From the Broward Palm Beach New Times:
Lois Frankel isn't going to get to eat her pie.
She doesn't have time. Hunched over a legal pad, she's scrawling notes. "I should have prepared something to say," she says under her breath. Frankel scans the room. Chanel jackets, Nordstrom pantsuits, wide-necked Lane Bryant silk shells, a dining room full of Talbots disciples. Forty-three ladies and their manicured nails in shades aplenty fondle American flags pinned to their lapels -- the jeweled, crystal, pewter, gold-plated ones, the Gulf War antiques, those God Bless America and Protect Our Troops brooches. Moussed up, sprayed up, some subtly bouffanted, the women of the Lakeland chapter of the Women Business Owners re-lacquer their lips while tuxedoed boys whisk away the carcasses of their buffet lunch.
Lost in thought, Frankel stares at the pie's puddling ice-cream topping. Suddenly, she swings her right arm around the back of her chair, leans over, and whispers, "These women are probably Republican." Good guess. In this conservative patch of North Florida, GOP loyalists outnumber Democrats four to one, and no woman has served as a Polk County commissioner in 13 years. These facts don't raise one bushy, dark eyebrow of the first female Democratic Minority Speaker of the Florida House of Representatives. The pro-choice, pro-gun control, über-liberal, six-term legislator will connect with them. The Frankel for Governor campaign is converting more believers today. The politician didn't drive five hours from her West Palm Beach home to give in to the odds.
It was a long trip to the Lakeland Yacht and Country Club from her two-story, half-a-million-dollar home in Presidential Estates, a gated community near a mall and an abortion clinic. "Did you notice that place?" she asks. "There used to be protests every Saturday. Antiabortionists acting like lunatics and scaring people."
Get in a car and spend 18 hours with Lois Frankel and you'll learn that the Florida legislature's most powerful woman is scared of getting lost. Her 1999 maroon Acura is equipped with a global positioning system. "Oh my God, I was lost in Miami once... at night. I figured that was the last time that was going to happen."
Frankel speaks in italics as if she thinks you won't quite take in every word. Sometimes, if Frankel has the oldies station on and gets lucky, a Supremes song will play and she'll, you know, get down. She really loves them, she says. Her memory fails trying to think of the last CD she bought. "I couldn't tell you what happened to music after 1979. But that Mariah Carey has talent." Frankel saw the pop diva's film, Glitter, a few weeks ago. "It was a great story about a woman who follows her dream to be a singer. Everybody tells her that it's impossible, and she gets beat up a little."
Lois Frankel wants to be the next governor of Florida, but everyone tells her that won't happen. She's too liberal, hasn't enough money, has no statewide name recognition, and is vying for her party's nomination against the most popular kid in school -- former U.S. Attorney General Janet Reno. "My campaign has nothing to do with Janet. I'm in this because I'm angry at what Gov. Jeb Bush has done to the state. Public education is a mess. He wants to take more money away from education to fix the state's budget, which is in crisis because of a tax cut he gave to the wealthy. He's allowed special interests to dictate what happens in Tallahassee. I'm sick of it. The people are sick of it."