Sarah Palin could learn a thing from Charlie Crist during the Republican Governors Association meeting in Miami this week.

It's not just good policy that makes good politics. It's also good press, and Crist is a master at public relations. Poor Palin became a victim of bad press, much of it generated by insiders in her own party and by her handlers' attempts to keep her away from reporters.

Charlie hasn't met a reporter he didn't like. Well, at least not one he will admit publicly he doesn't like. He's the consummate pol, whether he's preaching to the GOP choir or working on restoring the legacy of a black civil-rights hero or having a cafecito in Little Havana and chanting, ``Viva Cuba libre.''

You don't hear Charlie saying small-town Florida is the real Florida. Or that Tampa or Miami are the real Florida. Instead, his style is 1960s hand-holding and kumbaya-singing -- with GOP promises of ``Won't tax you, bro!''

GOOD TIMING

On Tuesday, Charlie, the self-proclaimed green governor, was set to hold a news conference with environmentalists and water managers to unveil a scaled-down version of his Big Sugar buyout plan. The new deal was to be unveiled at the Coconut Grove home of the late Marjory Stoneman Douglas, whose love for the river of grass helped garner generations of support for protecting the Everglades.

But when the governor's plane was delayed, Charlie called the whole thing off until Wednesday -- just in time for the start of the GOP governors' pow wow. It's all about timing.

The governors are in town to talk up their successes in the wake of the Barack attack. Palin already is jockeying for 2012.

A week after Barack Obama beat John McCain by capturing almost 53 percent of the popular vote, the Republican talking heads are warning that his was not a mandate. Strange that a party relegated in the presidential race to a few states in the South and a smattering in the west -- where there may be more antelope than people -- insists it still represents the will of the majority. Ronald Reagan claimed a ''mandate'' in 1980 with only 50.7 percent of the vote.

As the economy continues to tank and governors from Alaska to Florida face rising deficits in state budgets, Americans are tired of partisanship. They want solutions.

IT'S THE ECONOMY

In Orlando, the National League of Cities also is meeting this week to come up with its wish list for an Obama administration. Top on both the governors' and the mayors' agenda: how to rev up the economy. Jobs, jobs and more jobs.

After the 9/11 attacks, federal and state governments rolled out bond-backed construction projects. That's key now in a recession -- fixing and expanding roads, mass transit and bridges that are near collapse across the country.

The bipartisan National Surface Transportation Policy and Revenue Study Commission notes that the nation needs to invest up to $341 billion a year in the next 50 years to catch up. Yet state, local and federal governments spend about $87 billion a year now.

Technology to wean America from gas-guzzling trucks and SUVs must be part of the solution, too.

Miami Mayor Manny Diaz, an independent who heads the cities league, promotes green technology and endorsed Obama, can be a bridge between Florida's Republican governor and a Democratic White House. South Florida stands to gain.

And as gas prices drop and Palin's Alaska budget, dependent on big-oil profits, gets squeezed, even Sarah might appreciate a federal stimulus from an Obama federal jobs program.

Charlie surely will.

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