The Scene In The Spin Zone

Posted Oct 30, 2006 by Laura Fiorilli

Updated Oct 30, 2006 at 10:35 PM

After the debate, candidates and their handlers spilled out onto the covered breezeway outside the News Center to offer their spin on tonight’s debate.

First on everyone’s mind was tonight’s surprise: Just minutes before cameras rolled, Max Linn, the Reform Party candidate, won a court challenge and gained access to the debate.

Previously, organizers at WFLA planned to have only the mainstream candidates, Republican Charlie Crist and Democrat Jim Davis, appear in the debate, which was moderated by “Hardball” host Chris Matthews.

Linn was the first to grasp for the spotlight. Grinning, gutsy and clearly gobbling up the attention of reporters, he insisted his performance would make him Florida’s next governor.

But maybe he already has the victory he craves.

“I threw them for a loop by coming in at the last minute,” Linn said. “They’ve been trying to keep me out all year long!”

Governor Jeb Bush, who handed Linn a Sharpie marker on the way into the debate and wished him good luck, said he actually thinks the third-party candidate shouldn’t have shared the stage with Davis and Crist.

“It wasn’t fair to the people that spent a lot of time and money organizing this,” Bush said.

For their part, the two mainstream candidates stuck mostly to their messages afterward, offering few comments about the gadfly in their midst.

Crist, who was the target of most of Linn’s attacks, said the often-lively discussion was “a different kind of debate” and that he “had fun” with it.

As for Davis, he also seemed skeptical of the process that landed Linn, previously best known for making an emergency landing on Interstate 4 in his single-engine plane, in the spotlight.

“Democracy is a beautiful thing,” Davis said. “But it’s a little sloppy.”