Florida Governors Debate

Blogger has been acting oddly since late this afternoon, so I'm leery of posting at length; three attempts to post about the debate vanished into the ether.

Short takes: Welcome to the Jim Davis / Charlie Crist Cliche Festival. I heard nothing that you couldn't get off either candidate's websites and commercials, and very little substance. The only kudos I'll give out are to Mr. Crist for taking a nuanced stance on stem-cell research and not falling into the Religious Reich's vise-grip on the Terri Schiavo case, and to Davis for apologizing for his vote in 1990 against restitution in the Pitts-Lee case.

Other than that, like last night's squint-fest between Sen. Bill Nelson and Rep. Katherine Harris in the Senate debate, it was a joint press conference, and amazingly enough, of the four candidates I've seen in the last 24 hours, Katherine Harris was the most interesting to watch, primarily because you never really knew what she was going to do. Not that that's an advantage in a politician.

Oh, and Max Linn, the Reform Party candidate, was not there. After a judge ruled that he could appear, an appeals court judge overruled him. Damn those activists judges; I would have liked to have seen what would have happened if Max Linn had been there. It would have been interesting to see what came out -- or who.

Again, like last night, I'd call it a toss-up, and I don't see a whole lot of reasons for voters of either party to cross over to vote for the other guy.

(Minor edit after posting.)