Unlike the previous states we have discussed for U.S. Senate where the incumbents are showing to be in big trouble, the race for U.S. Senate in Florida gives us a different jumping off point.  One reason could be that the field right now among the GOP in Florida is very crowded.  According to the latest tallies and newspaper stories, seven candidates have jumped in and one is getting ready to.

As such, the incumbent Senator up for re-election in 2012, Bill Nelson, is polling ahead of his top four challengers among the Republican field.  However; the poll was performed by the Democratic firm Public Policy Polling.  Nonetheless, the crowded GOP field isn’t helping matters.

Branding himself as a middle-of-the-road Democrat, Bill Nelson has proven quite the opposite.  According to the St. Petersburg Times, Nelson has supported every major Obama policy including the dreaded health care overhaul, Wall Street reform, and the failed stimulus.

One can only imagine that as the true front-runners in the Florida Senate Race begin to float to the top, we’ll see the current poll numbers begin to improve for the chances of Bill Nelson being unseated after spending more than three decades in Congress.

The Candidates:

ADAM HASNER

Mr. Hasner is 41.  He was born in Brooklyn and earned a Bachelor’s Degree from University of Maryland.  He later went on to receive his J.D. from Florida State University.  Adam has served in the Florida State House of Representatives since 2002.  On April 25^th, he announced on Mark Levin’s radio show he was running for U.S. Senate to replace Bill Nelson.

In addition to the legislative experience in the Florida House, Adam Hasner worked for over 15 years in the private health care industry.

Adam Hasner is off to a great start.  He has the endorsement of folks like Erich Erickson from RedState.  He also won the Florida Straw Poll with 34% of the vote.

Hasner is the perceived conservative running in this race.  He touts an A grade from the National Rifle Association and is a recipient of the Christian Coalition of Florida’s Faith and Family Award.

On the other hand, his opponents have attacked him for receiving an F grade from the Christian Coalition.  However; after doing some digging, it appears he usually receives very positive grades and only received an F one year for allegedly supporting some gambling measures opposed by the group.

Finally, an old campaign mailer sent out for Hasner back in 2004 touted him as a “moderate.”

Regardless, one strong spot on Hasner’s resume is the fact that he was selected by Marco Rubio in 2007 to be Deputy Majority Leader then went on to be promoted by Rubio as Majority Leader.

I am sure we’ll be hearing a lot more out of Hasner.  The success of his campaign may very well be on convincing voters he is more conservative than his opponents.

You can find his campaign page here.

You can find his Facebook page here.

MIKE McCALISTER

Coming in 2^nd place in Florida’s straw poll is Colonel Mike McCalister.  He is 60 and has served honorably for our nation for 33 years in total.  A total political outsider, Colonel McCalister unsuccessfully ran for Governor in 2010 and is now trying again with the U.S. Senate.

Colonel McCalister seems to be a man of intense hard work.  In addition to his many years of military experience, he received a Bachelor’s degree from Southeast Missouri State University and also received a Ph.D. in Management from the Union Institute in Cincinnati.  Today he owns a small tree farm, is a university instructor and has worked in the private health care industry for many years.

Mr. McCalister carries a noble appearance and does not mince words when going after Obama and Bill Nelson on his campaign page.  I do question and will be looking into some statements he made during his campaign as Governor like calling the War on Drugs a “war on the poor.”  In fact, he went on to blame drug prohibition as one of the reasons Florida’s prison population was growing.

As a national matter, I personally have a hard time with the idea of legalizing drugs when we have so many Americans on food stamps.  If we can get rid of a nation where so many citizens are reliant on the government to feed them as well as provide their housing and healthcare, then perhaps we can talk about them having the personal responsibility to legally take drugs.  But until we improve that situation, I remain skeptical.

You can view his campaign page here.

GEORGE LEMIEUX

George LeMieux is 42.  He graduated from Emory University magna cum laude with a major in political science.  He then went on to receive his J.D. from Georgetown University Law Center.  He served alongside Bill Nelson as U.S. Senator after being appointed to the position by Gov. Charlie Crist after Mel Martinez announced he was retiring.  Of course, the same seat then went to Marco Rubio when he won in 2010.

LeMieux’s friendship with Charlie Crist stemmed way back to the 1990’s.  He worked with Crist when he served as his Chief of Staff in 2007.  Further, he served as Deputy Attorney General from 2003-2005.

Even though his work with Crist seems to go way back and would raise eyebrows among grassroots Americans who remember the Charlie Crist who ran as an independent as he was displeased at Marco Rubio becoming the GOP nominee, LeMieux is a tough character.  He set out to campaign heavily in Democrat counties like Broward where he went door-to-door to over 10,000 homes campaigning for Republicans.  Further, when Crist left the Republican team, LeMieux did not go down the same path and stayed loyal to the Republican Party.

Also, he has significant experience in the political world and seems very educated.

Still, Americans will want to explore any candidate further to better understand their convictions.

The latest thing to catch my eye was an article published in the National Journal where “GOP Insiders” overwhelmingly believe that Mitt Romney is a shoe-in to win the GOP nomination.  After reading the huge and boring list of the insiders who took part in the survey, I saw the name “George S. LeMieux.”  To be fair, it could be possible that there could be more than one person with that name.  We also don’t know if he actually predicted Romney individually.  He was merely listed among the “insiders” who responded.

Nevertheless, he comes with a lot of endorsements and received a 93% rating from the National Taxpayers Union.

You can read more on him by visiting his campaign site here.

BILL FISHER, JR.

If you’re looking to throw Washington and the Ivy League aside, then Bill Fisher might be your choice.  Bill is a Florida resident and proclaims to not have the Ivy League education of the elite — nor does he want one.  His experience is learned the hard way and according to him, he is not interested in trading it in for theirs.

While there won’t be a voting record to turn to for Bill, he believes his life experience in the various fields he’s been involved in will help him serve on behalf of the American people adequately.  Some of those fields include construction where he worked on many of Florida’s highways, participated in the building of schools, and other projects important to Floridians.

His father owned and operated his own business.  Further, Bill is the ultimate family man who loves bring a father and grandfather.

He’s certainly not an insider.  So, you may want to give him a look.  His page urges Floridians to “send a new “Bill” to the Senate.”

You can view his campaign website here.

RON McNEIL

Mr. McNeil is a Florida businessman and inventor.  According to his webpage, he has had 12 US Patents granted with five being in the environmental field.

He also provides a non-politician alternative to the top three listed in this article.  McNeil believes that spending his life as a successful business man, inventor, and innovator gives him the experience required to best serve the country.

While there is no voting record, McNeil’s position on the issues seem pretty strong.  He believes in very strong fiscal policy, a strong government, and free enterprise.

You can view his campaign website here.

CRAIG MILLER

If one finds themselves attracted to Herman Cain for his experience in developing successful restaurant chains in America, Craig Miller might be a viable choice.  Mr. Miller is 61 years old and is a veteran of the Air Force.  He went on to graduate college with a degree in Business Administration.

Working as a dishwasher in high school, Craig Miller began his career with Red Lobster Inns of America.  After gaining knowledge in the management sector, he went on to Uno Restaurants and in 17 years developed a small business into a massive national chain.  He then went on to serve as President and CEO of Ruth Chris Steak House leading the company to four years of growth and to a public offering.

Further, like Cain, he was involved with the National Restaurant Association serving as Chairman being selected by fellow colleagues in the industry to serve.

Mr. Miller also comes with the public service experience.  He was appointed by Gov. Bush to serve as Florida’s State Tourism Commissioner.

You can view his campaign website here.

MARIELENA STUART

 

One who truly loves America, Marielena Stuart came to America with her family from Cuba in the 60’s from Castro’s communist regime.  As such, Marielena seems to understand the price of freedom and what it is our country stands for.  She doesn’t appear to have served in public service.  However; she is a conservative activist and conservative writer.

One notable moment of her activism is her fight against Jackson Lab.  According to pro-life activists along with Stuart, the company backed medical eugenics and was looking to establish a new facility.

As a conservative, Mrs. Stuart continues to stay involved in many grassroots projects aside from her activism as a pro-lifer.

Aside from her grassroots work and love of country, she has been a conservative writer for quite some time.  Most of her work has been published in RenewAmerica.  You can check out her writing here.

Further, you can view her campaign website here.

CONNIE MACK:

Aside from the officially announced candidates, 4-term House Member Connie Mack had originally stated he wouldn’t seek the U.S. Senate seat in 2012.  However; after a considerable amount of time of the race not producing a clear front-runner, Congressman Mack reconsidered as was reported October 26, 2011.

Congressman Mack is 44 years old and obtained a Bachelor’s Degree from the University of Florida and was a marketing executive.  His father, Connie Mack III was a very admired and successful two-term U.S. Senator.

As a member of Congress, Connie Mack has been a hard conservative.  Most notably and recently, he voted against Speaker Boehner’s compromise to raise the debt ceiling being one of the rare members of Congress to actually support real budget cuts.  Afterwards, he had a little on-air exchange with Piers Morgan when the CNN host insinuated Mack had stabbed the Speaker in the back.

This is one of those actions Gov. Palin spoke of in Iowa when talking with Don Lemmon.  She stated that if it were not for the Tea Party, we would not have driven the nation’s attention on our debt and our over-spending.

Though he is not yet an official candidate, his announcement a couple weeks ago alone has made him the clear front-runner among the remaining candidates.  Hopefully, he’ll be able to keep it up and carry that momentum all the way to the general against Bill Nelson.

In Summary:

It looks like the possible insiders are viewed as the frontrunners.  I hope all the candidates get equal opportunity to get their messages out, especially the last two mentioned here.  These candidates are all better than Bill Nelson, obviously, and would be a big improvement.  But candidates like Stuart and Miller are needed in these races to have a strong voice to keep even the front-runners on their toes.

UPDATED: NEW CANDIDATE HAS BEEN ADDED

I want to thank the readers below for alerting me of Connie Mack.

I began writing and researching this and had compiled my original list of candidates about a week before he reconsidered as he announced he would not run back in March.  Being that it’s still early, I will probably be updating these threads as we go along.  We need to be engaged together in these races and I encourage anybody to continue sharing information they have as also encourage folks to continue checking the threads for updates as I have been using them to post individual candidate responses.

Article source: http://conservatives4palin.com/2011/11/c4p-senate-watch-2012-florida.html