THE VILLAGES — “Unlike some of the other flavors of the week, I am Haagen-Dazs black walnut with substance,” Republican presidential candidate Herman Cain declared Wednesday while launching his book tour here.

Cain has been using variations on the “black walnut” line since Sarah Palin called him “the flavor of the week” after his Florida straw poll victory.

A few hours after Cain invoked the ice cream metaphor, Palin announced she won’t be a presidential candidate in 2012.

Before Palin’s announcement, Cain said he wasn’t concerned about the possibility she’d run.

“If Sarah Palin gets in, we’ve got one more person in the race. That’s all it is. I’m not so much worried about that, and here’s why: If you have tracked, we have tracked our support. The thing about Cain supporters is we build and we build and we build. They don’t defect. My supporters are not going to go and run to the flavor of the week.”

Mitt Romney swept through the capital of the nation’s biggest swing state Wednesday, meeting voters at a restaurant, talking jobs with business professionals, and working to nail down dollars and support from some of Florida’s most influential Republicans.

The former Massachusetts governor cast himself as the candidate most likely to get the economy moving again – and the Republican best positioned to beat President Obama.

“My approach is a fundamental change in the way we’re doing things,” Romney told a dozen Tallahassee-area business officials, who complained to him about the faltering economy, while lunching on fried chicken and steamed vegetables.

On Wednesday, Romney seemed intent on making significant strides with those who can help drive his campaign in Florida, huddling at the state Capitol with Gov. Rick Scott, Attorney General Pam Bondi, and a roster of lobbyists who double as prominent Republican fund-raisers.

Newborns are the latest victims of the prescription drug epidemic plaguing Florida and the country, Attorney General Pam Bondi said today.

That’s why Bondi is asking lawmakers to help her create a task force to find out how rampant the problem is and come up with solutions before prescription drug-addicted babies become a crisis as difficult to address as pill mills.

“We do not want this to become the next crack baby epidemic…and that’s where we’re headed,” Bondi told reporters at a press conference flanked by supporters of the legislation, including Sen. Joe Negron, R-Stuart, the bill’s sponsor and chairman of the Senate Health and Human Services Budget Committee. Bondi was also joined by Stephanie Haridopolos, a family practice physician and the wife of Senate President Mike Haridopolos, R-Merritt Island.

Bondi said she and Stephanie Haridopolos recently visited the neo-natal intensive care unit at St. Joseph’s Women’s Hospital in Tampa. Kenneth Solomon, the unit’s director, said Wednesday that about 25 percent of the babies in his unit are there because they are withdrawing from drugs. The majority of the babies are addicted to oxycodone, Percocet or methodone, Solomon said. Twenty percent of the babies born addicted to drugs in his unit wind up in foster care, he said.

Usually, babies and mothers spend up to 72 hours in the hospital. But babies addicted to drugs can spend up to two months in the NICU at three times the cost, Solomon said. The babies suffer from extreme sensitivity to light and sound, fevers, incessant crying and respiratory problems, are often born prematurely and sometimes must be readdicted to the drug before the withdrawal procedure can begin, he said.

“Instead of getting milk, those babies are getting methodone,” Bondi said. “And it’s got to stop.”

As the Senate’s chief of state spending on health care, Negron said lawmakers need to step in immediately to assess the problem.

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Less than two months after the Florida Supreme Court ruled that Gov. Rick Scott could not require agencies to get his formal approval for rules they wanted to enact, a spokesperson said Wednesday the office is still reviewing the proposals — informally.

But a few House Democrats said such action may violate at least the spirit of justices’ 5-2 decision.

“Isn’t this like an end run around the court decision, that you”re subverting the court ruling?” Rep. Franklin Sands, D-Weston, asked Patricia Nelson, deputy director of Scott’s Office of Fiscal Accountability and Regulatory Reform.

Nelson said the governor still insisted on a “very close oversight of agency rulemaking.” But she denied that agencies had to go through the governor to get a go-ahead.

Indeed, Nelson said that if an agency has a standard that it must set quickly, or if there’s a backlog slowing review of a proposed rule, officials are told to enact it.

“We tell them you can move forward, because you don’t have to wait for my approval, based on the Supreme Court ruling,” Nelson said.

In a letter to agency heads sent shortly after the court ruling, Scott chief-of-staff Steve MacNamara said the governor “believes the majority opinion is illogical and grossly misreads the Florida Constitution.” MacNamara said Nelson’s three-person office will continue to “advise” agencies on what kind of rules they should enact.

Scott has vowed to cut government regulations and red tape. But Democrats on the House Rulemaking and Regulation Subcommittee saidWednesday  they were concerned that Scott’s review still amounted to undue influence, while acknowledging the agencies affected are under his control.

“It raises some great concern to me,” said Rep. Barbara Watson, D-Miami Gardens.

As Mitt Romney continues his Florida swing today with a visit to Tallahassee, his campaign is announcing endorsements from three Republican state House members who are in line to become speaker in coming years: Reps. Will Weatherford, Chris Dorworth and Richard Corcoran.

All three were backers of former Minnesota Gov. Tim Pawlenty before Pawlenty dropped out and endorsed Romney.

Another key Pawlenty supporter, former Jeb Bush campaign chairman Phil Handy, also signed on with the Romney campaign this week as a co-chairman of Romney’s Florida advisory council.

THE VILLAGES — Mitt Romney took another shot at Republican presidential rival Rick Perry‘s position on Social Security today but directed most of his salvos at President Obama during an appearance here this afternoon.

He also weighed in on New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie‘s decision not to enter the race and on Sen. Marco Rubio‘s prospects as a vice presidential candidate.

Romney spoke to a crowd of about 250 people in this heavily Republican Central Florida retiree community. About 40 Democrats in blue T-shirts — a large turnout for this area — stood outside holding signs critical of Romney.

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Saying she’s fighting for consumers, Attorney General Pam Bondi asked lawmakers to help her tighten Florida laws to protect vacationers – especially the elderly – from timeshare resale scammers.

The scam involves timeshare resale marketers promising timeshare owners that they’ve already got a buyer, getting a deposit for their “brokering” services, keeping the money – and disappearing, Bondi said.

“That has got to stop,” she said.

So far this year, Bondi said her office has received nearly 7,000 complaints about the timeshare resales – more than the number of all other consumer-related complaints combined.

The most common complaints include false claims that the marketer has a specific buyer ready to purchase or rent the timeshare; unkept promises that the property would be rented within a certain period of time; and failure to honor cancellation policies, Bondi said.

The bill, still in the works, will be sponsored by Senate Majority Leader Andy Gardiner, R-Orlando, and Rep. Eric Eisnaugle, R-Orlando, and has the support of the AARP.

Bondi said the state’s unfair and deceptive marketing and advertising laws need strenghtening to help prosecute the fraudsters.

The bill will likely include provisions restricting timeshare resale advertisers from:
- saying that they have a buyer if they don’t;
- misleading a customer about their sales success rate;
- acting as brokers for actual timeshare sales.

And the bill will also give sellers the opportunity to cancel their contracts with the advertisers within seven days.

Although he supports prison privatization and is committed to a broad expansion of it in Florida, Gov. Rick Scott said he disapproves of the legislature’s use of the state budget to establish policy – exactly how lawmakers ordered the privatization this spring.

“I should have the power to veto things that are major policy changes. I got elected as governor to mamke decisions on behalf of all the citizens of the state and to watch how all the money was spent. I ran a whole campaign on accountability,” Scott told reporters after Tuesday’s Cabinet meeting.

Scott appeared to be siding with a Tallahassee judge who ruled last week that the legilsature’s inclusion of the prison privatization effort in the state budget was unconstitutional.

In her ruling against Scott’s administration last week, Tallahassee Circuit Judge Jackie Fulford wrote that, if the legislature wanted to expand the prison privatization, it “must do so by general law, rather than ‘using the hidden recesses of the General Appropriations Act.’”

Scott said he hasn’t decided yet whether to appeal Fulford’s ruling, but was confident the 18-county region privatization of 29 prisons ordered by lawmakers would eventually take place.

“We’re going to do prison privatization in the state as long as we save money. I believe that we’re going to save a lot of money,” he said. During his campaign for governor, Scott said he wanted to slash prison spending by $1 billion – about half of DOC’s total budget.

Still, Scott said he’d like it if lawmakers restrict the budget to spending matters.

“That would be nice,” he said.

UPDATE: Chicago Mercantile Exchange Group spokesman Michael Shore would not respond to specific questions about Gov. Rick Scott’s pitch to bring the CME to the Sunshine State. Scott told reporters today the CME has narrowed down its search to Florida and Texas. Duffy’s threatening to flee Illinois because lawmakers there hiked corporate income taxes earlier this year.

“We are considering proposals from several states,” Shore said.

Florida Gov. Rick Scott’s been wooing the Chicago Mercantile Exchange since shortly after he took office. And he’s more eager than ever to get the 2,000 jobs a relocation of the CME would bring.

Scott said this morning Florida and Texas are considered the top two contenders if CME Chairman Terry Duffy follows through on his threat to move the exchange out of the state after Illinois lawmakers raised the corporate tax rate from 4.8 percent to 7 percent.

“Everybody call the Chicago Mercantile Exchange, get them to move those 2,000 jobs to Florida,” Scott told reporters during a Q-and-A session after this morning’s Cabinet meeting.

Scott believes he’s competing with his rival-in-chief – Texas Gov. Rick Perry – for the CME relo. But other news reports indicate that Duffy is also in talks with Illinois officials eager to keep the exchange at home.

Scott is “on the hunt” for new jobs, he said Tuesday, adding he’s optimistic about Florida’s chances of nailing the CME jobs. He appeared to have unleashed his inner salesman on Duffy in a recent conversation.

When asked what he told Duffy, here’s what Scott said:

“My pitch is, first off we have no personal income tax and we’re in the process of phasing out our business tax. I can tell you that if you have any issues with state regulation, I’ll at least respond. I can’t guarantee you the answer you want, but I can get you an answer. If you have problems, I’ll see if I can solve the problem. If I can’t, I can’t make any guarantees. But let me tell you. I will show up to try to solve problems. That’s all I’ve ever done in business. That’s all I’ve ever done with my life. And that’s pretty important to business people because their experience with a lot of government is they just can’t get an answer. A no is OK. But give me a darn answer.”

Scott said he’s spoken directly with Duffy and pledged to do all he could to lure the CME to the state. Two thousand new jobs would be a significant boost for Scott, who’s promised to create 700,000 jobs in seven years in Florida. About 80,000 new jobs have been added in Florida since the first-term governor took office in January.

Attorney General Pam Bondi took State Board of Administration executive director Ash Williams to task after Williams gave a state senator a bill for more than $10,000 for a public records request.

Appearing before the Florida Cabinet this morning, Williams defended the charges, saying the request was unprecedented in its breadth and depth. Williams told state Sen. Mike Fasano, a New Port Richey Republican who made the public records request, it would take 300 man-hours and more than seven weeks to produce the 6,000 documents Fasano is seeking.

Williams told the Cabinet that estimate was, if anything, a low-ball.

But Bondi, a former state prosecutor who also served as the Tampa state attorney’s spokeswoman, said she’s “lost sleep over the bill” and that her office charged much less for a public records request resulting in more than 25,000 pages of documents. She ordered Williams to provide an explanation for why the request would take so much time and cost so much.

“If you’re going to charge that amount for documents, you need to give a very detailed breakdown as to why you are charging that much, the hours involved,” Bondi said after the meeting. “If it’s a cost that large, you have to better break it down and justify it. It very well may cost that. I’d just like to see a better breakdown. I mean, that’s a lot of money.”

After receiving the bill, Fasano asked Senate President Mike Haridopolos, R-Merritt Island, to subpoena the documents or order Williams to appear before a committee.

Williams told the Cabinet Tuesday morning the agency would be obligated to provide the information if ordered and that the SBA previously has given lawmakers un-redacted information on the condition that it remains confidential.

Fasano last month began seeking the information from the SBA related to a $125 million state pension fund investment in a hedge fund called Starboard Value and Opportunity.

Does Herman Cain have staying power?

The Palm Beach County GOP is betting he does.

Cain, whose stunning victory in a nationally watched Florida straw poll has fueled a rise in the polls for his Republican presidential campaign, has been booked as keynote speaker for the Palm Beach County GOP’s Jan. 28 Lincoln Day dinner.

The fundraising dinner is three days before Florida’s calendar-busting Jan. 31 primary.

Republican Mitt Romney is returning to Florida today and renewing accusations that rival Rick Perry is a threat to Social Security.

Romney is scheduled to visit The Villages — a large, Republican-tilted retiree bastion in Central Florida that’s a must stop for GOP candidates. The former Massachusetts governor will be conducting an afternoon town hall-style meeting.

A new video released by the Romney campaign accuses Perry of wanting to end Social Security as a federal program and let the individual states handle senior benefits. Perry said during the last GOP debate he didn’t favor such an idea, only giving state employees the option of enrolling in state-run retirement plans. Click here to see PolitiFact’s take on the dispute.

Florida Republican Gov. Rick Scott offered some rare praise Monday for Barack Obama — touting the president’s decision to send three free trade agreements to Congress for approval.

The pacts with South Korea, Panama and Colombia were negotiated under the Bush administration, but delayed while Obama pressed for more aid for displaced American workers — a measure Republicans in Congress resisted. The package is expected to be approved quickly now.

Scott said:

“I am extremely pleased President Barack Obama moved these critical free trade agreements off his desk and into the hands of Congress.  These agreements are vital to our state and nation, and for far too long,  U.S. companies, including many in Florida,  have had to pay billions in excessive tariffs to Colombia and Panama for the ability to export American goods to those nations.

” A successful jobs plan is dependent on immediate ratification of these agreements, and I urge Congress to quickly pass them.”

The dominos began falling Monday after Florida last week set a Jan. 31 presidential primary, with South Carolina announcing it had moved its contest to 10 days ahead of the Sunshine State’s.

“Today, South Carolina’s Republican primary restores order,” South Carolina GOP Chairman Chad Connelly said in announcing the date.

Still, there’s plenty in flux.

Nevada, Iowa and New Hampshire — designated by the two national parties as early voting states — haven’t announced their dates yet, with all expected to jump ahead of Florida, which broke party rules by leapfrogging into January.

New Hampshire now is looking at Jan. 3 or 10 for its first-in-the-nation primary. State law in Iowa could push caucuses there  into 2011 if New Hampshire grabs Jan. 3, since the Hawkeye State must vote eight days before another state’s contest.

A week after the Florida Republican Party elected Lenny Curry as its new leader — replacing the late Dave Bitner — executive director Andy Palmer said Monday that he is leaving for the Tallahassee law firm, Metz, Husband and Daughton.

Palmer, who had earlier served as the GOP’s top executive, was brought back into the party leadership in January for a short-term stint. Gov. Rick Scott, Bitner, and other Republican leaders sought him out to help stabilize a party still convulsing from the tenure of former party chairman Jim Greer, now facing criminal charges for allegedly misusing donors’ cash.

Election year is coming. And with a new chairman just on board, the party is expected to move swiftly in naming a successor. Finalists for the job: Brian Hughes, a former Scott spokesman who recently took the communications job at the party, and Mike Grissom, a party deputy executive director.

 

Florida and more than a dozen other states’ new elections laws intended to clamp down on voting fraud could keep 5 million Americans from voting in next year’s presidential election, a new study by the Brennan Center for Justice found.

As in Florida, the laws require voters to show photo identification before casting ballots, cut back on early voting days or impose restrictions on voter registration drives. Florida’s new election law passed by the Republican-controlled legislature in May and signed into law by Gov. Rick Scott includes all of those elements and more.

The ACLU and other groups filed a federal lawsuit in June against Scott’s administration over the elections laws changes. The groups and the Brennan Center also asked the Justice Department to reject the most controversial provisions of the law. Late in July, Secretary of State Kurt Browning sidestepped the DOJ and instead asked a federal three-judge panel to sign off on those four portions being challenged in the lawsuit. Federal approval is required for five Florida counties under the 1965 Voting Rights Act.

The Brennan Center analysis found that the new laws, including Florida’s, could have a significant impact on next year’s presidential election because the changes will primarily impact minority and low-income voters who tend to vote for Democrats. Florida’s law could also make it more difficult for college and university students – who played a key role in President Obama’s 2008 victory – to vote.

“This is the most significant cutback in voting rights in decades. More voters may be affected than the margin of victory in two out of the past three presidential elections,” Michael Waldman, executive director of the Brennan Center for Justice, said in a statement released with the new study. “In 2012 we should make it easier for every eligible citizen to vote. Instead, we have made it far harder for too many. Partisans should not try to tilt the electoral playing field in this way.”

After getting a bill for more than $10,000 from the State Board of Administration, state Sen. Mike Fasano is asking Senate President Mike Haridopolos to subpoena the documents from the Cabinet agency regarding a $125 million investment in the state pension fund earlier this year.

Fasano is seeking public records demonstrating the “due diligence” the SBA used before it invested $125 million in Starboard Value and Opportunity, a hedge fund spin-off of Ramius LLC. Ramius’s president is a former client of SBA executive director Ash Williams. Williams told Fasano it would cost $10,750.13 for 360 hours of staff time and possibly take months to produce the documents.

An SBA spokesman said the investment – which took more than two years to research, negotiate and complete – was already in the works before Williams came to work for the SBA in July 2008 and neither the agency nor Williams has done anything wrong.

But on Friday, Fasano wrote a letter asking Haridopolos, R-Merritt Island, to use his legislative authority to subpoena the documents or order Williams to appear before a committee to explain the investment.

In his letter, Fasano said the SBA’s estimated cost of the records is “chilling to the concept of governmental transparency” and sets a dangerous precedent.

“It is a disgrace that the SBA could merely set a price tag on information that it does not want the public to see. Florida’s Government in the Sunshine laws are a protection that prevent secret deals and other behaviors from being hidden from public view. Circumventing these laws by slapping a price label on the requested material must not be tolerated. Not only will it damage access to information for the legislature, the greater danger is that it will damage access to information for Floridians as a whole,” Fasano, R-New Port Richey, wrote.

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Florida law enforcement and judicial officials Monday cautioned lawmakers about trying to create a tough new law spawned by the Casey Anthony case, although they acknowledged some legal changes may help blunt potential child abuse.

Sen. Joe Negron, R-Stuart, chairman of the Senate’s Select Committee on Protecting Florida’s Children, said it was possible lawmakers would consider creating a misdemeanor child abuse law that could be applied when a youngster faces the threat of harm.

Current law contains no such provision. Felony abuse laws can only be deployed after a child suffers injuries at the hands of a caregiver, slowing the role of law enforcement in stepping into cases, said those testifying before Negron’s committee.

Manatee County Sheriff’s Office Major Connie Shingledecker said a misdemeanor law would assist deputies looking to protect children in a home where parents are using drugs, or are otherwise negligent.

“For law enforcement, it’s a great option to have that tool in your armory,” Shingledecker said.

Negron’s panel is charged with examining Florida’s child protection laws in the wake of this summer’s verdict by an Orlando jury which cleared Casey Anthony of killing her 2-year-old daughter, Caylee.

Caylee Anthony was last seen on June 15, 2008. Her mother waited a month before telling her parents or police that the child was missing. Caylee Anthony’s body was found dead in December 2008.

Like every other state in the nation, Florida does not have a law making it a crime to not report a child missing. Florida lawmakers have filed at least eight bills criminalizing failing to report, with at least 25 other states considering similar legislation.

But those testifying Monday warned against such a law, saying it could interfere with efforts to find an abducted child, or work against prosecutors seeking later to convict someone accused of murder or abuse.

Because of constitutional safeguards against self-incrimination, Jacksonville-area State Attorney Brad King told the panel that if someone reports a missing child, and that youngster is later found dead,  a judge could determine that crime scene evidence is not admissable in court.

King also said that proving someone failed to report a missing child within a 24-hour period, as most of the proposed legislation calls for, will be tough.

“What you are asking us is to prove the negative, that someone didn’t report,” King said. “That could be very difficult.”

Republican presidential hopefuls Mitt Romney and Herman Cain will pay visits this week to The Villages, the Central Florida trove of Republican retiree voters that is a frequent stopping point for GOP candidates.

Former Massachusetts Gov. Romney will conduct a town hall meeting there on Tuesday afternoon.

Former Godfathers Pizza CEO Cain will sign copies of his new book there on Wednesday.

Both are making their first appearances in Florida since last month’s Presidency 5 conference and straw poll that boosted Cain’s national exposure and polling numbers.

The New Yorker‘s Ryan Lizza was asked by conservative blogger/radio host Hugh Hewitt why so many people are pushing New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie to run for president, but not Florida Republican Sen. Marco Rubio.

Said Lizza: “Because Marco Rubio is going to be the vice presidential nominee no matter what. And in fact, I think you should start this on your show. We should rename the Republican primary process the contest to be Marco Rubio’s running mate.”

The exchange occurs at the end of an interview about faith, politics and journalism.