Anderson, Vice, and Sarasota's mysterious gaggle of alt-right conspiracists

The piece below is from the "watchdog editor" of the Herald Tribune, Josh Salmon.

St. Cassian, murdered by children

It's a handy guide to several of the incisive editorials written by HT columnist Chris Anderson. Anderson looks into the curious Sarasota County concentration of a species of high-profile extremists who believe -- with the indomitable conviction of medieval martyrs -- that former president Donald Trump is the legitimate president of the United States, notwithstanding cumulative evidence so decisive that even the most determined liar on the planet could not make the facts turn Red. 

Let's hope Mr. Anderson keeps looking.

Surely there's a good story behind the mysterious manner in which Sarasota County became the Florida base for alt-right, QAnonical, white supremacist, Proud-Boy-loving, Moms-for-Liberty-leading "influencers." 

So far, despite Vice News's claim to explain How Sarasota Became the Conspiracy Capital of the United States, much remains obscure -- as dark as the Dark Money that has throttled and twisted local elections here for many years (see Cathy Antunes' guide entitled Local Dark Money . . . Citizens United meets Main Street, which not so strangely happens to focus on Sarasota).

Here's Salmon:

This week, I'd like to highlight one Herald-Tribune journalist in particular and his dogged reporting to keep accountability on a powerful and influential group of new Sarasota County residents. Herald-Tribune watchdog columnist Chris Anderson started with a curious post office box in Ellenton, where he found former Donald Trump national security adviser and Englewood resident Michael Flynn was chairman of a nonprofit called America's Future . The organization became notable when it was revealed it gave Cyber Ninjas Inc. a total of $976,514 for a controversial “audit” of the 2020 presidential election votes in Maricopa County, Arizona.

But his reporting did not stop there. Through a series of investigative opinion columns over several months, Anderson has beaten big national outlets on a huge story in our backyard – one he says could threaten our very democracy.

He shed light on the mysterious money behind Cyber Ninjas CEO Doug Logan, whose Sarasota computer security company was in charge of the ballot “audit” in Arizona. Anderson found that groups tied to Flynn, Sidney Powell and former Overstock.com CEO Patrick Byrne funded Logan’s Arizona project with nearly $6 million of privately raised money.

He also found Byrne purchased six properties in our area – four homes, a condominium and a medical building owned by a Venice gynecologist – for $10.4 million, overpaying the current market value by $6 million in the process. The columns noted that Byrne had some voter discrepancies of his own, registering to vote in Park City, Utah, listing his place of business as his residence.

Throw in Charlie Kirk, a Longboat Key resident and founder of a popular far-right group that is targeting local school boards around the country, and Anderson writes that Sarasota County has become the Conspiracy Capital of the World.  A chart of blind PACs from Cathy Antunes' exploration of Local Dark Money:

Kumbaya? Or abject public sycophancy?

SNL: Two of our largest developers have offered to write their own piece of the 2050 Comprehensive Plan (Sarasota News Leader story) to accommodate their unslakable desire to build every available open area of Sarasota County. 

Rex Jensen: Lakewood Ranch has about 2,000 home sales a year. 

    “We’re the second-fastest selling community in the United bloody States,” he added. 

[Commissioner Mike] Moran: “You’re such a visionary.” 

Jensen: “We haven’t developed much in Sarasota, though that will change.” 

    Note: Rex Jensen's Waterside at Lakewood Ranch is a 5,144-home, 5,500-acre development in Sarasota County set around a series of seven large borrow pits left over from mining operations. It stretches from I-75 to Lorraine Road:

Moran noted of Waterside Place, “That project is fabulous.” 

Jensen: “We’re going to be out of land shortly, and we have about 4,000 acres” that Shroeder-Manatee Ranch would like to develop.

“What really grates on us,” Jensen said during his presentation, “is the numerous prescriptive requirements [of 2050] — “the ‘Thou shalt’s’ and the ‘Thou shalt not’s.’”

So, Jensen and Pat Neal offered to write their own Shalts and Shalt Nots:

  Comprehensive Planning -- The Developer Version

“What’s wrong with what you see at Lakewood Ranch?” Neal asked. Jensen is just seeking “to dispense with the prescriptive requirements that you have in the 2050 [Plan].”

 “I think this is a great process,” Chair Alan Maio said

Commissioner Christian Ziegler concurred on the latter point.

And so, as the Sarasota News Leader reports, ". . . the County Commission has given Rex Jensen, the developer of Lakewood Ranch, the go-ahead to work with county staff on a new residential density category within the county’s 2050 Plan, which has guidelines for communities created east of Interstate 75."