UPDATED --St. Lucie County has reached the noon deadline to certify its election results without certifying the results.

But that hasnt stopped Democrat Patrick Murphy from once again declaring victory, with U.S. Rep. Allen West sending attorneys to St. Lucie County court to seek an emergency hearing on the noon deadline, according to the Palm Beach Post.

The House will start its sessions a little earlier, and one subcommittee will write the House budget for both K-12 education and higher ed, under new rules proposed Friday by leadership for approval by legislators next week.

For the most part, House rules put forward by House Rules Chairman Rob Schenck, R-Spring Hill, don't include many changes from the existing ones.

For nonmembers, the most noticeable changes will include a new default start time for floor sessions, 8 a.m. instead of 9 a.m. as it has been in recent years.

With last week's elections quickly slipping out of the rearview mirror, the new political reality began to take hold in Tallahassee this week.

House Republicans tapped a new speaker for the 2014-16 term after the defeat of their first choice for the position. The incoming speaker for the next two years laid out some of his priorities for the session that begins in March. And both sides began to fill out the leadership teams for the policy and political battles of the next few months.

The U.S. Department of Transportation has been vocal about passing local laws to curb the use of mobile devices at the wheel. And throughout the state of Florida, lawmakers and citizens groups are casting their ire on cell phones, demanding the government step in and ensure safety and transparency in one fell swoop.

In one case is a proposal to stop tech-loving drivers from picking up their cell phones while behind the wheel. In another is a move to stop lawmakers from texting lobbyists during public meetings.

WASHINGTON -- There can be unseemly exposure of the mind as well as of the body, as the progressive mind is exposed in the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, a creature of the labyrinthine Dodd-Frank legislation.