Today's Daily Schadenfreude: Jeff Kottkamp

For the second time in six weeks, it seems appropriate to aim our not-necessarily-daily laughing-and-pointing at Florida lieutenant governor Jeff Kottkamp. A Republican (of course), Kottkamp has been under scrutiny for some time because of certain irregularities in the travel he has done on the state's dime. And today, even more details are coming out about Kottkamp's "state business" -- and let's just say he might be taking a wee bit of advantage of Floridians and their tax dollars:

Lt. Gov. Jeff Kottkamp says he flew his family on a state plane for a weekend trip to historical St. Augustine in April 2007 so he could attend a federal Small Business Administration event.

Kottkamp said he was on official business, but records obtained by the Sun Sentinel show he had nothing scheduled that weekend. And SBA officials said they had no events during Kottkamp's visit.

Questions over whether Kottkamp used state aircraft for personal trips are the latest developments in a controversy surrounding Florida's lieutenant governor, whose extensive use of state planes has sparked scrutiny from lawmakers and ethics complaints.

On another trip over Thanksgiving weekend last year, Kottkamp traveled on a state plane to Tallahassee with one main event on his calendar: the annual grudge match between the University of Florida and Florida State University football teams.

Kottkamp's public schedule lists no events that weekend. A calendar maintained by his scheduler shows Kottkamp attending pregame events and a "jazz brunch" at a lobbyist's home the day after the game, before flying home to Fort Myers.

Kottkamp's wife, Cyndie, accompanied him onboth [sic] trips.

State law says aircraft can be used only for "conducting official state business."

Remember, Republicans are the ones who claim to be "fiscally responsible," eschewing taxes and supposedly cutting spending. Well, at least with Kottkamp (among others), the label is quite ill-fitting indeed. It's appalling, really, how often Republicans get away with this kind of crap. I'm not saying Democrats are completely blameless, but corruption just seems to fit the GOP like makeup on Katherine Harris: they deem it necessary to achieve their goals, and there's just too much of it.

Now, it's true that Kottkamp has reimbursed the state for some of the travel considered inappropriate back in February, including trips between his Fort Myers home and Tallahassee for himself and his family. But the more the Sun Sentinel digs, the more impropriety comes to light.

Not surprisingly, Kottkamp was unavailable for comment. But he and his "boss," Gov. Charlie Crist, surely aren't winning over any fiscal conservatives, whom they'll need if they want to stay in office beyond 2010 (unless, as is their wont, the conservatives just pretend any GOP wrongdoing doesn't exist). And it looks like the mainstream media, for once, isn't letting go of this issue anytime soon.

At any rate, no matter what the outcome, it does give us a chance to laugh at the continuing misfortune of Lt. Gov. Jeff Kottkamp, who not only abuses his power but then hides out instead of trying to explain it. Perhaps that's because there's no good -- or legal -- explanation? Well, Jeff, at least you can take comfort in one small bit of positive recognition from all this, because today's Blast Off! Daily Schadenfreude once again is for you!