Word: florida
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...warned that the party would all but vanish if it tried to be Dem Lite. But now the philosophical disputes are playing out in a high-stakes game of poker, with each side betting it will come out looking smarter when the stimulus' results are discernible. Should California and Florida, two of the states hardest hit by the nation's housing collapse, show improvement by the time the 2010 midterm elections roll around, you can probably expect to see the GOP running more from the center. Moreover, governors like Perry, who faces a strong challenge from Texas Senator Kay Bailey...
Crist, who is also up for re-election next year - but won't comment on whether he's interested in the U.S. Senate seat that Florida Republican Mel Martinez is leaving in 2010 - has retained high approval ratings despite Florida's dire straits. He attributes them largely to the fact that "I don't come down on issues in terms of ideology." But that has put him at odds over the stimulus with most in Florida's GOP congressional delegation, including Martinez, whom Crist has lobbied hard in recent weeks to join the so far struggling bipartisan effort Obama...
...colleagues on Capitol Hill, appeared to be sticking to his guns, criticizing the bill for supposedly wasteful spending and not enough tax cuts. But Crist insists those concerns shouldn't override "the fact that this thing is going to pass in any case. This is also Florida taxpayers' hard-earned money, and we have to fight for our fair share of the dollars...
Crist is not in an enviable position these days, as he gets hit from all sides. Fiscal conservatives say his Accelerate Florida spending hasn't stopped the state's unemployment rate from rising above 8%, while those on the left say his lowering of Florida's exorbitant property taxes has given the GOP-led legislature an excuse to make steep budget cuts in schools and health care - cuts that Crist last month had to step in and reverse amid citizen complaints. "I'm a fiscal conservative," says Crist, "but I just returned from visiting an unemployment office in Orlando...
...some justifiable positions on the stimulus," says Leslie Lenkowsky, a public-affairs professor at Indiana University who served in George W. Bush's Administration with Indiana's Republican governor, Mitch Daniels. (Daniels also offered the stimulus support before Obama on Monday visited his state, another GOP stronghold that, like Florida, went for Obama.) "But I would find it amazing if in the end they didn't accept the money. The job of a congressional opposition is to oppose, but the job of state governors is to make state government work...