''Every Republican in the state of Florida is wondering where his mind is. He's cooking his own goose,'' said Broward County Republican state committeeman Ed Kennedy.

``I worked for him, campaigned for him, raised money for him. Now, we're sitting back and saying my God, what do we have here?''

Just up the coast Wednesday at a Palm Beach County Republican Party meeting, one activist unsuccessfully pushed for a vote to censure Crist, according to the Palm Beach Post, which reported that his censure motion drew applause before being blocked on procedural grounds.

''You still have the same division in our party between the base who are extreme and the moderates who are interested in getting something done,'' said Republican operative and Crist supporter Roger Stone of Miami. ``The extremists love purity. And they love losing elections.''

Stone said the governor, reading the poll numbers, is betting his position will continue to prove wildly popular with the average voter. Crist needs the federal money to roll into the state to help stave off unpopular budget cuts and even less popular tax increases.

Grover Norquist, the influential conservative leader of Americans for Tax Reform, said Crist should have been wary about embracing an 800-page bill he probably had not read and stands to be loaded with unpopular spending provisions that will surface over coming weeks and months.

''This is the bill that the Republican Party will be running against in 2010 and 2012 and 2014,'' Norquist predicted.

Presumably Crist won't be among those running against that bill. But if the governor has any misgivings about the politics of appearing with Obama, he sure isn't showing it.

''My concern is not about what's best for one party or the other. My concern is what's best for the state and what's best for the people of Florida,'' he said Thursday, when he invited a mostly Democratic group of black legislators to the governor's mansion to celebrate the 100th anniversary of the NAACP and the 200th anniversary of Abraham Lincoln's birth.

''This is our president, and I wanted to show support for what he's trying to do, to help our students in the classroom, the most vulnerable in our society who deserve healthcare and the infrastructure benefit that this will bring about,'' Crist said.

Herald/Times writers Steve Bousquet and Marc Caputo contributed to this report. Adam C. Smith can be reached at asmith@sptimes.com.

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