Florida’s liberals want their cake and eat it too

After having the state’s courts custom design legislative districts to accommodate liberals – and costing Pinellas County an extremely effective legislator in Washington, the whining has begun. In several districts, lines were drawn to all but assure a Democratic seat holder. But recently liberals are complaining that the correct Democrat might not emerge from primary elections to face only token or no GOP competition. Now come the plaintive cries that the anointed Samantha Jones might lose her primary to Sam Smith (names changed to protect the liberal). Geez, do we have to go back to the courts again and plead that the right Democrat might not win their party’s primary? Isn’t that what the electoral process is all about – that the person favored by the most people, not party hacks, wins the election?

Around Tampa Bay

1. We know there’s no good time to do road work on the major arteries to and from the beach, but two weeks into spring break? Maybe that’s the time to work on the railroad grade in Umatilla. We’ve had to deal with CSX in a previous life and frankly, they just don’t care.

2. It is heartening to see good use being made of Clearwater’s South Ward School with the Clearwater Historical Society and the Clearwater Bomber Museum. Now if some wise person could find an equally good use of the picturesque North Ward School, it would be terrific. A couple ideas are being floated.

3. Hard to pick a favorite in the ticket brokers versus pro sports teams because both sides are driven by nothing but greed. As we pointed out several months ago (RANTS – Oct. 4, 2014), the Lightning want to tell you who you can allow to use your purchased ticket – and grab part of the resale price. Meanwhile the brokers add ridiculous commissions and upcharges to the tickets they re-sell. This will supposedly be worked out by the Florida legislature – good luck with that.

4. The Beach Boys are coming to Ruth Eckerd Hall next Monday (29^th) with Fun, Fun, Fun, Surfin’ USA and other high-energy hits. They are still fronted by 74-year-old Mike Love, whose best line is “If we knew we were going to be doing this for this long a time, we would have recorded more ballads.”

5. You’ve lived here a long time if you attended the Beach Boy’s first visit to Clearwater at Jack Russell Stadium 51 years ago this year. Filling in for Brian Wilson at that concert was a premier studio guitarist named Glen Campbell who would hit the Top 40 for the first time two years later with By the Time I Get to Phoenix.

The diamond, the media and other stuff

6. Among the names reportedly on the Obama short list for a Supreme Court nominee – Loretta Lynch. He’s got to be kidding.

7. We always enjoy “Best Of” lists. A recent Buzzeranker piece rated the top 15 major league baseball players of all time. Top Five were Ruth, Mays, Gehrig, Aaron and Williams. That’s quite a quintet, but somewhere in that top five there has to be Ty Cobb. Replacing who? As a member of the military would say, that’s above our pay grade.

8. Best piece of “beach music” you’ve never heard – John Franklin’s Ocean Drive Sunday. You can find it on U Tube or ITunes or on the high rotation section of our IPod.

9. Allegations of match fixing; suspicions of juicing by both male and female players; maybe pro tennis won’t be so boring in the future.

10. From Jonathon Eig’s Get Capone, a so-so book but with a few interesting tidbits – the man who pronounced an 11-year sentence on Big Al was Federal Judge James Wilkerson of the Northern District of Illinois. The man he replaced was somewhat better known – Judge Kenesaw Mountain Landis who left the bench to become Commissioner of Baseball.

In their nineties, these character actors are still kickin’

Media notes on Barney Miller’s Abe Vigoda’s passing a few weeks ago at 94 mentioned that he often appeared on lists of people who were still alive but who most people thought had died. A few more veteran character actors now very much alive in their nineties: Nehemiah Persoff (Jake Guzik on The Untouchables) 96; Noel Neill (Superman’s Lois Lane) 95; Nanette Fabray (Sid Caesar’s sidekick and Shelly’s aunt) 94; Barbara Hale (Perry Mason’s Della Street) 93; William Schallert (Patty Duke’s TV Dad) 93; Bill Macy (Maude’s long suffering husband, Walter) 93 and, of course, the most active of the 90-year-olds, Betty White who is also 93.