At at time when states are doing all they can to try to attract new industries, many policymakers are looking to the film industry as a potential force for job creation. States across the country are attempting to lure film and television production with a mix of tax cuts and other promotions.

But Florida Republicans have potentially handicapped the economic stimulus of their program with a heavy dose of conservative censorship:

Movies and TV shows with gay characters could be ineligible for a "family-friendly" tax credit in Florida under a little-noticed provision tucked into a $75 million incentive package that Republican House leaders hope will attract film and entertainment jobs to the state.

The bill would prohibit productions with "nontraditional family values" from receiving a so-called family-friendly tax credit. But it doesn't define what "nontraditional family values" are, something the bill's sponsor had a hard time doing, too.

"Think of it as like Mayberry," state Rep. Stephen Precourt, R-Orlando, said, referring to The Andy Griffith Show. "That's when I grew up — the '60s. That's what life was like. I want Florida to be known for making those kinds of movies: Disney movies for kids and all that stuff. Like it used to be, you know?"

Much of the concern for language stems from the fact that no one knows exactly what it means.

When specifically asked about potential state money for a television show with gay characters, Precourt told reporters, "That would not be the kind of thing I'd say that we want to invest public dollars in."

But other policymakers refused to go that far, and some weren't prepared to offer a definition at all.

Already members of the Florida Senate are indicating that they will not take up the 'nontraditional family values' language, leaving the proposal's future in doubt.

Georgia and Florida have been something of a Petri dish for Republican corruption lately. Both states’ Republican House Speakers resigned in disgrace in the last few months, and both of their replacements as Speaker are already involved in some ethically shady dealings.

We start in Florida, where the Republicans’ Speaker-Elect has lost millions of dollars in bad financial deals -- and he appears to be skimming off the top of his campaign account to make ends meet:

[Rep. Chris] Dorworth financed his bid to become speaker through his reelection campaign fund and his political committee, Citizens for an Enterprising Democracy. A good portion -- more than 30 percent, or $40,000-plus -- went to his pocket for reimbursements in the past two years, records show.

Among the recent expenses: A $600 flight to Miami for the Super Bowl and a $527 stay at the luxury Biltmore Hotel in Coral Gables.

In defending himself against charges that he went gallivanting around the state on his supporters' dime, Dorworth told a reporter -- and this is true -- “I clearly don't gallivant. . . . I'm not a gallivanter.''

Regardless, he really should send a letter to each of his campaign donors letting them know how much fun he had at the Big Game. They would want to know what their money is buying.

Meanwhile, over in Georgia, new Speaker David Ralston is raising eyebrows for accepting over $1,200 in free meals in the month of January, all paid for by lobbyists:

Reports to the State Ethics Commission show lobbyists spent about twice as much on Ralston in January as they did on Glenn Richardson, the man he replaced, during the same month last year.

Lobbyists disclosed spending $1,225, or about $40 a day, on Ralston in January, mostly for meals and refreshments. (…)

Last January, before he was the House leader, Ralston was treated to two lunches, worth $43.35, by lobbyists.

If Ralston maintains that pace all year, he’ll receive nearly $15,000 in free meals from lobbyists. By comparison, that’s almost as much as his base salary as a State Representative ($17,342, according to the National Conference of State Legislatures). An arrangement like that raises real questions about what these lobbyists are getting in return.

Almost a year after he was indicted on felony charges of corruption, former Florida GOP Speaker Ray Sansom is finally leaving the legislature.

He resigned on Sunday:

The move, rendered in a letter hand-delivered by Sansom's attorney to the Capitol shortly before 8 p.m., ends a legislative career that once put Sansom near the apex of Florida politics but unraveled in scandal as he took a job at Northwest Florida State College on the same day in November 2008 that he was sworn in as House speaker.

Sansom, R-Destin, did not acknowledge wrongdoing, but said he was stepping down out of love for the House. The resignation was effective immediately.

Despite Sansom's refusual to acknowledge wrongdoing, the House Ethics committees was prepared move forward with a hearing which would have laid out the case against him in full.

That's off now that Sansom has resigned -- which is probably good news for lots of Republicans (like former Speaker Marco Rubio, who made Sanson his budget chief).

One GOP lawmaker it doesn't help is the next Speaker -- Rep. Chris Dorworth. Dorworth made news this week for dipping into his campaign funds to pay for a $600 flight to the Super Bowl and a $527 visit at the luxury Biltmore Hotel in Coral Gables.

The reason the future Speaker is using campaign funds to pay for personal expenses? He owes $2.7 million in legal fees for a bad business deal.

The Rose Institute at Claremont McKenna College has published another in-depth guide to redistricting, this time focusing on the Florida. With a non-partisan redistricting ballot measure in 2010, Voting Rights Act requirements, and the addition of at least one new congressional seat, the Sunshine State is expecting one of the most interesting redistricting battles anywhere in the country:

An initiative called FairDistricts will be on the ballot in 2010 proposing a constitutional amendment to restrict gerrymandering. It would require the legislature to draw compact districts that conform to pre-existing political and geographic boundaries. Currently the only restrictions on redistricting in the state are that all districts must be contiguous and the map must follow federal law and the Voting Rights Act. (…) If the Fair Districts initiative passes, it will leave control of redistricting in the Legislature’s hands but impose significant restrictions on how it can draw the lines. The degree of that control will almost certainly be the subject of multiple post-redistricting lawsuits.

In addition to the legal and constitutional issues, Florida is also a very diverse state, politically, ethnically, and geographically. The Rose Institute report delves into all these factors, in every major region of the state. It’s well worth a read.

For a primer on how Florida conducts redistricting, a state-by-state fact sheet is available over at Redistricting Facts.

Democratic victories are always tough to come by in Republican-led legislatures, but one Florida Democrat played a key role in building bipartisan support for a rail-funding package designed to revolutionize transportation in the Sunshine State:

A key player: Sen. Jeremy Ring of Margate, who sponsored the bill and kept wooing fellow Democrats and the unions to his side.

Ring's pitch for the bill was all about jobs. Not only would construction workers and engineers find employment, he said, but the state's economy would be changed by a network of commuter, light and high-speed rail systems that would link the major urban areas of the state from Jacksonville to Miami to Orlando to Tampa.

``This will transform the future of Florida,'' Ring said. ``Today, the Florida Senate took the bold step of planning for a 21st century transportation system.''

Though imperfect, there’s a lot to like about the rail funding bill. It provides crucial support for two longstanding commuter rail projects -- SunRail and Tri-Rail -- and it significantly increases Florida’s odds of winning a $2.6 billion federal stimulus request for a bullet train between Tampa and Orlando. If successful, the three projects would add thousands of new jobs to the state economy and provide important new choices for commuters and travelers.

Naturally, Florida’s conservative base opposed the bipartisan plan, and their anger could reshape many of the key legislative and state-wide races in 2010:

But anti-tax advocates and "tea party" types are already vowing to use passage of the sweeping package against its supporters, from Crist on down.

So is Sen. Paula Dockery, the Lakeland Republican and SunRail critic who's hoping her fierce opposition to the $1.2 billion SunRail project will give a lift to her GOP primary campaign for governor against Bill McCollum.

Governor Crist and many state legislators in both parties supported the plan, and with Florida Democrats likely poised to make gains in the legislature, it will be interesting to see how this issue will impact Republican primary races.

Back in April, Florida’s legislative Republicans refused to accept nearly $444 million in federal funding for the state’s unemployment system – money that would have shored up the unemployment trust fund at a crucial time and helped prevent a business tax hike in the middle of the recession.

This week, the Republicans’ stubbornness came home to roost as Florida’s unemployment trust fund officially went broke. For now, the state will be forced to borrow hundreds of millions of dollars from the federal government to keep the system running, but just as we warned in April, paying back that money will cause heavy tax hikes on Florida businesses:

Replenishing the fund won't be pain-free.

Employers will feel a bigger sting under changes lawmakers made this spring to the unemployment compensation tax system.

How much more employers will pay is based on a complicated formula that takes into account such things as the number of workers a business has laid off, its size and the number of years it has been paying into the system.

Of course, it wasn’t just the DLCC, media analysts, and Democratic legislators warning that this would happen; Republican Governor Charlie Crist opposed the decision too. But instead of accepting free money from the federal government, legislative Republicans chose to raise taxes to pay back borrowed money, all while denying extra help to Florida’s unemployed workers and their families.

As we also noted back in April, Floridians deserve better than this.

Florida Democrats face a steep climb in the State House, where Republicans hold a convincing margin heading into 2010, but the wind is clearly at the Democrats’ backs as next year’s legislative races take shape.

Since 2006, Democrats have gained nine seats in the lower chamber, and conditions on the ground have produced a wealth of new targets for Democratic takeover:

Stemming chiefly from term limits, there are 25 House seats now held by Republicans where no incumbent is running, while Democrats have only three such openings. The disparity, helped along by voter trends, gives Democrats a chance to pick up – perhaps – 18 seats, [Democratic Rep. Ron] Saunders said.

Key to Saunders’ math, is even more calculus. In particular, it’s rooted in the performance of Chief Financial Officer Alex Sink in Republican-held districts during her 2006 race against then-Senate President Tom Lee, a Republican.

Across 18 districts, mostly narrowly GOP-leaning and concentrated in Central Florida, Sink gained at least 48 percent of the vote against Lee. Among them, are districts held by Reps. Pat Patterson, R-Eland, Alan Hayes, R-Umatilla, Dorothy Hukill, R-Port Orange, Ralph Poppell, R-Port Orange, Sandy Adams, R-Oviedo, Ed Homan, R-Tampa, and Bill Galvano, R-Bradenton.

In addition to the Republicans’ 25 open seats, Democrats are also buoyed by the Obama campaign’s massive voter registration effort in the state, which left the party with a 750,000-voter advantage in statewide registrations.

Even if Democrats fail to win back a majority next year, they’ll be working hard to gain as much ground as possible before 2011 redistricting.

Virginia Republicans have been facing statewide ridicule over blocking hundreds of millions of dollars in extra federal stimulus money.

Now Florida Republicans, already looking foolish over their inability to pass a budget, have decided to follow their Virginia colleagues off the cliff:

Days from the end of the legislative session, Florida lawmakers have refused to move a bill to expand unemployment eligibility in order to accept $444 million in federal stimulus aid.

As in Virginia, Florida Democrats quickly blasted the move by legislative Republicans. Their stance is so inexplicable, that even GOP Gov. Charlie Crist has asked them to reconsider:

“I think taking it is important,” Mr. Crist said. “I know the people need it, especially those who may be facing unemployment. I wish it would be reviewed again.

Without the extra stimulus money, Florida’s unemployment system will be in crisis – just like Virginia’s. But in Florida, Republican obstruction is especially outrageous because of who might have benefited from program changes needed to secure the extra money:

The state’s unemployment trust fund is expected to run out of money in August. State officials plan to ask for a federal loan for the fund, and the Legislature is moving ahead with a bill that would increase unemployment taxes on businesses.

Lawmakers are expected to pass a measure that would allow them to use $700 million in stimulus money to extend unemployment benefits for the rest of the year to 250,000 people whose benefits would otherwise expire. But they have been unwilling to make more changes, like offering benefits to those who left work because of domestic violence or the relocation of a spouse.

In other words, Florida Republicans are sabotaging their state’s economy, hitting businesses with a massive new tax hike, and refusing to help domestic violence survivors escape abusive relationships – all just to spite a Democratic president.

Floridians deserve better, but they won’t get it with Republicans in charge.

Earlier this year, Florida Speaker of the House Ray Sansom, a Republican, was forced to step down from his leadership post after a grand jury agreed to examine accusations that the lawmaker had traded appropriations in exchange for a job with Northwest Florida State College.

On Friday, Samson was indicted on a felony charge.

Prosecutors allege that the former legislator falsified the state budget to create $6 million for an aircraft hangar sought by a company owned by a wealthy friend and major GOP political donor named Jay Odom.

The grand jury report makes a strong connection between the $6 million airport building and the political contributions, totaling more than $1 million, that Odom made to the Republican Party of Florida, to a political committee Sansom controlled and to Sansom's own campaigns.

With this kind of leadership from Florida Republicans, it is no surprise that the state is in tough shape financially.

No wonder GOP lawmakers are working on passing a new voter suppression bill.

Last week, Matt told us about an outrageous new plan by Florida Republicans to suppress legitimate votes and frustrate voter-turnout efforts.

The plan would force recently-moved voters to use provisional ballots and outlaw anyone from approaching a line of voters, even to offer legal advice on combating disenfranchisement.

With local media starting to pay attention, Republicans are doing everything they can to stifle debate and force their plan through the legislature:

The 81-page bill was debated for just six minutes before it passed on a 10-5 party-line vote at a one-hour meeting at 8 a.m. of the House Economic Development Council. No other committee is slated to review the bill, so there's no chance for additional public testimony in the two weeks left in the session.

(…)On Friday, Republican Rep. Jennifer Carroll of Green Cove Springs suggested restricting debate to six minutes. When the committee chairman, Rep. Dave Murzin, R-Pensacola, allowed two people to make brief statements, Rep. Rob Schenck, R-Brooksville, insisted that no more testimony be allowed.

But despite these efforts, the plan’s embarrassing details continue to leak out.

The prohibition on anyone interacting with voters at the polls apparently also makes it illegal for volunteers to hand out water on hot election days –- an important practice, particularly in case of delays or machine malfunctions at polling places.

The people of Florida deserve better than this disgraceful piece of legislation.