Castor On Storms,.Flags And Missed Meetings

It's no secret that Hillsborough County Commissioners Kathy Castor and Ronda Storms don't care much for each other. Their open fighting has been much publicized. But as Castor campaigns to succeed Jim Davis in heavily Democratic Congressional District 11, the irony is that Storms has helped Castor by raising her profile.

"Look, I'm not going to back down, whether it's Ronda Storms or it's Tom DeLay or others in Congress," Castor declared in a Political Connections interview airing today at 11 a.m. on Bay News 9. "It's very important at this time when the Republican Party has control from the White House to the Congress to the state Legislature down to the local level that there are independent voices, people that will speak out."

Castor is the front-runner in a Democratic primary that also has state Sen. Les Miller, businessman Al Fox and lawyers Scott Farrell and Michael Steinberg. Farrell is calling on her to resign her commission seat, saying she's not paying sufficient attention to her commission duties while campaigning, but Castor brushed that off in the taped interview saying she has rarely missed commission meetings. Castor also ripped the new Medicare prescription drug program as "a disaster" that should be overhauled and said she would support a flag burning constitutional amendment. Political Connections airs at 11 a.m. today, but starting Monday the interview can be seen at no cost on Channel 340 (Tampa Bay on Demand).