FLOOR NOTES

Count Florida a big winner

After their state decided the presidency in 2000, delegates from Florida are being wooed by the Democratic Party this year with rooms at the plush Marriott Copley and convention hall seats that are nearly front and center.

Four years ago, Floridians found themselves assigned to a “generally awful” hotel near Los Angeles International Airport; their Staples Center seats were a neck-wrenching hard left of the stage. Scott Maddox, leader of the 2004 Florida delegation, was wearing his new sense of entitlement nicely, saying this week: “We are front and center in the convention hall because we’re going to be front and center in this election.”

O’Reilly talks arts with the artists

Fox News’ Bill O’Reilly took on the Hollywood-Washington axis of evil Tuesday in a Creative Coalition panel discussion about public funding for arts education.

What America really needs -- he told notables including Alfre Woodard, Ellen Burstyn, Jerry Stiller, Richard Schiff, Wes Craven, Billy Baldwin, Wendy Malick, Bianca Jagger, Andrew Cuomo and Arianna Huffington -- are some real celebrities, “your Tom Cruises,” to get behind public arts money.

“Trust me,” he said. “I know how your world works. I respect you. Not a lot, but I respect you.”

Malick shrugged it off. “That’s what he does,” she said. “He’s combative by nature. I have to give him credit for walking into the lion’s den.”

Learning the ways of the fishbowl

The sisters Kerry were up early Tuesday morning. At a press breakfast, Alexandra, 30, said: “I am desperate for some coffee. Otherwise I won’t be able to conjugate a verb.”

And Vanessa, 27, a Yale graduate who is on leave from Harvard Medical School and is headed to London to study foreign policy, among other things, said she could not grasp the nuances of economic policy, no matter how many times she was briefed.

The pair said some of the best advice about life in the fishbowl had come from those who went before: Ron Reagan, Chelsea Clinton and the Gore girls. But no amount of talk can prepare you for the first time a woman you’ve never laid eyes on walks up and plants a big wet one on your cheek.

“What frightens me is that you want to retain your privacy, and you want to know that you can walk down the street and someone is not going to come up and kiss you because they think they can,” Vanessa said. “This is baptism by fire.”

Large minority is no longer silent

Many speakers this week have urged the preservation of “a woman’s right to choose.” Based on the cheers they’ve drawn, you’d think every Democrat at the convention supported abortion rights.

Not so, said the 50 men and women who rallied Tuesday morning outside Faneuil Hall. They wore pins that read “43%” -- the share of Democrats who told Zogby pollsters in December that abortion was the equivalent of manslaughter.

“It’s great to be here,” Chris Rose, a Democratic candidate for state representative in Colorado, proclaimed from the podium. “I haven’t seen so many pro-life Democrats since ... “ A long pause. A smile. “Ever.”

Warrior, lawyer, senator ... baker?

Yes, the nominee-in-waiting once made cookies, or at least owned a Quincy Market shop that did. Kilvert & Forbes -- taken from John F. Kerry’s and his partner’s mothers’ maiden names -- has been baking for more than 20 years. Most of those have been since Kerry sold his interest. But this week, the dark chocolate chunk cookie has been selling at record rates -- about six dozen cookies a day, twice the normal figure. The big, chewy cookies cost $1.25 each.

Compiled by Times staff writers James Rainey and Robin Abcarian, with contributions from Times staff writers Maria L. La Ganga, Elizabeth Mehren and Steven Stromberg.