We turn our gaze now back to Florida’s 13th Congressional District. You may remember a special election there a few weeks back, where an uncharismatic GOP lobbyist with little party support handily defeated the attractive, popular, experienced, and well-funded Democrat. With new Congressman David Jolly having only a few months to pick up any of the advantages of incumbency, you’d think the Democrats would have FL13 in their crosshairs as one of their few chances of a pickup this fall.
Well, maybe they do — but the crosshairs belong to a blurry scope mounted to an unloaded Nerf gun:
Democratic leaders in Washington and Tallahassee on Friday heralded the last-minute emergence Marine Corps. Reserves Col. Ed Jany to challenge Republican U.S. Rep. David Jolly in his Pinellas County district as a home run.
Jany, a former Orlando cop and Special Forces Green Beret offers a potentially impressive Washington outsider contrast to Jolly, the former C.W. Bill Young aide-turned federal lobbyist.
But all we know at this point is that Jany, 49, is a first-time candidate with no known political or fundraising network, that he lacks a home in the Pinellas district, and that he won’t even be listed on the ballot as the Democratic nominee because he did not change his party registration to Democrat in time. We know also that party officials could not have been clumsier in how they cleared the field for the little-known Jany.
Pop the corn while I grab us some beers, mmkay?
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