Florida

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Ships! Spaceships! Palm trees!

Florida is America's wang, and hangs proudly over the Caribbean from the United States' abdomen. It is also the least explicable of the weird states, being the only state so honored with its own tag by Fark.com.

Contents

[edit] Demographics

Due to its geographic location, it is home to both large numbers of retired Americans from northerly climes, and (the descendants of) disenfranchised Cuban businessmen who were pwned by Fidel Castro in 1959. Also flying cockroaches large enough to need their own runways.

[edit] Retirees

Retirees in Florida are required to submit to the following provisions prior to being allowed past the Florida state line checkpoints:

  • New Florida residents above the age of 64½ are required by Florida Statute to wear enormous sunglasses that cover their already enormous coke-bottle trifocals. While not in use and at night time, they are required to be displayed conspicuously on the front seat of their Crown Victoria (or other large vehicle as deemed appropriate by local law enforcement).
  • Per the aforementioned article, all new Florida residents of the specified age are required to drive a vehicle no less than 20 feet in length and maintain speeds no more than 10 (ten) miles per hour below the posted speed limit. (This statute is temporarily lifted if the driver is en route to a bingo game and has proper bingo identification)

[edit] Foreign residents

As of FY2010, all resident aliens will be required to pay a state entry and exit tariff in the amount of 20% of their gross income. Conversely, all illegal aliens will receive a scholarship to the University of Florida, a (non-transferable) all-access pass to Café Risque (with multiple convenient locations along I-75), and a yearly stipend of no less than 20% of the average gross income of all legal citizens residing in the state.

Key West thinks they are a foreign country, the "Conch Republic." But they aren't.

[edit] Politics

[edit] State Politics

The current governor is Lord Voldemort Rick Scott, a shiny-headed teabagger hard-working former CEO of a large hospital network. Rick Scott is notable for spending over seventy-three million dollars of his own money on his campaign. He was elected despite having committed the largest Medicare/Medicaid fraud in the US and the largest financial fraud in Florida history.

The previous governor of Florida was Charlie Christ Crist. Charlie was a moderate republican, and as such his views seemed rather wishy-washy depending on who talked to him. Notably during his campaign as a republican for US senator, he was staunchly pro-life, though after becoming an independent he was pro-choice. To his credit, however, Crist did a lot to help the Florida education system and the environment, particularly the Florida Everglades.

Crist was at one point considered a possible running mate for John McCain during the '08 presidential election, and one must wonder whether the election would have turned out differently if he was a vice-presidential candidate instead of that crazy moose-shooting hockey mom.

[edit] Federal Politics

Florida, being part of the South[1], is usually regarded as a red state, despite having gone blue in the last two presidential elections. It turns out the large number of Medicare-receiving senior citizens, Latino immigrants and South Beach/Keys-dwelling gays in the more metropolitan areas of the state are more than sufficient to garner more votes than the traditional conservative remnants of the Confederacy.[2] It is considered a swing state by candidates and thus receives a lot of attention during the summers and autumns of election years.

Florida was in the spotlight back in 2000 when hanging chads and weird recount rules required the 2000 U.S. presidential election to be settled by the U.S. Supreme Court in the court case Bush v. Gore. Controversial at the time were that the current governor, Jeb Bush was one of the candidate's brother, and the current secretary of state Katherine Harris went on to work for the president after the court decided to prevent a recount.

[edit] Famous Floridanians

[edit] Footnotes

  1. "The further north you go, the farther south you get" is a common phrase, recognizing that the southern parts of Florida tend to be more liberal and diverse while the northern areas are, well, less of both.
  2. Or, maybe, people are just becoming more reasonable. But I doubt it.
The Bible Belt
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