Don't Get Excited Yet, Alex

It's old news now, but Alex Sink has pulled ahead in the governor's race, according to a new poll released today by Public Policy Polling. She beats McCollum 37-23 and Scott 36-30. There are no trend lines worth noting, as the last time PPP took a look at this race was in March. Furthermore, no other poll shows Sink leading on both Bill McCollum and Rick Scott, though a poll released earlier this month showed her ahead of McCollum.

But for a million reasons, there should be no breaking out of champaign. This poll has plenty of bad news for Sink. For 54 percent of voters, Sink in unknown, a bad thing considering she has served as Chief Financial Officer now for four years. She even remains unknown by 49 percent of Democrats. This isn't surprising to me. One thing I'd like to see polled, just for curiosity, is how many people think Alex Sink is a man. I, for one, find myself correcting her gender virtually every time her name comes up in conversation. Meanwhile, only 36 percent view Rick Scott as an unknown, and just 33 percent have no opinion of McCollum.

One curiosity, independent son-of-someone-famous Bud Chiles is only viewed positively by 12 percent of those polled, yet comes in at 13 percent in a matchup with Sink and McCollum and pulls 14 percent in a race with Sink and Scott. While he can't be called a spoiler if Sink wins, that likely shows there are some people willing to vote for Chiles based purely on his late father's good name.

What distresses me most about the poll, though, is the continued trend of Sink performing worse against Scott than McCollum. Scott is so slimy, I can't imagine why anyone would be more inclined to vote for him than any alternative. That shows more about the crooks-over-politicians mentality that poisons the tea conservatives are drinking. I've complained about this before, but there really is no core value that should drive conservatives to support Rick Scott. It is a disgrace to the philosophy that this man gains any support at all.

At this point, though, Scott is the nominee. He has extraordinary problems, and fortunately, Bill McCollum is matching Scott dollar-for-dollar in advertisements explaining everything wrong with the disgraced hospital executive as a gubernatorial prospect. Scott's negatives rise every day, and the PPP poll shows 41 percent of voters already realize he is bad news.

But since they have no opinion of Sink whatsoever, Scott can still beat Sink in the general election. That leaves the Democrat a window from now until the Aug. 24 primary election to make sure everybody in Florida knows who she is, and thinks good things about her going into November.

Don't believe Rick Scott is going to run out of money before the general. The man is sitting on more ill-gotten loot than you'll find on the Pirates of the Caribbean ride. He will spend every day between Aug. 25 and Nov. 2 beating the heck out of her on the air. Sink's negatives are now at 22, but Scott will make sure they go up. Sink's positives sit at 24 today. It is her job to make those rise. While Scott and McCollum are arguing about how much taxpayer money should be wasted in their mudslinging contest, Sink needs to get on TV and convince voters she is the real deal before an utter fake starts telling them otherwise.