when haridopolus screwed west on the redistricting i was hoping allen would run for the senate. instead he switched districts. and hasner is running for rep in my district(22).

haridopolus and miller never had any type of traction. haridopolus sunk the pet project of the tea party here in florida(e-verify) and would have faced tons of conservative oppostion to his candidacy. miller never ran for anything higher than a house seat before(and only took third in that race).

mcallister spoke at my tea party group a couple of times. he seemed like a good guy to me.

i hear atwater is coming in. but right now it is a two person race. mack and lemieux. i think either one of them beats nelson.

oh, i voted for scott and am very pleased with the job he has done as governor.

by the way. i LOVED your diary about jim demint being the VP choice of romney. it makes perfect sense.

I was surprised that McAlister did that well in 2010, though now, I suspect that most, like myself, who voted for him did so for the same reason as I.

If Mack can’t start to show some movement, I look for Jeb to toss his hat into the ring. Everyone else would drop out,( or all but do so), and the $$$ wold come rolling in. And Jeb on the ticket would make it near impossible for Obama to win Florida.

I think that the reason that Jeb hasn’t announced as yet is that he’s waiting to see if Rubio is the VP pick….then, Scott can appoint him to finish out Rubio’s term.

However, in watching his actual votes during his time, he voted as nicely as any Reagan Conservative would have.

McCalister has a military record and a very Tea Party-type platform. I’ve heard him in person, but am just not sold.

The others who dropped out, particularly Hasner and Haridopoulus, were in the Florida Legislature and were ‘conservative Republicans’ who all too often voted for Big Sugar or High-Speed rail, or watered down any illegal-immigration legislation to the point where it was worthless.

Once each of these things became public, their support dropped mightily and they ended up dropping out.

LeMieux has won several Tea Party straw polls lately, and by sizeable margins.

Atwater has just this week launched a trial balloon about running, and he’s as good a conservative as anyone.

As I read it, Mack is the Establishment guy and LeMieux, McAlister and Atwater are more or less good conservatives enough so that they get TeaParty folks enthused.