After 10 Glorious Years, Sunshine State News and I Are Passing the Baton

In his weekly radio address, which was released on Friday, Gov. Rick Scott came out strongly in support of pending free-trade agreements with Colombia and Panama which have stalled in Washington. Scott insisted that Florida would benefit more than any other state in the nation under these agreements, which have also won the backing of many of the states leading Republicans including Congressmen Vern Buchanan, Connie Mack and David Rivera.

In a statement on Friday afternoon, Florida Republican U.S. Sen. Marco Rubio weighed in on the cut, cap and balance plan that congressional Republicans are backing. Whats at stake here is Americas credit rating, and the people that give us our credit rating have been very clear that we cant just raise the debt limit. They also want to see a plan to see how we are going to deal with our debt, said Rubio. The president hasnt offered a plan to do that. The Senate Democrats who run the Senate have not offered a plan to do that.

In an effort to head off a conservative stampede and to set the record straight, a statewide tea party group is advising its members that no endorsement has been made in the Republican contest for U.S. Senate. "Individual candidates who crown themselves as a 'tea party candidate' have not been endorsed by Florida Alliance and should be questioned as to the specific individual, group or groups who endorse them. If and when a candidate is endorsed by Florida Alliance we will issue a statement," wrote Tom Gaitens, a tea partier from Southwest Florida.

There was no monthly change in the statewide unemployment rate last month, as an Agency for Workforce Innovation report released Friday shows the jobless rate remained at 10.6 percent in June. The rate is 0.8 percent less than June 2010, but there are still 982,000 unemployed workers in a work force of more than 9.23 million. Florida added 4,300 jobs in June, much less than the 28,000 gained in May, when the state led the nation in job creation. So far this year, the Sunshine State has added 85,500 jobs.