year for life in retirement benefits. This package was based on the premise that he'd worked for the company for 44 years, even though he'd been there only 25. Now that's creative accounting. ...

Court: Abortion foes don't violate racketeering laws
WASHINGTON -- The Supreme Court declared Wednesday that federal extortion and racketeering laws could not be used against abortion protesters blocking clinic entrances, handing a victory to civil-liberties groups that said a contrary decision would have stifled all types of political protest.
Ruling 8-1 in a Chicago case, the court said abortion protesters had not committed extortion under federal law when they blocked clinic entrances. The court also rejected claims that the protesters, led by Operation Rescue's Joseph Scheidler, had violated federal anti-racketeering laws originally aimed at combating organized crime...

Nothing Is `Free' About Bill O'Reilly's Froth Factor
W hat's next? Is Bill O'Reilly, the Father Coughlin of cable TV, going to take credit for breaking the story of Watergate, exposing the Pentagon Papers and getting the scoop on the Iran/Contra scandal?
This guy is probably shameless enough to claim authorship of ``Primary Colors.'' 

2/24-21/03

Senate president: Bush's budget not balanced
TALLAHASSEE — Senate President Jim King on Friday took back the credit he gave Gov. Jeb Bush for submitting a balanced budget, saying Bush's plan to take money out of trust funds is not acceptable.
King warned the state's budget situation is going to be worse than the governor outlined in January.
King previously said the Senate would start its budget work with Bush's $54 billion proposal.
"The budget that he produced was at least a balanced budget. I didn't think anybody could do that," King said earlier this month. "My own appropriations people said you can't get a balanced budget with what we've got. He was able to do it."
He changed his tune Friday.  

The will of voters is being trampled by wily folks in Tallahassee
There is no getting around it.
We have a governor. We have a Legislature. We have a Supreme Court.
But we also have to build a high-speed train. And protect pregnant pigs. And outlaw smoking in Florida workplaces. 

Rallies in Orlando, Pensacola support military action in Iraq
ORLANDO — American flags snapped in the wind and vocal praise for President Bush filled the air Saturday as thousands of Floridians rallied in support of U.S. troops preparing for a possible war against Iraq.
About 2,000 people turned out in Orlando to hear songs and speeches, including the Gettysburg Address, while another 1,000 prayed and marched in Pensacola. The day's events began in Miami with the Tribute to the Military 5K Run.  

The fight against apathy rages in our back yard
Dissent protects democracy.

Martin Dyckman: A British model for Florida to follow
TALLAHASSEE -- A remarkable thing happened in Great Britain a few years ago. The government conceded that miscarriages of justice do occur, and set up an agency to rectify them. The mother country hasn't run out of things to teach us.

Byrd raised money with no opponents in state House campaign
House Speaker Johnnie Byrd spent hundreds of thousands of dollars he raised for his re-election campaign last year despite running unopposed, and much of the money went to a former aide, a newspaper reported Sunday. Byrd, R-Plant City, spent more than $400,000, about half of which went to a consulting firm owned by longtime friend and former legislative aide Michael Corcoran, now a lobbyist for clients with business before the Legislature, The Miami Herald reported.

Issue of tax exemptions persistent one in Florida
Larry Fuchs got a haircut last week because he wanted to look halfway decent when he testified before state lawmakers about taxes. If he had bought clippers to cut his hair, he would have paid the state's 6 cent sales tax on the item. "But going to a salon, I didn't pay any tax," the former director of the state Department of Revenue told the Senate finance & tax committee. Fuchs and others question tax exemptions in a year when Gov. Jeb Bush has proposed increasing college tuition at least 7 percent, slashing state money for programs for troubled teens, and reducing health care for the working poor with catastrophic illnesses.

Exposing tax shelters
From 1995 to 2001, the now-bankrupt energy trading giant, Enron, paid outside advisers from the banking, accounting and legal professions nearly $88-million to help it find $2-billion in reduced tax liability and inflated profits. The manipulations contributed to Enron's house of cards, which all came tumbling down in late 2001. The company's undoing caused devastation for employees and shareholders and a created a whopping financial loss for the government in uncollected taxes.

Feeney staff's phone records not protected, court decides
TALLAHASSEE — A state appeals court has ordered Florida Republicans to release the records of cellular phone calls made by former state House Speaker Tom Feeney's staff involving public business.
The controversy over the calls on phones provided by the state Republican Party has passed because Feeney has since won election to a new congressional seat in his hometown of Oviedo.
But media attorneys said Friday's ruling represents an important precedent for access to public records. 

Florida Atlantic investigating former president's new Corvette
BOCA RATON — Florida Atlantic University has locked out employees of its money-raising operation while officials probe allegations that the workers gave former President Anthony Catanese school money to buy a new Corvette.
Employees of the FAU Foundation were placed on paid leave indefinitely, university trustee chairman George Zoley said.
 FAU probes whether Catanese got Corvette gift
By Larry Keller, Palm Beach Post Staff Writer
University officials changed the locks on some doors to ensure that records couldn't be tampered with during the probe. 

Pinellas school board member's children will boycott FCAT
Pinellas County School Board member Mary Russell's two children will skip the Florida Comprehensive Assessment Test because she is opposed to the high-stakes exam that the state uses to grade schools' performance. There have been boycotts of standardized tests in other states in recent years. But none of any magnitude have happened in Florida.
FCAT scores may flunk 10,000 area 3rd-graders
Third-graders in public schools across Florida face an ultimatum from Gov. Jeb Bush and the Legislature: Read by 9 or repeat third grade next year.
Students are worried, parents are upset and educators are at odds over a new state law that could result in as many as 50,000 third-graders being retained. Schools are bracing for massive failures.
"We have very young students sitting for very high-stakes tests," said Chris Colwell, assistant superintendent of Volusia County schools. "We expect a significant increase in the number of third-graders who are retained."
FCAT presents special obstacle
Half of S. Fla. kids with impairments may be retained
All Florida third-graders must pass the high-stakes Florida Comprehensive Assessment Test to be promoted, but the test poses an especially high hurdle for the state's 30,000 third-graders with special needs. 

Voucher plan's rush leaves standards behind
A three-year-old voucher program for disabled students in Florida has grown so quickly and haphazardly that the push for oversight is now coming from an unusual corner: the private schools that stand to benefit from the program.

In state spending, we're dead last and cutting back
Michael Milligan figures he will spend a quarter-million dollars to put his four kids though college. Maybe more if Gov. Jeb Bush has his way.

People hard to find in People First program
And now, from those folks who brought you One Florida and Service First, state employees will soon have "People First." They've come up with a shiny shibboleth for the Convergys takeover of state government's personnel services, which is moving swiftly. If the Department of Management Services' advisories on the transition phase of the seven-year, $280 million deal with Convergys were any more optimistic, somebody might set them to music and open on Broadway.

DCF still feeling fallout from Rilya as lawmakers debate reforms he following are changes-  Department of Children & Families Secretary Jerry Regier is proposing to make at the agency:
Transfer child welfare services to locally run nonprofit agencies serving each of the state's 67 counties by the end of June 2004.
Increase spending on prevention programs and family services with a goal of reducing the number of children in out-of-home care by 25 percent.
#Transfer abuse investigations to sheriff's departments.
#Centralize administrative responsibilities now being done in DCF's 14 districts.
Transfer the regulation of child care facilities to the Agency for Workforce Innovation.
#Transfer cystic fibrosis program to the Department of Health.
Among bills to be considered during the 2003 legislative session are measures that would:
Transfer the DCF mental health program to the Department of Health
Create a Commission on Marriage & Family Support Initiatives within DCF. 
Florida DCF head: Public confidence will quickly be restored
TALLAHASSEE — Department of Children & Families Secretary Jerry Regier believes the agency that was on "red alert" when he took over six months ago already has improved and should be winning the public's confidence in about a year. 
For kids in trouble, double talk
Regier shifts problem away from governor. 

Bush budget cuts target state juvenile programs
The reduced class-size mandate is blamed, and officials warn a crime increase is likely. 

Florida contractors file federal lawsuit over affirmative action
TALLAHASSEE — Florida contractors Friday filed a federal lawsuit challenging Florida's affirmative action policies in construction contracts.
"It's a challenge against the state's use of race and gender in contracting," said Allen Douglas, executive director of the Florida Associated General Contractors Council.
The group has about 1,500 members in five Florida chapters, Douglas estimated. 

Disney World cuts hours of part-time workers; layoffs possible
ORLANDO — As a sluggish economy and war fears continue to take a toll on the tourism industry, Walt Disney World is cutting back the hours of some of its part-time employees and acknowledged Friday there may be layoffs if matters worsen.
The announcement came days after Disney imposed an indefinite hiring freeze at its central Florida attractions and resorts, which employ about 54,000 workers.
The cutbacks affect the resort's "casual-regular" employees, who work less than 25 hours a week. There are between 4,000 and 5,000 such employees at Disney at any given time, spokeswoman Marilyn Waters said, but she did not know how many workers would be affected. 

Port St. Joe, companies debating what to do with mill site
The mill that dominated this town for more than 60 years is gone, and left behind is a debate over whether houses or industrial jobs will replace it. The Smurfit-Stone Container Corp. and The St. Joe Co. want to build homes at the former paper mill site, but a local port authority wants to buy the site and reopen the town's deep-water industrial port to commercial shipping, helping boost the sagging local economy.
Site plans make waves in Port St. Joe
Port Authority clashes with firms over old mill area
The Smurfit-Stone Container Corp. and The St. Joe Co. want to build houses at the former paper mill site in Port St. Joe at the expense of attracting needed industrial jobs, local port officials say.

Missouri justice retired to Florida says death penalty should end
JEFFERSON CITY, Mo. — A former Missouri Supreme Court chief justice who once set execution dates for the condemned believes the death penalty process is "fatally flawed" and capital punishment should be abolished.
Charles B. Blackmar, who retired in 1992 after almost a decade on Missouri's highest court, said Friday his personal opposition to capital punishment is not new — although he had not previously discussed it publicly — nor did it deter him from affirming death sentences while on the bench. 

Black bear shootings, disappearances on rise
OCALA NATIONAL FOREST -- When wildlife biologists found the carcass of a black bear last month near a rural Marion County road, they assumed the obvious: a vehicle probably struck the 150-pound animal.
Then closer investigation revealed two large gunshot wounds.
The bear apparently was killed with a high-powered rifle, moved and dumped to make the scene look like a roadway accident.

Florida proposes standard to measure water quality in Everglades
HOLLYWOOD — Florida has proposed a new standard to measure water quality across the Everglades, but only "time will tell" when that goal will be met, the state's top environmental official said Thursday.
The state hopes to eventually limit to 10 parts per billion the level of phosphorous contained in water discharged into all parts of the Everglades, Environmental Protection Secretary David Struhs said. That amount is roughly the same as the level in drinking water. ... Both environmentalists and the sugar industry, a major user of fertilizer in the area, were wary of the plan. 
Some would reject Everglades buyout
Despite the big money being paid, some in the path of Everglades restoration would rather stay. 
Everglades land: In rush to buy, is any price too high?
By Robert P. King, Palm Beach Post Staff Writer
Speculators are making millions off the South Florida Water Management District 

New rules to protect sea turtles frustrate gulf shrimpers
NEW ORLEANS — Over objections from shrimpers, a federal agency issued a rule Friday requiring shrimpers to put even larger devices on trawl nets to protect endangered sea turtles.
Shrimpers in the Gulf of Mexico will need to fit the larger turtle excluder devices, or TEDs, on nets by August 21 and shrimpers in South Atlantic states by April 15. 

Maureen Dowd: Ready or not ...
WASHINGTON — Nobody in America makes me feel more insecure than Tom Ridge. The man who is supposed to restore my confidence in the prospect of my safety gives me the uneasy sense that the door's unlocked, the alarm's off and there's a ladder leaning up against the house.

Thomas L. Friedman: My survival kit
In the past few weeks I've started to have a heretical thought: Are we overreacting to 9/11? Are we going to drive ourselves crazy long before Osama bin Laden ever does? Having argued that 9/11 was the start of World War III, I would never diminish its significance. And I do not have an ounce of criticism for the FBI, CIA or Department of Homeland Security for issuing terrorism warnings at the hint of a threat. They are doing their job. But increasingly I wonder whether we're doing ours.

Paul Krugman: The Bush administration's martial plans 
The Marshall Plan was America's finest hour. After World War I, the victors did what victors usually do: They demanded reparations from the vanquished. But after World War II America did something unprecedented: It provided huge amounts of aid, helping both its allies and its defeated enemies rebuild.
It wasn't selfless altruism, of course; it was farsighted, enlightened self-interest. America's leaders understood that fostering prosperity, stability and democracy was as important as building military might in the struggle against communism.
But one suspects that our current leaders would have jeered at this exercise in "nation-building." And they are certainly following a very different strategy today. 

Sorry, Mr. Secretary, I don't buy your Iraq story
This is hard. So soon after very nearly swooning over Colin Powell's report to the United Nations Security Council, I find myself thinking the once unthinkable: I don't believe him.

2/17-20/03

Deal in works for cash-strapped state to keep state library
TALLAHASSEE — Gov. Jeb Bush's administration is close to an agreement on what to do with the state library, which it had wanted to give away for money-saving reasons. An outcry from librarians erupted and officials now are close to a deal that would keep the archives, the library's historic collection and the state museum in state government hands. ..
State Library's transfer to Nova being considered
TALLAHASSEE· Despite mounting public opposition, including more than 7,000 petition signatures protesting a proposed breakup of the 150-year-old State Library, a deal is quietly being negotiated that could move much of the massive library collection from the state capital to a private university in South Florida.
Judith Ring, head of the State Library, has e-mailed the staff that she is "almost certain" a big chunk of the library's collection will be moving, and the president of Nova Southeastern University said Monday he is in the final review of an arrangement with state officials, who he said are moving with "some urgency."...
Save State Library
Sentinel's position: Breaking up the State Library would show a disregard for preserving Florida history.
What price tag to place on history?
That's what lawmakers must ask themselves as they weigh a proposal by Gov. Jeb Bush to break up the State Library, which could include relocating from the state's capital a large chunk of the state's vast archival collection to Nova Southeastern University, a private college in Broward County.
The move would save the state about $3 million, including the elimination of 41 employees at the State Library in Tallahassee. True, every bit of savings helps.
But is breaking up the library's collection to save a few dollars in the public's best interest? The answer clearly is no. Researching Florida history should be encouraged, not discouraged. It took decades to amass the research documents, but now they are housed together at the State Library. The collection includes tens of thousands of volumes of historical research material, some of the oldest photos ever taken of Florida and a huge legislative library.
It shows a lack of regard for Florida's history to bequeath that central archive to a private university, especially given that the governor originally hoped to relocate the material at nearby Florida State University. But FSU had neither the space nor the money to properly house the collection.
There are many other ways to cut state spending without ceding responsibility for the state's historical assets. Money could come from the so-called turkeys that lawmakers routinely insert into the state budget. Scale that back some, and the historical assets that so richly depict Florida's past can be preserved in one place...

House Republicans rally around their embattled speaker
TALLAHASSEE -- House Republicans are rallying around Speaker Johnnie Byrd, whose increased spending on public relations has prompted widespread criticism...

Judge OKs law that may hinder environmental challenges
TALLAHASSEE — A law that could prevent residents and environmental groups from challenging development permits has been upheld. Leon Circuit Judge L. Ralph Smith's ruling Monday upheld the measure that was tacked onto a popular Everglades restoration bill during the closing moments of last year's legislative session...

Environmentalists brace for battle
Gov. Bush is targeting trust funds earmarked for preservation and cleanup programs to save money. ...

DEP secretary offers new phosphorus cleanup plan
Florida's top environmental regulator pitched a new proposal Wednesday for cleaning up phosphorus pollution in the Everglades. Department of Environmental Protection Secretary David Struhs is set to release the proposal today at a nature center in Hollywood, Fla., in advance of presenting it next week to the state's Environmental Regulation Commission...

Serial killers track Florida's reefs
Every time Brian Lapointe dives the reefs off Palm Beach County, he finds more of the thick, green seaweed. The algae cover the reefs and the ocean floor, killing coral, weighting down sea fans until they snap, obliterating habitat for lobster and reef fish. On a dive at North Colonel Ledge near Juno Beach a few weeks ago, he found seaweed blanketing the reef and 70 percent to 80 percent of the ocean bottom...

Fighting for the Apalachicola's life
In South Florida we never understood the harm we were doing until it was too late. Now we are engaged in expensive and problematic restoration efforts to save the Kissimmee and our River of Grass - the Everglades.
Here in North Florida, the Apalachicola River and bay are still relatively healthy. The bay supplies almost all the region's oysters and serves as nursery for the Gulf of Mexico's seafood industry. The river, Florida's largest, supports a diverse community of freshwater fishes and a vast wetland forest in the floodplain corridor; the bay depends on inputs from the floodplain for its survival...

Blue crabbers say crabbing dead on the Caloosahatchee River
FORT MYERS -- Blue crabbers say that water management and large releases of water from Lake Okeechobee have killed their industry along the Caloosahatchee River...

Legislature: Senators scorn Bush's proposed aquaculture budget cuts
TALLAHASSEE — Cuts proposed by Gov. Jeb Bush in the state's aquaculture inspection program would destroy Florida's shellfish and tropical fish businesses, industry representatives told the Senate Agriculture Committee on Wednesday...

Tables turn at state job agency
116 unemployment compensation employees looking for work themselves
More than 100 unemployment compensation employees may soon be applying for the state benefits they administer for other laid-off workers...

Democrats propose cap on state salaries
TALLAHASSEE — Democratic lawmakers on Wednesday proposed capping all state employee salaries at $200,000 and requiring legislative approval for any state employee pay packages exceeding that amount. If approved, it would mean that most university presidents and football and basketball coaches would have to have their salary approved by the Legislature...

Board told Florida needs 20,000 new teachers for this fall
JACKSONVILLE — Florida needs to hire 20,000 more teachers before August because of the class-size amendment, a growing number of students and teacher retirements and transfers, the state Board of Education heard Tuesday. The number could be affected by how the Legislature deals with the class-size amendment, but education officials believe that 5,000 to 7,000 new teachers will be needed to meet its requirement of reducing the number of students by two in each classroom in the next school year.'...

Long-term pain' built into Bush's budget, King says
'Short-term savings' decried
Senate President Jim King said Tuesday lawmakers might have to shortchange counties on court funding if Gov. Jeb Bush's budget is passed with no new revenue sources...

Still a sucker's bet
Our position: Florida legislators shouldn't even be flirting with the expansion of gambling.
Gambling interests in Florida are like a life-threatening cancer. Rebuffed repeatedly by voters, they sink into remission -- only to reappear when least expected, more...
Gambling industry now gets a warm welcome
When gambling interests sought an expansion of gaming in Florida last year, they tried to tuck it into state legislation promoting the adoption of racing greyhounds...

Help beneath the Bush brothers
For both, the buck stops at lower levels.  threatening than ever before...

Sane enough to die
For those who wonder why America's fixation on the death penalty strikes other civilized countries as bizarre, consider the case of Charles Singleton. ...

Bush's push for family values may take back seat to budget woes
TALLAHASSEE — Republicans want to strengthen the family and reduce the state's 80,000 divorces each year to establish a solid foundation for reducing government and improving children's lives.
Gov. Jeb Bush and House Speaker Johnnie Byrd believe a family values, conservative agenda would help identify ways to improve the state's massive social and educational problems.... Florida Democrats aren't so sure it's the government's business and outside observers can't imagine where they'd find the money for new programs. ...

Gov. Bush makes gaffe while on business trip to Spain
MADRID, Spain — Florida Gov. Jeb Bush, on a business trip to Spain, made at least one big gaffe when he met local businessmen: calling Spain a republic when it is a constitutional monarchy with King Juan Carlos as the head of state.
"I want to thank the president of the Republic of Spain for his friendship with the United States. I know this is a difficult situation in the short term," Bush said in Spanish about Prime Minister Jose Maria Aznar.
Spain has not been a republic since the late 1930s, when General Francisco Franco defeated Republican troops in the 1936-1939 Civil War. After Franco's death in 1975, Spain became a constitutional monarchy. ...

Desmond Tutu speaks to students and government in Tallahassee
TALLAHASSEE — South African Archbishop Desmond Tutu told students and Florida government officials Tuesday that the U.S. civil rights movement helped fuel anti-apartheid activists in South Africa. Tutu gave two talks on overcoming racism in South Africa and the United States in the state capital...

Analysis shows Bush got fewer votes from black areas in November
TALLAHASSEE — Gov. Jeb Bush received fewer votes from the state's predominantly black precincts in last year's general election than he did in his previous two gubernatorial races, a new analysis shows.
Bush gathered 2.09 percent of the votes in more than 225 precincts in which 80 percent or more of the registered voters were black, according to the analysis published Sunday by Gannett Regional Newspapers in Florida. He finished next to last among seven statewide candidates, with only independent candidate Robert Kunst faring worse.
Blacks' disenchantment with the governor was geographically uniform across the state, the analysis found. It reviewed almost 5 percent of the total state electorate. ...

Attorney creating 24-hour, all-news channel for black viewers
STUART — The nation's first 24-hour, all-news cable channel catering to blacks is planned by millionaire attorney Willie Gary. Gary announced Tuesday that MBC News: The Urban Voice, will broadcast from nearby Fort Pierce and will have studios in Atlanta and Tallahassee...

Crist wants feds to review Florida's gas prices
TALLAHASSEE — Attorney General Charlie Crist asked the Federal Trade Commission Tuesday to look into whether Florida gas stations are artificially increasing prices to take advantage of unrest in the Middle East. According to the American Automobile Association, Florida's average cost per gallon for regular gasoline on Tuesday was $1.695, up 19 cents from a month earlier and 56 cents higher than the same time last year...

Investigators probe possible ballot fraud in state Senate race
ORLANDO — State investigators said they will send letters to more than 1,000 central Florida voters who requested absentee ballots in last fall's state Senate District 19 election but didn't send them in. Officials at the Orange-Osceola State Attorney's Office suspect some of those voters never asked for absentee ballots, and may be victims of ballot fraud...

Dozens of 'other' ways proposed to help lower malpractice insurance rates
TALLAHASSEE — When a task force appointed by Gov. Jeb Bush to look at how to lower medical malpractice insurance rates finished its work this month, it released a 300-page report with 60 recommendations. ...

Lawmakers seeking reform on state's no-fault insurance
TALLAHASSEE — Lawmakers are calling for reform in the state's no-fault insurance program, saying it is rife with fraud and motorists are paying too much for the limited policies.
As they prepare for the upcoming legislative session, lawmakers want to find a way to adjust or eliminate the system. The goal of some lawmakers is to increase the coverage for motorists and lower their annual premiums.
"My approach is either fix it or flush it," said Senate President Jim King, R-Jacksonville, who is leading the charge for no-fault reform. "The fraud right now is way out of hand." ...

Florida lawmakers question fast-train bidders
TALLAHASSEE — State lawmakers Tuesday started asking questions about the four expensive proposals being pitched to build the high-speed train voters ordered in 2000. Transportation Chairman Jim Sebesta, R-St. Petersburg, said that the cost of the four bids is higher than state officials expected...

State paid too much for mine, audit shows
Since only 60 of the 300 acres can be mined, Florida overpaid by $7.8-million, the Auditor General's Office says.
When Gov. Jeb Bush and the Cabinet voted two years ago to spend $10.2-million to buy a 300-acre mine near Ichetucknee Springs State Park, environmentalists applauded but wondered if the price was too high.
State auditors have answered that question with a resounding yes. The state paid more than four times what the property was worth, auditors concluded in a scathing report released this week. ... 

Senate panel hears call for Miccosukee sovereignty
TALLAHASSEE — For the second time in as many years, representatives of the Miccosukee Tribe made the trek north to urge Florida lawmakers to relinquish state jurisdiction over tribal lands they say are already sovereign. And for the second time is as many years, a host of law enforcement officials and prosecutors have lined up against them in a formidable show of force that has even the Senate sponsor concerned...

Video lottery touted to Florida House panel
TALLAHASSEE — Florida should take a gamble on allowing video lottery machines at its jai-alai frontons, dog tracks and horse tracks, a House panel was told Tuesday. Tourists and residents alike are already gambling on the computerized betting machines at Indian facilities and on cruise ships, witnesses told the House subcommittee on Gaming and Pari-mutuels...

The thing to fear is fear
In the spring and summer of 1940, when London was subjected to ferocious bombing almost nightly, urgent pleas were made to the Royal Family that they should leave Buckingham Palace for the countryside, or even for Canada. At least, it was urged, the young daughters of the king and queen should be evacuated.
The queen's response to this is worth remembering. "The princesses would never leave without me," she noted, "and I couldn't leave without the king, and the king will never leave."
Buckingham Palace was indeed eventually bombed, with the Royal Family still in residence. The queen's words on that occasion are justly famous. "It makes me feel I can look the East End in the face," she said (the East End, the working class section of London, had taken the worst of the blitz).
In Washington this week, the messages being delivered by our leaders are somewhat less inspiring. "The people in Washington are terrified," CNN's Robert Novak claimed this weekend. "But nobody's more terrified than our members of Congress and their spouses. That's the reason they didn't stay here for next week to do the work they were supposed to do. They were terrified and wanted to get out of town." His colleague Mark Shields agreed: "You know the line about coming back to Washington and never going back to Pocatella? Well Bob Novak is right: They've all gone back to Pocatella this week. I mean, they're out of here." ...

Bush needs to heed demonstrators
Fifty million Frenchmen can always be wrong.
And 50 million Germans, every half century or so, will almost certainly be wrong.
But 5 million or 50 million demonstrators in cities all around the planet cannot be ignored. Not even when they may be more wrong than right. For these demonstrators, by their pleas and their very presence in the streets, represent the biggest leadership failure of the presidency of George W. Bush. ...

Paul Krugman: Behind the great divide
There has been much speculation why Europe and the U.S. are suddenly at such odds. Is it about culture? About history? But I haven't seen much discussion of an obvious point: We have different views partly because we see different news.
Let's back up. Many Americans now blame France for the chill in U.S.-European relations. There is even talk of boycotting French products.
But France's attitude isn't exceptional. Last Saturday's huge demonstrations confirmed polls that show deep distrust of the Bush administration and skepticism about an Iraq war in all major European nations, whatever position their governments may take. In fact, the biggest demonstrations were in countries whose governments are supporting the Bush administration.
There were big demonstrations in America too. But distrust of the U.S. overseas has reached such a level, even among our British allies, that a recent British poll ranked the U.S. as the world's most dangerous nation — ahead of North Korea and Iraq. ...

Molly Ivins: Why not try persuasion instead of bullying?
AUSTIN, Texas — Before we all work ourselves into such righteous snits we can't even talk to one another anymore, let's see what we can agree on. Wanting to get rid of Saddam Hussein does not make anyone a bloodthirsty monster or a tool of the oil companies. Being worried to death about the consequences of invading Iraq does not make anyone unpatriotic or in favor of Saddam Hussein. ...
MOLLY IVINS - Why the French reject war
As our coaches used to say, ''OK, people, settle down and listen up.'' We have been enjoying a lovely little spate of French-bashing here lately. Jonah Goldberg of The National Review has popularized the phrase ''cheese-eating surrender monkeys'' to describe the French. It gets a lot less attractive than that...

CARL HIAASEN; We can do better than buying duct tape
The most powerful and technologically advanced nation in the world is advising citizens to use duct tape and plastic to protect against terrorist attacks...

2/12-16/03

Anti-war protesters take to streets of Naples, world
America's true motives for a war on Iraq are greed, power and retribution.
Anti-war protesters took those sentiments to one busy Collier County intersection Saturday to condemn the war on terror and denounce President Bush's tough stance to launch an attack against the oil-rich, Arab nation. ...
Protesters rally around the state
MIAMI — Thousands of Floridians joined a worldwide chorus of anti-war protesters on Saturday, hoping they could dissuade President Bush from moving forward with plans for an attack against Iraq. At least 20 rallies took place statewide, including a heavily attended event in Miami's Bayfront Park that drew at least 750 protesters, many of whom carried signs saying "Don't bomb in our name" and "Contain Iraq without war." "War can be a solution to defend a nation," said Rafael Velasquez...
Millions protest war
Rallies span globe, decry U.S. stance. Protests were held in more than 600 towns, cities.  Up to 500,000 in New York City.   War protest.(Orlando)
Orlando peace movement swells
Carrying signs denouncing war with Iraq, many of the protesters marched from Orange Avenue at Colonial Drive to Gaston Edwards Park on Lake Ivanhoe. The rally, organized by PeaceOrlando, coincided with a day of global protests.
One of the group's organizers, Kathy DiBernardo, said she thought Saturday's rally would be the group's largest since beginning a weekly demonstration in downtown Orlando several months ago...
300 rally locally against war
By Campbell Roth, Palm Beach Post Staff Writer
The Rev. Thomas Masters leads the Currie Park crowd by criticizing President Bush... South Floridians join worldwide call for peace
More than 700 South Floridians joined a worldwide call for peace Saturday, protesting in Miami-Dade and Broward counties against a potential war with Iraq...
South Floridians join worldwide peace protests
SUNRISE -- Rocky Solomon is no pacifist.
Standing shoulder to shoulder with anti-war demonstrators on the corner of Flamingo Road and Sunrise Boulevard on Saturday, Solomon wanted to make clear that he was not the kind of person who thinks military action can never be justified. It's just that he knows what it's like to be in combat, he said, and he doesn't want to see anyone else go through it unless the mission is truly justifiable...
Hundreds rally against war in Tallahassee
Downtown demonstration draws massive crowd
Antiwar demonstrators packed the downtown chain of parks Saturday in the biggest peace rally in more than a year. The crowd swelled to an estimated 500 people at one point, organizers said, with protesters lining Monroe Street and carrying signs with messages such as "No Bombing Civilians" and "No More Innocent Lives Lost." Protesters chanted and cheered as some passing drivers honked their horns in support. (more from Tallahassee Indymedia with links to photos)
Peace vigils continue across Volusia (2/15)
DAYTONA BEACH -- They talked and sang and rallied for peace Saturday afternoon on the steps of the Courthouse Annex on City Island.
Linda Ryan, who coordinated the rally with the help of Halifax Citizens Against the War, estimated the turnout at 220. Though the rally coincided with protests elsewhere in the nation and the world, the Halifax group and an unnamed group in the DeLand area have been staging weekly protests or vigils since early this year.
Saturday's local event featured 19 speakers, including ministers, professors and representatives of other organizations that oppose war. Local musicians also performed songs of peace...

From watchdog to lapdog
Petroleum storage sites at the Port of Tampa have been polluting Tampa Bay since 1996. When it rains, heavy metals including arsenic, lead and mercury flow into the bay from the sites used by ChevronTexaco, Murphy Oil, Marathon Oil and others. It happened again last summer, and there is no end in sight.
The Florida Department of Environmental Protection is charged by law to protect our natural resources and to deny permits to polluters. Yet a review of these cases by Times staff writer Craig Pittman shows that DEP is in no hurry to resolve the problem. ...

Audit cites department of education problems
By Mary Ellen Flannery, Palm Beach Post Staff Writer
The DOE's property records show $123 million in property, but their inventory turned up only $69 million. ...

House speaker backing off controversial phone call plan
TALLAHASSEE — House Speaker Johnnie Byrd now says he won't set up computerized phone banks to automatically dial Floridians and deliver recorded messages about the House's good deeds.
"He got a lot of feedback from constituents, a lot of people don't want to be hit with it at home," Byrd spokeswoman Nicole de Lara said Wednesday. "The speaker has decided not to award a contract." ...

The lesson from FAU's choice
By Stebbins Jefferson, Palm Beach Post Columnist
Qualifications are irrelevant if you have connections. ...
Having taken, now give
Palm Beach Post Editorial
The responsibility on university presidents. ...

Librarians throw book at closing state library
By Ron Hayes, Palm Beach Post Staff Writer
Gov. Jeb Bush's plan to eliminate the Florida State Library meets an angry rebuke from the state's librarians. ...
Jeb is history, but that won't stop him from dismantling it
Jeb Bush is history. No kidding. It's not a joke, it's not wishful thinking. It is absolutely the truth. Still don't believe me, do you? Ah, but I have the proof, the whole proof and nothing but the proof...

For a better Florida
THE BUDGET: The governor and legislature, who promised not to raise taxes, are depending on the sales tax revenue to pay for the huge bills coming next year.
BUSH: Can the governor's cutting-edge conservatism survive a budget crisis and his own divided party?...

Don't fall for this one
Our position: Giving more money to private schools is not the way to deal with class size.
A lot of ideas are floating around Tallahassee right now about how to pay for the pricey amendment requiring smaller class size. One of the most misguided would direct more money to unregulated private schools....

Speculation on lieutenant governor simmers
By Jim Ash, Palm Beach Post Staff Writer
Gov. Bush talks with Ruben King-Shaw, who's believed to be a leading candidate. ...
Blacks have lower opinion of Jeb Bush
Seven weeks after the racial rhetoric of the November elections, Gov. Jeb Bush met his most vehement black critic in peace to talk about his absence from the memorial service honoring a former senator.

Florida population to increase by 8 million residents by 2030, researchers say
Florida's population, influenced by a continued influx of new residents from other states and abroad, is expected to swell by nearly 8 million residents to 24.4 million by 2030, according to the latest projections by University of Florida researchers.
"The growth will continue to be relatively steady, with each of the next three decades adding between 2.62 and 2.99 million people to the state," said June Nogle, a demographer with UF's Bureau of Economic and Business Research.
Florida's population in the 2000 census was 15.9 million and had reached 16.7 million by 2002, according to UF estimates. ...

DNA test allowed as execution looms
After 25 years of arguing he didn't kill a woman, Amos Lee King can try again to find proof...

Lawmakers hear from public on medical malpractice proposals
MIAMI — A panel of lawmakers heard from a chorus of doctors, lawyers and victims of medical malpractice Thursday hoping to shape reforms to Florida's malpractice insurance system during the upcoming legislative session.
Their views represented the complex debate: victims who feared a proposed $250,000 cap on pain and suffering awards would put a finite price on their hardships, attorneys who said the reforms could limit access to the courts and doctors who said skyrocketing malpractice insurance was crippling their profession.
"These are very vexing issues and what we have to do is to seek the wisdom of Solomon to find the solutions ... that ensure that we maintain quality health care," said state Rep. Dudley Goodlette, a Naples Republican chairing the committee. ...
Place no cap on reform
Palm Beach Post Editorial
Faulty premise from malpractice task force. ...

AAA says rising gas prices near gouging
TAMPA — The recent spike in gasoline prices isn't justified and is coming "uncomfortably close" to gouging, a AAA spokesman said Thursday.
The price of a gallon of regular gasoline has risen about 13 cents in less than two weeks to a national average of $1.633, and the automobile association's spokesman Geoff Sundstrom said nothing has occurred in the market to warrant it. ...

Proposal to shut death-row offices draws fire
Fifteen years ago, Judge E. Charles Miner Jr. closed his courtroom and holed up at home for three weeks to study two murder cases. Delivered by a big panel truck, the files arrived in 40 boxes.
Miner knows all too well what it takes to review death-row appeals.
That's one reason the retired judge has joined the growing opposition to Gov. Jeb Bush's plan to privatize the final stages of the process.
In his 2003-04 budget, the governor has recommended closing the three state offices that handle such death-row appeals and transferring their cases to private attorneys. Private lawyers paid by the state already handle about one-quarter of such appeals -- typically those challenging the effectiveness of an inmate's lawyer or touting the discovery of new evidence.
Now, searching for efficiencies in a lean budget cycle, Bush said he thinks private lawyers should handle all of them...

Parade of teens, advocates: Don't cut Florida prevention programs
TALLAHASSEE — A parade of advocates and teens pleaded with a state Senate committee Thursday to fund programs designed to prevent juvenile delinquency and turn around teens who have gotten into trouble.
Senators on the Criminal Justice Appropriations Subcommittee said they support the programs and suggested the message be carried to the House and governor.
In his recommended budget, Gov. Jeb Bush has proposed making substantial cuts to prevention programs and eliminating nonresidential programs for juvenile offenders...

University students tell Florida lawmakers: Save Bright Futures
TALLAHASSEE — Lawmakers who harm Florida's popular "Bright Futures" scholarship program will be ousted, about 500 students vowed Thursday while protesting cutbacks to the program, which has helped nearly 100,000 go to college since 1997. ...

Bullet train bids finally tell public the true price tag
ORLANDO — As the tedious work of planning Florida's high-speed rail network inched forward over the past two years, Gov. Jeb Bush has always been nearby with chastening words. If the state has to pay too much, he said, these trains will never leave the station.
Now that the public could be on the hook for as much as $2.7 billion to help build the route's first leg, Tampa to Orlando, Bush finally has his answer on the project's cost.
But the question remains: How much is too much?
"This little choo-choo could cost a lot of money," Bush said Tuesday. ...
Repeal of bullet train beats bait-and-switch
Palm Beach Post Editorial
South Florida suckers could pay, get nothing. ...

Lawmaker wants to make it harder to change the constitution
TALLAHASSEE — It should take more than approval by a majority of voters to change the Florida Constitution, say state lawmakers who want to require passage by voters in 34 of the 67 counties.
Proposed constitutional amendments would still need a majority of voters statewide under the measure sponsored by state Sen. Anna Cowin and Rep. Mike Hogan. But ballot measures would also have to carry at least half of Florida's counties.
Cowin, R-Leesburg, said Wednesday the change would protect the views of voters in smaller counties. ...

SCOFLA: High court rules on records in judicial case
TALLAHASSEE — Records of sexual harassment allegations against a trial judge are public, the state Supreme Court ruled Thursday in a Tampa case.
But the records are exempt from release until the Judicial Qualifications Commission rules there is "probable cause" to believe the allegations are true. ...

State won't fight challenge of adoption law requiring sex details
FORT LAUDERDALE — The state won't defend a court challenge of an adoption law that requires some women who want to put their babies up for adoption to detail their sexual pasts in local newspapers. ...

A vindictive drug war
Ed Rosenthal, the author of numerous books on marijuana, is being used as a scapegoat in Attorney General John Ashcroft's latest attack on the use of marijuana for medicinal purposes. On Jan. 31, Rosenthal was convicted on three federal counts of cultivation and conspiracy, charges that carry a minimum five-year sentence. He had been raising marijuana plants to distribute to sick people in the San Francisco Bay area whose doctors recommended the drug as a way to ease their pain and other symptoms...

Health and Human Services approves Medicaid expansion
TALLAHASSEE — The Department of Health and Human Services approved an expansion Wednesday of a Florida Medicaid program that allows a small number of people to design and manage their own benefit package.
The program, a priority of President Bush's administration, currently serves 2,000 Medicaid recipients in Florida who require long-term care. It's different from other Medicaid programs in that it gives patients more control of their own health care services. ...

Broward elections chief calls two city primaries a success
FORT LAUDERDALE — Broward's embattled election chief declared Tuesday's municipal primaries in two cities a success, saying the cities' willingness to work with her office led to smooth elections.
But it was unclear whether Miriam Oliphant's message would resonate with officials in more than a dozen other cities, many of whom have voiced concerns over working with her in next month's municipal elections. ...

Editorial: Toll roads
Freshman Florida House member Mike Davis of Naples offers a plan to build roads to keep up with growth. He proposes tolls for some of those roads, and a new Collier-Lee authority or board to build them. At first blush, his plan seems to be a creative way to tap new money to get an important job done. At second and third blush, his plan becomes problematic. The plan yields questions and drawbacks that, short of timely answers, dictate a delay until next year's legislative session. ...

Presidential contenders headed to AFL-CIO meetings in Florida
MIAMI — A group of Democrats hoping to challenge President Bush next year are headed to Florida to attend the AFL-CIO's winter meetings later this month, officials said Wednesday. ...

Mount Dioxin health study gets reduced funding
PENSACOLA — A study to determine if two toxic waste sites have caused cancer, birth defects and other health problems for nearby residents would get continued federal funding, but at a sharply reduced level, under an agreement between House and Senate budget writers.
The University of West Florida would receive $225,000 for the study and Citizens Against Toxic Exposure (CATE), a group representing residents, would get $300,000 as part of the spending bill for the fiscal year that begins in September, Sen. Bill Nelson, D-Fla., said Thursday.
"We need to find out if these chemicals are making people sick and get them medical help if they need it," Nelson said. ...

Sugar: Don't derail Everglades progress
This year the Florida Environmental Regulation Commission must finalize a rule limiting phosphorus reaching the Everglades, and those who care about the Everglades should be offended by the campaign of misinformation by some activists.
The campaign by the Florida Audubon lobbyist group called "Getting to 10 " should be called "Getting to Court." The "no compromise" standard of 10 parts per billion (ppb) of phosphorus -- the equivalent of two drops of water in an Olympic-size pool -- is based on politics, not science. Audubon lobbyists know very well that 90 percent of the Everglades Protection Area already receives water of 10 ppb or less.
This rule is really about water flowing into border areas at the ends of canals that drain water from Lake Okeechobee, agricultural areas and from communities such as Wellington and Weston...

Battle over water utility sale moves into courts
TALLAHASSEE — The Public Service Commission asked a court Wednesday to block the sale of the state's largest public water utility to two Panhandle towns.
An entity formed by the two towns, Milton and Gulf Breeze, is seeking to buy Florida Water Services as a way to generate revenue. The company's water customers, however, are concentrated in central and southwest Florida, far away from the Panhandle communities. ...

Environmental groups sue to stop Gulf Coast cell towers
PENSACOLA — Three environmental groups are suing the Federal Communications Commission to halt the placement of cellular telephone towers along the Gulf Coast in five states, claiming towers have been responsible for killing thousands of birds. ...

Federal spending includes money for Florida citrus, shrimpers
MIAMI — Florida will receive millions of dollars for citrus canker eradication, struggling shrimpers and high speed rail under a $397.4 billion spending bill that President Bush said Friday he will sign into law. Florida Gov. ...

Jeb Bush leading Spanish trade delegation
There are more corporate subsidiaries from Spain in Florida than from any other European country.
TALLAHASSEE — Gov. Jeb Bush heads to Spain on Saturday for a seven-day trade mission at a time national leaders are trying to figure out if the United States is facing an unusually high threat of terrorist attack.
Although his office is announcing his travel itinerary on a daily basis, the president's brother said he's undeterred by current events.
"I've got to go promote our state," said Bush, who has also led similar trips to Brazil, Mexico, Israel, Chile, Argentina, Uruguay and the United Kingdom.
"Business needs to go on," Bush said. "We cannot be paralyzed by the possibility of war or the preoccupation on the homeland defense."
The terrorism alert is now orange, or high, second from the top on a color-coded scale of five. Red, or severe, means an attack was imminent or under way. ...

Washington Calling: Patriot II; Man-eating lions; Deep Throat
A weekly size-up by the Washington staff of the Scripps Howard News Service...

Bush defends his tax cut plan
By Marilyn Geewax, Palm Beach Post Washington Bureau
But Fed Chairman Alan Greenspan repeated his warnings that the cuts will not stimilate the country's economy...
Many Americans to lose if Bush hits his trifecta
Palm Beach Post Editorial
Using budget deficits to ease tax burden on rich. ...

If you liked Patriot Act I, don't miss the sequel
There is a hero in the Justice Department, someone whose identity I hope stays as secret as Deep Throat...

An avoidable nuclear scare
Almost a year ago, a nuclear power plant near Toledo, Ohio, was shut down just in time to discover that a disaster was literally a quarter-inch away. The U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission, which is supposed to protect the public from danger at the nation's 103 commercial nuclear reactors, had delayed a shutdown order in Ohio after the power company complained it would lose money...

In case of attack: Duct?
Homeland security officials are urging sealing houses with duct tape, but experts say it won't work. ...
A Fiendish Plot By The American Duct Tape Council?
Please stand by for an important message from your U.S. Department of Homeland Security: In the event of a biological and/or chemical terrorist attack, be advised that no matter what you do, you are still a huge chunk of %$#@*&! toast.
There now, don't you feel so much better? Thank you. You may return to your fetal position. ...

Bob Herbert: Beware Mr. Bush's 'compassion'
Tip O'Neill once said of Ronald Reagan, "He has no concern, no regard, no care for the little man of America." George W. Bush is making the Gipper look like a softy.
He's at it again.
President Bush traveled to Nashville on Monday to talk, among other things, about compassion, which is a topic this president probably should leave alone. Bush's idea of compassion tends to send a shiver of dread through those who are disadvantaged.
But there he was in Nashville at the National Religious Broadcasters convention, exhorting his audience to "rally the armies of compassion so that we can change America one heart, one soul at a time."
The president said religious organizations had a responsibility to assist the poor and those who are suffering, and to help alleviate the "artificial divisions" of race and economics.
"I welcome faith to help solve the nation's deepest problems," he said.
If religious leaders take up the challenge they will have to do some awfully heavy lifting, because Bush's domestic policies — instead of easing suffering — are all but guaranteed to provide an ever-swelling stream of people in need of help. ...

A symbol of terror and racism in the South
From time to time, I join the legion of voices reminding the NAACP that it has better things to do than to worry about the Confederate flag and other emblems and structures, such as statues of fallen Rebel soldiers.
Given recent events, however, I do not think I will be criticizing the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People again on this and similar issues. An organization -- with the power to make racists and otherwise wrongheaded whites pay attention -- needs to remain vigilant and actively involved in confronting racism no matter how seemingly innocuous.
Who has forgotten the political storm then-Senate Majority Leader Trent Lott unleashed last summer when he stupidly, but earnestly, praised the earlier segregationist policies of South Carolina Sen. Strom Thurmond?
Lott's praise of his old Dixiecrat crony and Lott's new appointment to another powerful committee on the Hill strongly suggest that the Republican Party -- led by George W. Bush -- still has not heard the news that racism is a cancer that keeps the United States from being a truly great nation. ...

Molly Ivins: The season for stupidity
"Every gun that is made, every warship launched, every rocket fired signifies, in the final sense, a theft from those who hunger and are not fed, those who are cold and are not clothed."
— Dwight David Eisenhower, April 16, 1953.
The news is not good. Osama bin Laden wants us to invade Iraq. 
We're at orange on the alert code. The economy is tanking. We're spending $1.08 billion a day on the military. The president wants a $674 billion tax cut. In the first year, 50 percent of that tax cut would go the richest 1 percent of Americans and three-quarters of it would go to the richest 5 percent. In the years beyond that, the concentration at the top actually gets worse, according to citizens for Tax Justice. To pay for that, he wants to raise the rent on subsidized housing for the poorest people in the country and break up Head Start, sending it down to the states, where governments are frantically cutting everything they can. Money to pay for everything from cleaning up Superfund sites to leaving no child behind is being slashed to pay for this obscene tax cut. ...

2/11-10/03

Legislature: Meek presents class size proposal to Senate committee
TALLAHASSEE — Lawmakers should drop any idea of asking voters to repeal the class-size reduction measure, U.S. Rep. Kendrick Meek told a Senate panel charged with figuring out how to implement it. Voters have already spoken, the leader of the class-size campaign said Monday. "This is an act of democracy," Meek said, adding that lawmakers would be setting the wrong precedent if they suggested voters didn't know what they were doing when they cast their ballots. ...

Mortham's special treatment
When Allen Mortham Jr. couldn't get his state employee health insurance plan to pay a $10,632 bill for an emergency helicopter trip to the hospital, his mother made a few calls. ...

Juvenile justice overhaul bill controversial
The chairman of a key Senate committee wants to move Florida's juvenile delinquency programs into the adult prison system. It could be a bluff. Gov. Jeb Bush didn't recommend making the Department of Juvenile Justice a division of the Department of Corrections, and there's no House companion for the bill (SB 1038) that Sen. Stephen Wise quietly introduced just before last Friday's filing deadline.
What Bush did recommend in his budget is saving $64 million by turning juvenile crime prevention programs over to the counties. Wise seems to be saying that, if we're going to scrap prevention in DJJ, why have a department at all? Let's just have the DOC handle offenders from their first truancy until they're wheeled out of the geriatric prison...

Death penalty problems
With the exoneration of death row inmate Rudolph Holton, the governor should be reviewing the entire judicial process rather than focusing on the wrong issue...

Lawsuit: FPL power plant caused boy's cancer
WEST PALM BEACH — The parents of an 8-year-old boy sued Florida Power & Light Monday, saying the nearby St. Lucie nuclear power plant caused his cancer. The lawsuit cites a report that said a carcinogen was found in the baby teeth of children living near FPL's two nuclear-powered plants, the one at St. Lucie and the other at Turkey Point south of Miami. The cancer-causing substance, which imbeds itself in bones and teeth, is produced only by nuclear explosions and by nuclear reactors...

Blind voters allege discrimination by Palm Beach elections chief
WEST PALM BEACH — A group of blind voters sued Palm Beach elections supervisor Theresa LePore on Monday, claiming she didn't provide equipment that would have let them vote by secret ballot. The lawsuit asks that LePore make available audio equipment that will let voters who are blind and visually impaired vote without assistance. It also calls for LePore to train poll workers on how to use the new technology...

Oliphant fighting to regain public confidence in Broward voting
FORT LAUDERDALE — Miriam Oliphant took over the job of Broward County elections chief with one mission: restore voters' confidence following the 2000 election recount debacle. But since the botched primary in September, it's Oliphant who has been fighting to retain public confidence in her ability to do her job...

High Speed Rail: Disney throws support behind regional transportation plan
LAKE BUENA VISTA — The Disney Co., whose millions of visitors and thousands of employees add heavily to central Florida's chronic traffic woes, will support a multibillion-dollar regional transportation plan, the company said Monday. The end result could one day be a light-rail system linking Walt Disney World with the Orange County Convention Center and the International Drive tourist district...
High Speed Rail: Four companies enter bids to build Florida's bullet train network
TALLAHASSEE — Four companies, including the firm that built the nation's only high-speed rail line, entered bids Monday to build the state's bullet train network. Prices ranged from $404 million to $2.7 billion, depending on the route. Fluor-Bombardier was joined by Global Rail Consortium, Georgia Monorail Consortium and Et3.com in submitting bids to the Florida High Speed Rail Authority. Only Fluor-Bombardier has a commercial system in operation in America — Amtrak's Acela line in the Northeast...

Florida, tribe at odds on land issue
When is land owned by an Indian tribe part of its sovereign nation and when is it simply a piece of land the Indian tribe bought? In South Florida, the question is threatening to stymie Gov. Jeb Bush's high-profile effort to restore the Everglades and lead to a face-off with the Miccosukee Indian Tribe in the U.S. Supreme Court...

Analysis: Bush now seeks tax cuts he once scorned
WASHINGTON — President Bush's tax plan include dozens of small tax breaks for interests as disparate as insurance companies, elite private universities, operators of landfills and people of modest means who donate to their churches. These items have received little notice, because individually they are insignificant compared with the president's sweeping proposals to lower tax rates and make most people's returns on investments tax free...

Dan K. Thomasson: Republicans, the deficit party
WASHINGTON — For those of who came to the capital in the early '60s, it is difficult to comprehend the philosophical switch that has taken place between the two political parties in their approach to the important task of budgeting. In those times, minority Republicans railed almost daily against Lyndon Johnson's deficits from the floors of Congress, contending that the president's "guns and butter" approach to spending would hock the future of "our children and our grandchildren."...
Morton Kondracke: A test — 'dynamic' vs. 'static' budgets
The Bush administration should quit ducking and say -- with dollar signs -- exactly what it expects its supply-side economic policies to do for the economy and the federal budget. Who knows, the White House might be right on the money. As a matter of ideology, Bush & Co. believe that more deep tax cuts won't ultimately reduce federal revenues and worsen deficits, but will cause the economy to boom, bring in higher revenues and restore the budget to balance...
Guest editorial: Spending spree at the Pentagon
No one wants to shortchange the Defense Department at a time when the nation is facing acute foreign threats, but the Pentagon's latest budget proposal seems to glory in its excesses. The $380 billion proposal throws billions around indiscriminately, financing the weapons of tomorrow, the weapons of yesterday and a middle generation of weapons headed for obsolescence even before they begin rolling off production lines...

Molly Ivins: Another thing CEOs should probably avoid
AUSTIN, Texas — Sprint Corp. has just fired its two top executives for (I love this part) a conflict of interest. It seems these worthy gentlemen felt perfectly entitled to pay zero taxes on more than $100 million in stock-option gains. Isn't that special? But that's not why they were fired. They were fired because Sprint's accounting firm Ernst & Young set up these lucrative tax shelters...

Guest editorial: An even longer arm of the law
The Bush administration, it seems, has been quietly preparing a bill that would give it even more sweeping powers than it already has assumed to conduct additional wiretaps and electronic surveillance, hold people in secret, limit judicial review of its activities and further clamp down on public information...

Conflict with Iraq echoes Vietnam, yet no one hears
WASHINGTON -- "You can't trust the government; you can't believe what they say, and you can't rely on their judgment. . . . People do things the president wants to do even though it's wrong, and the president can be wrong."...

The logic of contradictory thought
Let's see if I understand this:
We are seriously considering nuking Iraq, which doesn't have nuclear weapons, because it is trying to get them. We will not nuke North Korea, which has nuclear weapons and is building more. That will teach other countries not to try to get nuclear weapons.
I get it.
Last time the Germans went to war, we licked them and executed their leaders. We spent 50 years telling them not to act like Prussian militarists, who go to war to get their way. So when their chancellor, Gerhard Schroeder, doesn't join in our war on Iraq, he is useless. That's because we are not Prussians.
I get it...

2/9-7/03

Legislature: House speaker spending $600,000 in salaries for staff
TALLAHASSEE — House Speaker Johnnie Byrd is spending more than $600,000 in salaries for a recently enhanced communications office that will transmit recorded phone calls to millions of Floridians touting the Legislature's accomplishments. Byrd, R-Plant City, has said the revamped communications staff will help all House members reach their constituents, noting that "a well-informed electorate is vital to the strength of our democracy." ...
Byrd's e-mail campaign proposal hits nerve
By Mary Ellen Klas, Palm Beach Post Staff Writer
Democrats in the state legislature decry the House speaker's plan as self-promotion. ...

FAU proposes $290,000 salary for new president Brogan 
BOCA RATON — Florida Atlantic University has proposed a salary for Lt. Gov Frank Brogan that would rank third among the state's 11 public university presidents, even though he has no experience.
A draft contract released Friday details a base salary of $290,000, plus the use of a car and a new $2 million on-campus residence for Brogan, who beat out a field of academics last week when he was unanimously selected as the school's next president. (other perks as well...)
Pay university IOUs
Palm Beach Post Editorial
State way behind on matching private gifts. ...

Florida voters might get another shot at amendments
TALLAHASSEE — Senate President Jim King thinks it might be a good idea to hold a special election to give Florida voters a chance to affirm their decisions for smaller classrooms.
"You wanted all of these constitutional amendments and we now know what they're going to cost," King said during an interview aired on public television. "Now you tell us in your vote whether or not you wish still to have these constitutional amendments.
"I think that's ultimately where we're going to go," he said. "Probably within this next year." ...

Bush budget rattles walls in Florida
By Randy Schultz, Palm Beach Post Editorial Page Editor
If you think Florida's economy has been tough the past three years, you weren't here in 1990-91. The early-'90s recession hit the state hard because it was a real-estate recession. Building slowed, which made everything else slow down. Yet even when the latest recession officially started three years ago, real estate in Florida stayed strong, which has kept everything else relatively strong.
A few days ago came news that Palm Beach County's median used-home price increased last year to nearly $284,000. That represented a jump from 2001 of almost 20 percent. Even on the Treasure Coast, the price rise was close to 20 percent, bringing the median price to $128,300...

Jeb dumps troubled kids, and costs, onto counties
Palm Beach Post Editorial
Taking the state out of a state responsibility. ...

Lost in Plain Sight: The Legacy of Foster Care
There's more than one way for a foster child to disappear. Some go like Rilya Wilson, the 5-year-old from Miami who simply vanished last year, leaving behind nothing but a mystery. Others disappear more slowly, losing their childhoods a piece at a time as they grow up in the foster care system. They're the kids no one wants, the ones raised by the state and set adrift as young adults...

Florida gears up for possible conflict in Iraq
PENSACOLA — Not far from where tourists frolic on beaches, at theme parks and other Florida playgrounds, a deadlier game is being played as the state flexes its military muscle. Florida will play a major role if the nation goes to war with Iraq, just as it did in the Persian Gulf War, Bosnia and Kosovo in the 1990s and in Afghanistan and at home following the Sept. 11, 2001 terrorist attacks. More than 6,800 Reserve and National Guard troops have been called up across Florida while the state's active-duty duty bases are deploying thousands of troops, dozens of aircraft and a few ships in numbers often shrouded in secrecy.  ...
Israelis calmy preparing for war
By Margaret Coker, Palm Beach Post Staff Writer
Israeli military leaders are saying on TV that a U.S.-led war with Iraq is a certainty...

Democrats endeavor for unity
The Florida Democratic Party is looking for a message - and some money to convey a new image to voters. State Chairman Scott Maddox and other participants in a meeting of the party's budget and finance committee Saturday made one thing clear: They are finished moaning about last November's rout and pointing fingers at those responsible. With scores of city elections set this year, and both a presidential campaign and U.S. Senate race to prepare for in 2004, Democratic leaders said they want to concentrate...

Imaginative settlements defined Butterworth era
By Larry Keller, Palm Beach Post Staff Writer
The state's universities often were beneficiaries of companies that ran afoul of the former state attorney general. ...

Group files complaint that FCAT discriminates against disabled
WEST PALM BEACH — A support agency for disabled students filed a complaint with the U.S. Department of Education saying the Florida Comprehensive Assessment Test discriminates against special education students.
The seven-page complaint was sent to the department's Office for Civil Rights in Atlanta. It requests an investigation of the FCAT and the policies regarding how students with disabilities are allowed to take the test.
Thousands of disabled students statewide are in danger of being held back or of not receiving their high school diplomas this year because they can't pass the test...

Editorial: Malpractice insurance- Legislators must place citizens' interests first
There are few surprises in a governor's task force report on solving Florida's malpractice insurance dilemma.
Recommendations include a $250,000 cap on pain-and-suffering awards, making it harder to sue emergency room doctors and creating a statewide patient safety commission.
At least now they're out there in public, in writing, and with enough clout to demand serious attention by patients, doctors, lawyers and politicians. Now the Legislature and lobbyists have a foundation for a head start on one of the most pressing matters on the agenda of the 2003 session convening March 4. ...
Malpractice dud
The governor's malpractice task force did very little to offer any constructive solutions to the problem but offered up some bad ones...

Group set to fire up Orlando activists
Carla Joseph moved here from Houston two years ago only to see the same things she'd been exposed to in Texas: plenty of injustices and nobody doing much about them.
"In Orlando, people are just not informed about what their rights are," said the 34-year-old Joseph, who led children's education programs in Houston. "People are just worried about day-to-day survival."
Joseph hopes that will change with the arrival of the Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now, or ACORN, which plans to set up its state headquarters in Orlando...

Unionizing move fans political fires
Madeira Beach city support staff are not happy with their treatment, contends Commissioner Charles Parker...

Guest editorial: John Ashcroft's death-penalty edicts
Attorney General John Ashcroft has directed federal prosecutors in New York and Connecticut to seek the death penalty in a dozen cases in which they had recommended lesser sentences. Ashcroft's orders are a triumph of ideology over good prosecutorial practice. The Bush administration should reconsider them. ...
Tossing plea deal no bargain for nation
Some years before he became U.S. attorney general, John Ashcroft was boasting about his conservatism. He said there were two things one finds in the middle of the road -- ''a moderate and a dead skunk.'' He added that he had no intention of becoming either.
When he served in the U.S. Senate, the Christian Coalition gave Mr. Ashcroft a 100 percent rating. He has built a political background of being against abortion rights, gay rights and gun control.
But it is something else he believes in that threatens to tear apart the nation's criminal justice system, and that is his pro-death penalty stance...

Religious indoctrination dressed up as social welfare
This message is to anyone who thinks that the separation of church and state is a vital component of American liberty: Wake up and start hollering. Our president is conducting a full frontal assault on this vital right, and few beyond a handful of civil liberties groups are paying any mind...

Crumbling Schools
Miami-Dade Public Schools squandered tens of millions of dollars on a mangled construction program, delayed crucial projects by months or even years, and trapped children in schools that are not only crowded, but obsolete, poorly maintained and in some cases downright unsafe, a Herald investigation has found. ...

Former WorldCom executive's Boca Raton home for sale
BOCA RATON — Former WorldCom executive Scott Sullivan has put his sprawling home west of Boca Raton on the market for $22.5 million — and it's still under construction. Sullivan was chief financial officer at WorldCom when investigators say the company carried out a $9 billion accounting fraud, the largest in U.S. history...

Appellate court blocks Panhandle castration sentence
TALLAHASSEE — Judges cannot sentence sex offenders to be surgically castrated because there is no provision in state law for that penalty, an appellate court has ruled. A three-judge panel of 1st District Court of Appeal on Thursday unanimously reversed the castration sentence of Paul Bruno...

A tainted bay, but no fines yet
A DEP agreement allows oil companies suspected of violations more than a year to prove their innocence.  TAMPA -- For years, a good rain is all it has taken to send pollution pouring into Tampa Bay from oil company property at the Port of Tampa.
The pollutants are all heavy metals: arsenic, copper, lead, zinc, nickel, iron, mercury.
At one point, state environmental regulators threatened to levy thousands of dollars in fines against the oil companies.
But then top officials at the state Department of Environmental Protection cut a deal with the companies that allows the pollution to continue while the companies take nearly two years to figure out whether it is their fault.
Frequent DEP critic Linda Young of the Clean Water Network said she was not surprised the agency cut a deal rather than force a cleanup.
"That's typical of the way DEP has been dealing with enforcement lately: prepare a plan of study not to correct the problem but to figure out some way to get around it," she said. ...

Guest editorial: Shortchanging the environment
His State of the Union oratory to the contrary, President Bush wants to spend less money on the environment and clean energy programs than Congress gave him two years ago. In a way, that's not surprising. Domestic programs generally took their lumps in a budget weighted toward tax cuts and military spending. Even so, some of the president's proposals — including a reduction in the Environmental Protection Agency budget from $8.1 billion in 2002 to $7.6 billion this year — seemed downright peculiar, coming as they did on the heels of Bush's ringing pledges for a cleaner environment and reduced dependence on foreign oil. ...

Bush seeks tax breaks he once blasted
WASHINGTON -- President Bush's tax plan include dozens of small tax breaks for interests as disparate as insurance companies, elite private universities, operators of landfills and people of modest means who donate to their churches.
These items have received little notice, because individually they are small compared with Bush's sweeping proposals to lower tax rates and make most people's returns on investments tax-free. But altogether, the tax breaks for special interests could total hundreds of billions of dollars in revenue losses during the next 10 years.
Many of the proposals are similar to ones Bush scoffed at when they were proposed in the 2000 election campaign by his Democratic opponent, Al Gore.
For instance, at a rally in Little Rock, Ark., about two months before the election, Bush made this criticism of Gore's tax proposals: "The tax code is too complicated as it is. My opponent's plan makes it more complicated with a lot of fine print. You get tax relief if you behave a certain way or only if you meet certain small categories. It's so targeted, it misses the target."
Bush declared at the rally, "I believe that everybody who pays taxes ought to get tax relief," not just "the right people," as defined by Gore...

Paul Krugman: Is the economic maestro Greenspan really just a hack?
It's probably wishful thinking, but some people hope that the old Alan Greenspan — the man we used to respect — will make a return appearance next week.
During the Clinton years Greenspan became an icon of fiscal probity, constantly lecturing politicians on the importance of eliminating deficits and paying off debt. Then George W. Bush took office, and Greenspan became — or was revealed as — a different man.
First the Fed chairman lent decisive support to the Bush tax cut, urging Congress to reduce taxes lest the country run too large a budget surplus and pay off its debt too quickly. No, really. 
Then when the budget plunged into deficit, Greenspan not only refused to reconsider, he supported plans to make the tax cut permanent. The stern headmaster had become an indulgent uncle.
But now the fiscal deterioration has reached catastrophic proportions. In its first budget, the Bush administration projected a 2004 surplus of $262 billion. In its second budge