Some final campaign season scribblings.

Is it a state law, or something that Jimmy Buffet must appear somewhere in the Tampa area on the eve of every presidential election? Look, I like Mr. Parrothead as much as the next guy, but isn’t this shtik getting a bit old?

Can we please, please, please dispense with this piffle that former tampa Mayor Dick Greco is a Democrat? Okay, sure, fine, perhaps it might say “Democrat” on Greco’s voter registration card, but when you become an ubiquitous presence on the dais with every Republican candidate from Charlie Crist to John McCain and when the last time you voted for a Democrat, Thomas Jefferson was on the ticket, isn’t it sorta hard to maintain this mythology you still are loyal to the party of FDR, JFK and LBJ?

Oddly enough, Greco has probably done more stumping for McCain than Gov.  Crist, who toward the end of this campaign cycle was playing more hard to get than a nun.

Perhaps no other politician in Florida history has been more adept at tacking with the prevailing electoral winds than Crist, who as it appeared the McCain campaign had attracted a major case of the cooties, began to ever so subtley distance himself from the Republican presidential nominee, perhaps as much as an expression of pay-back for not being named McCain’s running mate, as taking the first baby steps toward positioning himself for future White House considerations in 2012.

As well, Greco was more visible on the hustings than current Tampa Mayor Pam Iorio, who strangely played an extremely low-profile presence in the Brack Obama campaign during his frequent trips to the Tampa area.

There’s been a bit of musing as to how nasty this campaign as been and to be sure it has, but the 2008 presidential race still has a long way to go to match the vitriol of some past races, most notably the virulent contest between John Adams and Jefferson in 1800, in which both exchanged brutal accusation against each other. And they were supposed to have been once those closest of friends!

Prediction: If John McCain loses, Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin will drop off the radar faster than the Hidenburg. By the time the 2012 presidential cycle rolls around again, the GOP presidential battle will see another crowded field with the possible likes of Crist, Mitt Romney, South Dakota Sen. John Thune. Mike Huckabee and probably some names we’ve never heard of entering the race.

Betcha can’t wait, right?