Rick Scott's communications director to press: "I really don't miss some of you dips---s at all."

[seafan]

That was from 2008, not long before the Rick Scott plague hit Florida.

As we say down here, 'conditions are rapidly deteriorating.'



Man behind Gov. Rick Scott's message doesn't always play nice with press



When Gov. Rick Scott held a Twitter town hall in January, his top communications adviser, Brian Burgess, was at his right hand. (Photo credit COLIN HACKLEY | Special to the Times)



By Steve Bousquet and Adam C. Smith, Times/Herald Tallahassee Bureau
June 23, 2011

TALLAHASSEE — Brian Burgess, the man charged with shaping Gov. Rick Scott's image and message, got his start working with reporters on behalf of a Kansas district attorney best known for prosecuting an abortion provider.

"I really don't miss some of you dips---s at all," Burgess e-mailed a Kansas reporter in 2008, after he left to work with a conservative public relations firm in Virginia. "Have fun in your world of make-believe."

The line is vintage Burgess, the most combative communications director for a Florida governor in many years.

.....

The son of a John Deere executive, Burgess is a native of Moline, Ill., who grew up in Fort Collins, Colo. He attended Friends University, a Christian liberal arts school in Wichita, Kan., where he played basketball. He spent three years as a radio operator in the Army before working for Phill Kline, the district attorney crusading against abortion in Johnson County, Kan. While serving as Kline's spokesman, Burgess clashed with local reporters, including Justin Kendall, a writer for The Pitch, an alternative weekly in Kansas City.

"He called me a 'bottom-feeding journalist.' That sort of endeared him to me," Kendall said.

Burgess entered Scott's orbit while working at CRC Public Relations in Alexandria, Va., a firm that represents conservative interest groups, and in 2004 worked with the "Swift Boat Veterans for Truth" attacking John Kerry's war record.
CRC in 2009 landed the account of Scott's Conservatives for Patients Rights, the advocacy group that campaigned against President Barack Obama's health care plan and became the springboard for Scott's candidacy for governor.

.....

"Are there things we don't want you to know?" (Burgess) asked. "Yes. There are things we don't want to broadcast to our opponents."

.....

These are the faces of unmitigated hatred and fear.



It is quite evident that for Rick Scott and his acid-mouthed communications director, everyday Floridians are their "opponents", instead of citizens who want their state's government to address their needs in a timely, logical and transparent manner.


Oh, to have Governor Bob Graham back in office again.

[Lasher]

1. You don't have Nixon to kick around any more

[Wilms]

2. Q Poll: Gov. Rick Scott approval rating at 29%, the worst score of any US governor

Q Poll: Gov. Rick Scott approval rating at 29%, the worst score of any US governor

Florida voters disapprove 57 – 29 percent of the job Gov. Rick Scott is doing, the worst score of any governor in the states surveyed by Quinnipiac University and down from a 48 – 35 percent disapproval in an April 6 survey, according to a Quinnipiac University poll released today.

http://saintpetersblog.com/2011/05/q-poll-gov-rick-scott-approval-rating-at-29-the-worst-score-of-any-us-governor/

[Octafish]

3. Repukes will vote for any steaming pile of dog turd, provided there's an 'R' after it.

Thank you for keeping us informed about the situation and doing something about it, seafan. I heart puke spin doctors, toadally.

[liberal N proud]

4. These republican governors and their staff all act like they are dictators

[Pacifist Patriot]

5. The FU Scott delivered at the Orlando airport yesterday was just lovely.

I despise that creature with every atom in my body!

[AmBlue]

6. I saw this in my morning paper, seafan.

I about choked on my coffee. Rick Scott isn't even up to the job of taking out Bob Graham's trash. If this creep isn't the WORST ever "occupier" of our governor's office, I'll EAT my St. Petersburg Times. These people have obviously forgotten who they work for.

I thought this part was especailly vomit-inducing:

***

On Twitter, the 6-foot-4 Burgess poses for a photo standing in front of public records that, after six months, still have not been released to the reporter who requested them. He accuses another reporter of making mistakes, but won't specify an error when challenged. He yells at reporters day in and day out for stories he doesn't like.

"He is a different type of communications director than we've ever seen, a full body contact, knuckle-to-knuckle press person — and I say that as a compliment,'' said Republican communications consultant Sarah Bascom. "If you have one of the most aggressive and one of the most knowledgeable capital press corps, as we do in Florida, having an aggressive knife-fighter communications director fits very well."

***

These cretins actually think this nastiness is worthy of admiration.

[seafan]

7. This GOP cesspool drowning Tallahassee for the last decade and a half is killing Florida.

These people HATE any form of government, so they will lie, cheat and steal to grab control of it.

Then they completely destroy it, bolstering their claim that 'government is worthless and broken beyond recognition'.



They have destroyed nearly everything in sight.


There's going to be some fierce and quite terrible karma catching up with these people.


May it come soon.