Rick Scott Six months ago, in the wake of the wipeout midterm elections, moderate Florida Sen. Bill Nelson privately vented that President Barack Obama, weighed down by his health reform effort and muddled messaging, was “toxic” for Democrats back home.
Yet Obama’s approval rating has surged from 42 percent to 51 percent in the past month, and Nelson is now openly embracing the president, dutifully pronouncing himself “fired up” at an Obama-hosted Miami fundraiser this spring.
What’s changed? The killing of Osama bin Laden, slow but demonstrable improvements to the foreclosure-ravaged economy, a cooling of tea party passions and the toxic nature of House Budget Committee Chairman Paul Ryan’s Medicare overhaul in a state with one of the largest populations over age 55 in the nation — are all factors in Obama’s turnaround.
But Obama’s biggest asset in a critical swing state he won by a mere 2.8-percentage-point margin in 2008 might be Rick Scott, the wildly unpopular Republican governor Democrats are casting as Lex Luthor to Obama’s Clark Kent.
http://www.politico.com/news/stories/0511/55894.html
