Super PAC attack!

The onslaught has begun.

Millions of dollars in political ads are flooding Florida TV, including two new spots Wednesday by President Barack Obama’s campaign and an anti-Obama ad from a super PAC, the new breed of political action committee powered by unrestricted donations.

The volleys come after several weeks of building intensity and set the table for a congested summer and fall in the country’s largest swing state.

“Not only will it be incomparable, it’s uncharted territory for everybody,” said Florida Republican strategist Adam Goodman, who is concerned about finding air space for legislative and congressional races. “Your stuff is going to have to be pretty damn good to break through that clutter.”

Obama’s new spots, boasting about his support for military veterans with a reminder to voters about the killing of Osama bin Laden, and steps to preserve Medicare, closely follow the ad by the group Crossroads GPS depicting a fictional former Obama voter.

“I supported President Obama because he spoke so beautifully. He promised change,” says a woman who ages before viewers. “But things changed, for the worse.”

The ad is critical but deftly so, reflecting the desired target: swing voters who will likely decide the outcome in November. Despite a poor economy, Obama is still widely liked. A Quinnipiac University poll released Wednesday showed 76 percent of Florida voters think he is likeable, even if they favor Republican Mitt Romney in the election.

Get ready to see a lot of it.

More here

You want fries with that? Connie Mack campaign finds the funny spot. At Whataburger

The other day, Connie Mack's Senate campaign got a little too huffy and puffy over the story about Republican rival George LeMieux for the way he went about getting an interim Senate appointment in 2009 (story here).

Today, Team Mack got a sense of humor, playing up the details of a high-stakes meeting that LeMieux and other insiders had at a Tallahassee Whataburger at 1 a.m. The image is depressing: The cruel flourescent lights, the grease in the air, the late hour in a town that had hit REM sleep hours before. But the Mack press release is pretty funny:

What-a-tale – It’s What’s In the Whataburger George?

What Legitimate Business Warranted George LeMieux Demanding and Getting a 1:00 AM Meeting with Former RPOF Chair Jim Greer and Charlie Crist's Chief of Staff, Eric Eikenberg?
 
MIAMI – Startling revelations revealed over the past four days by the Tampa Tribune and the Times/Herald that George LeMieux allegedly exerted significant – and as of yet unexplained – significant pressure on Charlie Crist to appoint him to Florida’s vacant U.S. Senate seat.
 
The latest revelation came today, when the Tampa Bay Times / Miami Herald reported, “LeMieux was adamant that he deserved an interview, however, and met with Greer and Crist's chief of staff, Eric Eikenberg, at 1 a.m. at a Tallahassee Whataburger.”
 
Based on this new information, Mack Deputy Campaign Manager David James stated that a few simple questions should be asked of LeMieux, Crist, Eikenberg and Greer:
 
“Just exactly what was discussed at the 1:00 AM meeting at Whataburger, why were they there, who all really was there and what deals were made?”
 
Floridians may not know the full details of the meeting until the July trial of Jim Greer, which will likely feature George LeMieux sitting in front of the jury, but as Jim Greer said this week, "There's a lot more to this story and I'm not ready to tell it.”

Of Quinnipiac's polling, demographics and partisan whining

Like fans and coaches working the refs, partisans and politicians' paid staff are quick to pick apart polls that show their guy or gal is losing. But the polls are probably more accurate than the partisan whining.

Today’s Quinnipiac University poll showing Mitt Romney ahead of President Barack Obama by 6 points is probably no different.

Democrats were quick to zero in on the demographic breakdown of the 1,722-person poll, which showed respondents broke down this way by party identification:

Republican (34%), Democrat (31%), Independent 29%

And in March, when Obama led Romney by 7 (and Sen. Bill Nelson led Connie Mack by 8), this was the party breakdown of the poll:

Republican (29%), Democrat (33%), Independent (33%)

But here’s the breakdown of active registered voters:

Republican (36%), Democrat (40%) and independent (23.4 %).

To recap: When more Democrats account for the overall sample, the Democrat tends to win. And when more Republicans are sampled, the Republican wins. And the loser whines that the poll isn’t accurate because the demographic breakdown doesn’t mirror registration or performance in a state where Democrats cast anywhere from 37 percent to 42 percent of the ballots and Republicans cast anywhere from 38 percent to 41 percent of the ballots in recent Florida presidential elections.

However, pollsters say the surveys (and many others like it) are actually more accurate than they appear because they’re technically not gauging actual voter registration. They’re gauging self-described party ID of voters. They’re getting a sense of the voter writ large. Although, there is considerable overlap between the self-described party ID and self-described party registration.

Marco Rubio: "Don't fall in the trap of looking to our politics."

Sen. Marco Rubio, R-Fla., told a Hispanic business group in Washington that their presence in the audience on Wednesday afternoon had much to do with the people who came before them. And he decried what he called the "divisive politics" of pitting people against each other.

"As we try to examine how we can continue to be a great nation, don't fall in the trap of looking to our politics...The source of our greatness has always been our people," Rubio told the Latino Coalition, which was meeting this week at the U.S. Chamber of Commerce in Washington. 

Rubio's speech followed one to the gathering by former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney, the presumptive GOP presidential nominee. Rubio also made a claim that seems ripe for our friends at PolitiFact: "This nation, this political process, has not solved one single major issue in the last three-and-a-half to four years," he said.

Rubio also got an award from the Latino Coalition named for Hector Barreto Sr., one of the founders of the United States Hispanic Chamber of Commerce. He told the coalition he "may not deserve it, but now I'll have to earn it."

Ileana Ros-Lehtinen to Dancing with the Stars hunk William Levy: Congrats!

The hot moves of William Levy, the Cuban-born telenovela star, captivated fans this season of ABC's Dancing with the Stars.

They also apparently caught the attention of U.S. Rep. Ileana Ros-Lehtinen, the Miami Republican and first Cuban-American elected to Congress.

Ros-Lehtinen put out a statement Tuesday congratulating Levy for her "pulse racing performances ... and for tonight's win" — though Levy placed third, by a razor-thin margin, in the finals of the popular dance competition show.

"William has won the audience through his dancing skills, charisma, humility and hard work and tonight these skills were demonstrated more than ever," she said. "William's example is a testament of the greatness of our nation, where an immigrant such as him, who arrived in the U.S. from communist Cuba with nothing but the clothes on his back, can go on to pursue and achieve his lifelong dreams."

Alas, the congresswoman did not get a chance to watch the season finale. She is traveling in Asia.

Photo credit: Courtesy ABC

Sen. Tom Coburn endorses George LeMieux for Senate

From a press release endorsement by U.S. Sen. Tom Coburn, R-Okla:

"I am proud to endorse George LeMieux in his election to return to the U.S. Senate. I served with George and have seen firsthand his commitment to reducing our national debt and stopping Washington's out-of-control spending. During his time in the Senate, George was a proven leader. He passed necessary legislation to prevent Medicare fraud and offered the 2007 Solution, a roadmap to balance our budget. America is facing a difficult time and it is imperative we elect people like George LeMieux to go to Washington to make the difficult decisions that will save our country for future generations."

Invoking DNC chair and Sen. Nelson, RNC's Priebus calls on Obama to revoke Castro visa

Talk about strange political bedfellows. Republican National Committee (RNC) Chairman Reince Priebus is invoking Democratic Committee Chairwoman Debbie Wasserman Schultz and Democratic Sen. Bill Nelson in his call to revoke the visas of Mariela Castro et al.

Here's what Priebus just tweeted: "Officially invite @DWSTweets to join me in Miami for a press conference calling on @BarackObama to revoke visas granted to Cuban officials"

Doubt he'll get a response.

Background story is here. Press release follows:

WASHINGTON - Republican National Committee (RNC) Chairman Reince Priebus released the following statement calling on President Obama to revoke the visas that were recently granted to Cuban officials:

"President Obama should listen to his Democratic National Committee Chairwoman Debbie Wasserman Schultz and Senator Bill Nelson of Florida. He should change course and revoke the visas granted to Cuban officials. America should not be in the business of welcoming leaders of the oppressive Castro regime to our country," said RNC Chairman Reince Priebus.

"Democrats and Republicans disagree on many things, so when we come together on an issue, President Obama should take notice. As Senator Nelson said, granting visas to the Castro regime simply 'makes no sense.'

"At a time when an American sits in Cuban jail for helping the Jewish community gain access to the Internet, we should not be rolling out the red carpet for Communists with an atrocious human rights record. America must stand for freedom and with those fighting for it."

New Obama Florida ad plays the Osama card

Another ad announced from President Barack Obama's Florida campaign.

Q Poll: Romney tops Obama 47-41. Rubio could be a difference-maker.

Mitt Romney has crept to a 6-percentage point lead over President Barack Obama in Florida, where a new poll shows a majority of registered voters don’t think the incumbent deserves a second term.

Romney’s 47 percent to 41 percent lead over Obama would grow even bigger -- to an 8 percentage-point advantage – if the challenger chose Sen. Marco Rubio a running mate, according to Quinnipiac University’s new survey.

The seemingly small 2-point advantage with Rubio could be huge in must-win Florida, which Obama won by just 2.8 percentage points in 2008. The last three presidential elections -- including the 2000 elections decided by 537 votes -- have been won by an average spread of 2.6 percentage points.

“Given Florida’s recent history, if Rubio were to add 2 points to the Republican ticket, that could be quite important,” said Peter A. Brown, assistant vice president of the Quinnipiac University Polling Institute.

But there’s a catch, Brown noted: The 2-percentage point boost is not “statistically significant in the 1,722-person poll, which has an error margin of 2.4 percentage-point error margin.

Also, Romney’s lead might not be as big as the poll indicates because the survey could have under-sampled Democrats, who appeared to comprise a disproportionately low number of respondents relative to their numbers at the polls or on the voter rolls.