Florida GOP Leads a Lamb to Slaughter

Don't. Jump!

You're right about one thing, Joyce Kaufman: The mainstream media are not likely to take the congressional candidacy of Dennis Lamb seriously. Here's my best effort:

Dennis Lamb? Seriously?

This Hollywood man -- who either has no political experience or simply forgot to mention it on his new website -- is going to challenge Debbie Wasserman Schultz, who in every new congressional session has gained leadership posts and influence within the legislative branch's dominant party. A Democrat in a district dominated by Democratic-voting Broward County, she's liberal in almost every respect, but she still outflanks prospective Republican candidates by taking conservative positions on Cuban policy and relations with Israel.

And yet Lamb's "mission" statement contains Tea Party-style paranoia about big government spending. He channels Glenn Beck when it comes to dreading "socialized medicine." And to hear him talk about terrorism, you'd swear Lamb thinks the election's in 2002. In Mississippi.

C. Stiles

Wasserman Schultz

Although no member of Congress is invincible, Wasserman Schultz is awfully close. She won 78 percent of the vote in the last election. And the hypothetical Republican who knocks her off will need -- at a minimum -- for Wasserman Schultz to get hit with a massive scandal. That Republican will need to be a moderate, have lots of experience in government, be groomed by the party's higher-ups, be blanketed with donations, and be launching his campaign during a period marked by the mass exodus of moderate Democrats to the Republican Party. 

Which makes Lamb 0-for-6, and I'm probably forgetting another half-dozen prerequisites. So if you want to be taken seriously, Candidate Lamb, save your political debut for when you've done more than watch a whole lotta Fox News.