Rick Scott

Rick Scott wants to be our Governor. I perused his website just to make sure that some of the news reports I’ve heard were accurate. Sure enough, Rick Scott wants to run the State of Florida like a business. And, that concerns me. First, businesses either make products to sell for a profit or provide services for profit. I don’t look to the state government to do either. The state has no ‘business’ making a profit off its citizens even if there was a way to do so. Moreover, a government renders a limited number of services without competition from anyone – or at least, it should. So, I’m not much convinced that his plan to run the state government as a business is a very good one. A government should be run as a government fully accountable to the electorate.
Rick Scott also wants us to assume that he became a more astute businessman, and therefore a better gubernatorial candidate, because he was ousted as CEO from Columbia/HCA following the $1.7 billion fraud claim settlement. I’ve got to wonder exactly what lessons he learned as set forth in his website claim. He obviously didn’t learn how not to get caught and it’s unlikely that he learned honesty out of the affair. Whether he knew of the fraud or not doesn’t qualify him, in my mind, as a good gubernatorial candidate. If he knew, he is a common thief – if he didn’t know of the frauds, he’s not a very good CEO.
News pundits claim that Rick Scott has spent over $15 million of his own money to get the job as the Governor of this State. That job pays only about $140,000 a year. I have to wonder about the business acumen of someone who spends $15 million out of his own pocket to obtain a 4 year job that will gross only about $520,000. I’ve been in business for myself for some time and, to me, the figures just don’t add up unless, of course, he has plans of continuing larceny.