We're still awaiting word from Florida Democratic Party Chairman Rod Smith about the closure of the Democratic Leadership Council.
The centrist group, founded in 1985 after Ronald Reagan's second landslide, helped get the party back on its feet. Bill Clinton, one of its progeny, embraced the centrist pragmatism of the DLC and became the first two-term Democratic president since FDR.
But in this audacious age of Barack Obama, moderation is dead. As hyper-leftists brand tea parties the second coming of the KKK, Democrats (and their media apologists) appear blissfully oblivious to the extreme makeover occurring in their party.
Sure, President Obama has started giving lip service to business and he's nodding more toward the center. But he's still raising taxes. He's still reinventing the Constitution with ever-expanding federal initiatives. He's still appointing judges to move his "progressive" agenda forward in the courts.
And Mr. Obama has plans for Florida.
Sunshine State Democrats who have generally hewed to the DLC line of fiscal restraint and "tolerant traditionalism" are now in the uncomfortable position of bowing to The One as his 2012 re-election campaign ramps up.
Alex Sink got a bitter taste of that experience last year. The more Obama came down here, the lower the Democratic gubernatorial candidate polled. Ultimately, Sink lost to Rick Scott, who hammered her relentlessly as an "Obama liberal."
Florida is a big, crucial swing state, and conventional wisdom suggests that the president must hold it to win another term.
In the philosophical void left by the DLC, Obama operatives provide money, organization and foot soldiers to mobilize the Democratic base. Smith, who participated in DLC activities when he was a state senator, will find himself taking orders from D.C.
Damien Filer, political director of the liberal but nonpartisan group Progress Florida, downplays the demise of the DLC.
"I'm not aware of any relevant presence they had in Florida," said Filer, calling the state party "moderate" under former party chief Karen Thurman and now Smith.
Florida Democratic Party mouthpiece Eric Jotkoff refuses to speak on the record to Sunshine State News, and Smith has been coy since Democratic candidates were routed in November.
After the election, I sat down with my consultants, and their names were John Walker, James Beam and Jose Cuervo, my Hispanic consultant," Smith joked.
The chairman may be swilling Obama Kool-Aid as well if he thinks the president's agenda will play in Florida this time around.
Increasingly, Obama's first term looks like Jimmy Carter's (nonexistent) second term. His big-government prescriptions have failed to lift the economy and, as the Clinton (DLC) crowd well knew: "It's the economy, stupid."
Filer says Obama understands this axiom. "The reality is that Obama has been moderate, but he's been painted to the left of Castro. Perception and reality are very far apart in many instances," he says.
Yet the party's center is hollowing out with recent retirement announcements by Rep. Jane Harman of California and Sen. Jim Webb of Virginia, which followed those of Sens. Kent Conrad of North Dakota and Joe Lieberman of Connecticut.
Aside from the few Democrats who hold a diminishing number of safe congressional and legislative seats, more Florida Democrats face extinction in 2012.
Sen. Bill Nelson, who claims to be a "political moderate," is on the firing line for his voting record, which toes the party line 89 percent of the time, including his support for the Porkulus bill and Obamacare.
Will Nelson distance himself from Obama to save his own skin? The bigger question is: Will he be allowed to?
State Democratic parties -- indeed, the states themselves -- are becoming wholly controlled fiefdoms of the regime in Washington. That leaves "moderate" swing states like Florida hanging.
Obama's get-out-the-vote operation here was truly impressive in 2008. But after the "shellacking" the president's party took in 2010, it remains to be seen how many votes that machine can gin up as the message of "hope and change" sputters.
"It's challenging to run in tough economic times, but the mechanics will be there," Filer opined.
The demise of the DLC as a counterweight to the party's activist left wing could further boost Republicans in Florida and elsewhere.
As the Wall Street Journal observed: "Democrats have once again become the party of government dominated by public unions, green activists, trial lawyers and the cultural left."
That wasn't a winning combination in 2010, but if Obama & Co. stay on their current course, "it means the policies of the Pelosi congresses weren't aberrations," the Journal concluded.
Are Florida Democrats really part of that party, Mr. Smith?
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Contact Kenric Ward at kward@sunshinestatenews.com or at (772) 801-5341.
