After a near-decade of national leadership from big government Republicans, the voters sent our party packing on Nov. 4, handing the presidency and additional Congressional seats to the Democrats. Republicans of all stripes were caught up in the rout.

Still, there were victories both in Florida and the nation for libertarian Republicans.

A major victory was won in California where long-time friend of the RLC Tom McClintock - for whom Rep. Ron Paul actively campaigned this year - won a seat in the U.S. Congress. Here in Florida, term limits advocate Tom Rooney picked up a Congressional seat (CD16), replacing incumbent Tim Mahoney in a district still referred to as "Mark Foley's old seat." Meanwhile, Rep. Tom Feeney of Orlando (CD24) lost his Congressional seat.

In the Florida legislature, two of the five RLC-endorsed candidates won their seats - Rich Workman (D30) and Lake Ray (D17). Thanks to Sarah Lovett, Dean Santoro and Matt Caldwell for flying the limited government flag in their first, but hopefully not last, electoral efforts.

RLCer Bruce Reichert and Alan Burton won non-partisan seats on the Collier County and Volusia County Soil & Water Boards, respectively, as did Jeff Hunt in Duval County. Hunt is not an RLCer, but is the right-hand man for RLCer Adam Guillette, the Florida director of Americans for Prosperity.

For a full recap of RLC results, see the national RLC blog at http://www.rlc.org/blog.

Win or lose, congratulations to all our candidates! The entire membership of the RLC applauds your dedication to liberty.

It has come to the attention of the executive committee of the RLC of Florida that offensive messages were recently posted on one of the local RLC Meetup websites. We are embarrassed and apologize without qualification for this lapse.

It is difficult for the RLC of Florida to monitor the various local sites that permit public postings. If you ever see any postings under our banner that are offensive or contrary to the principles and positions of the RLC & RLC-FL, please let us know immediately and we will see that the situation is corrected.

Our official Statement of Principles and Positions can be found here.

For the future, the board adopted a new policy on linking:

We recognize that in a political context, linking to another site may be construed to be an endorsement of that site and possibly other material contained on that site despite disclaimers to the contrary. Due diligence should be exercised by members in placing links in official forums or pages operating under or associated with the RLC-FL. This includes verifying the material linked as well as other material on the linked site, is credible and worthy and that the overall pattern of links be supportive of and not detrimental to the interests and principles of the RLC of Florida.

The RLC-FL thanks the several individuals who brought this matter to our  attention and the prompt efforts of the RLC of North Florida in correcting it.

At the August 17, 2008 Executive Committee meeting, the Republican Liberty Caucus of Florida endorsed five more Republican candidates for local and state offices. In order to be considered for endorsement, each candidate must be nominated by a current member of the RLC-FL. In addition, each candidate is required to sign the RLC 'Liberty Compact' which requires the candidate to pledge to their individual constituency

and the people of the State of Florida, that as their elected representative I will work to: Restore liberty, not restrict it; shrink government, not expand it; reduce taxes, not raise them; abolish programs, not create them; promote the freedom and independence of citizens, not the interference of government in their lives; and observe the limited, enumerated powers of the Florida Constitution, not ignore them.

The five candidates are:

Remember, there is still time before the General Election in November, so if you know a candidate that represents our fundamental libertarian-Republican principles, put them in for nomination. The board meets again on August 31. 2008. Go here to find out the criteria for nomination and endorsement.

Good luck to our candidates!