Floridians just got a lesson in -- or perhaps a reminder of -- why they can't trust their deadbeat dad of a federal government.

Republicans might as well stop looking at Marco Rubio as Donald Trump's vice presidential running mate. The Florida senator doesn't want the job.

You would never believe it today, but before agriculture was an environmentalist's dirty word, it was a friendly word, a romantic word, a word that gave us hope -- something Florida editors rallied to sell as a savior of precious green belt.

A year ago environmentalists to a man/woman were blaming Big Sugar for the lion's share of Indian River Lagoon pollution, pooh-poohing the devastating effect of human waste leaking from the land. Actually, many of them still are. But times have changed. Florida rivers and estuaries have come under greater scrutiny. Now, through more concentrated scientific study, we understand what a threat septic tanks and faulty sewage pipes are to the quality of our waterways.

Just because Donald Trump is looking for a running mate doesn't mean the best GOP vice presidential candidates are wringing their hands in the parlor like a string of Victorian ladies-in-waiting.

Ohio Gov. John Kasich, the anti-Trump Republicans' last hope for a "hail Mary" into the endzone, has signaled he will drop out of the race.

Kasich's surprise change of heart leaves Donald Trump the last Republican standing.

No more debates, no more internal sniping with the RNC brass, nothing left for Trump but preparation to face the Democrats' presumptive nominee, Hillary Clinton, in what promises to be a clash of Titans from now until November.

UPDATED 4 a.m. Wednesday -- There will be no contested convention. The steam is gone from what might be the hottest Republican primary in history. Donald Trump -- an American original, the only presidential nominee in more than 150 years besides Dwight Eisenhower who never held office -- is the presumptive nominee of the Republican Party in 2016.

Thirteen freshmen or redshirt freshmen in the Florida House were among 32 representatives named "Champions of Economic Freedom" on Americans for Prosperity-Florida's 2016 scorecard, released Tuesday.

Siberia? Nyet. Not this time. Not really. Florida delegates and alternates to the 2016 Republican National Convention have been assigned to one of two hotels located a 25-minute bus ride away from Cleveland's Quicken Loans Arena -- the Embassy Suites Hotel Cleveland -- Rockside (primary hotel) and Courtyard by Marriott Cleveland Independence.

If I were a Democratic donor, I'd want to know why CD 26 candidate Annette Taddeo -- the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee's chosen one -- is allowed to bulldoze her way through cash when she's got a contested primary and a well-financed Republican incumbent ahead of her.

And is anybody looking at what she's spending her money on? For one thing, a payroll big enough to choke a horse. For another -- and this one is a curiosity -- a Republican consultant that most Dems wouldn't consider for a moment.