Sunday, February 17, 2019

Gatehouse Media podcast. The latest “Inside Florida Politics” with George Bennett, John Kennedy, Zac Anderson.


This week’s edition of “Inside Florida Politics” is out.

The link to this episode is at the end of this blog post if you wish to begin listening right off today.

For new and recently-new readers of
“Lake Worth City Limits”.


It is worth noting this blog you are reading now focuses mostly on the six square mile City of Lake Worth and suburban (unincorporated) areas out west in Central Palm Beach County.

Just to the east of this City lies the Town of Palm Beach across the scenic Intracoastal waterway (aka, the Lake Worth Lagoon).

Our municipal elections are coming up on March 12th and this City tries very hard to keep our elections nonpartisan. However, President Trump is at the Winter White House in Palm Beach for the long Presidents’ Day weekend and just so happens what is happening in Venezuela right now is very significant and a topic of much discussion.

But as hard as our elected leaders in this City of Lake Worth try to stay nonpartisan and keep out of foreign affairs that can be difficult sometimes when one of our former elected officials declared his support for Nicolas Maduro several years ago. Prior to that the former editor at The Palm Beach Post, Mr. Randy Schultz, had about enough when Cara Jennings, another former commissioner in Lake Worth, called for a resolution to end the Iraq War. The pull quote from Schultz was quite clever:

Commission ‘solved’ Iraq, passed buck.


This City is very supportive of FREE SPEECH but our elected leaders have more than enough LOCAL issues to deal with at City Hall. So please keep that in mind if you have any plans to protest this long holiday weekend. Please head on over to Palm Beach for the day. Thank You.


Now back to Inside Florida Politics, this week’s podcast.


Political journalist George Bennett is the expert on all things presidential in South Florida and about the first lady too. This week Bennett solved not one but two issues: Is next Monday Presidents Day, President’s Day, or Presidents’ Day? And the other issue is the president of Venezuela: Is that dictator Nicolas Maduro or Nicolás Maduro with an accent?

Both of those questions are answered by George Bennett this week:


PALM BEACH — With the threat of another partial government shutdown averted, President Donald Trump is expected to arrive Friday evening [the president did arrive last evening] to spend the long Presidents’ Day weekend at Mar-a-Lago, with a side trip to Miami on Monday to deliver a speech on Venezuela underscoring his opposition to the socialist regime of Nicolas Maduro.


This coming Monday, a federal holiday, is Presidents’ Day. And as for Nicolas Maduro the AP style is optional on using the acute accent; here is a recent excerpt from the AP:


The president of Colombia says China’s role in Latin America would be stronger if the Asian country recognized Venezuelan opposition leader Juan Guaido as the country’s interim president instead of backing President Nicolas Maduro.


Now that is settled!


This latest podcast is a very interesting one and just over thirty-three minutes. These podcasts from Gatehouse Media are posted every Thursday around noon. So stay tuned for another episode next week.

A question:

For long-time readers of The Palm Beach Post does the name John Kennedy sound familiar?


Briefly, how we got here. Gatehouse Media took over at The Palm Beach Post in May 2018. The Post had been on the market since November 2017 after a series of just terrible decisions by the editorial board. For example, there was the dragging-of-feet coming to realize the full extent of the sober home crisis, then no endorsement for President of the United States in Nov. 2016 and then in Dec. 2016 the editor at the Post unceremoniously shut down the Post’s Tallahassee News Bureau which was manned by long-time political correspondent John Kennedy.

Now John Kennedy is the State Capital Bureau Chief for Gatehouse Media which owns The Palm Beach Post. On Kennedy’s Twitter feed it says he, “Enjoys fine irony.” Very apropos one could say.

Welcome back, Mr. Kennedy!

To the podcast this week.


With host political journalist George Bennett of The Palm Beach Post, Sarasota Herald-Tribune politics editor Zac Anderson and Gatehouse State Capital Bureau Chief John Kennedy these political journalists talk about,


Parkland disconnect between polls and politicians, plus Roger Stone on 'process crimes' and PBJs.


PBJs? And what are the special numbers this week? The funky FREE music? Well, you are just going to have to listen to this week’s episode to find out.

Hope you enjoy this week’s Inside Florida Politics.