With Maryland's late primary set for September 12th, there are two Dems poised to take on Republican Governor Bob Ehrlich.
Mayor Martin O'Malley of Baltimore and
Montgomery County Executive Doug Duncan
Polls have shown either candidate being capable of beating Ehrlich in November. These polls also show Martin O'Malley ahead of Doug Duncan, though that lead has shrunk a bit more recently. The Duncan campaign has been pointing to that shrink in the gap as positive momentum for their candidate.
However, that momentum may be coming to a halt with
recent revelations that in 1999 Duncan's County Exec campaign received $20,000 in donations from companies connected to Abramoff. Then in 2000, Duncan and the Council approved leasing a unoccupied school (against community residents wishes) to yeshiva connected to Abramoff. Duncan, since these revelations, has returned the $20,000. However, this clearly makes it harder for Doug Duncan to go after Ehrlich, who also returned $16,000 in campaign contributions from Abramoff as well. (Note: Ehrlich's money came directly from Abramoff while Duncan's came indirectly as far as I can tell from the Sun article.)
Putting the latest questions aside, the Baltimore Sun recently ran an article questioning just who/what exactly are the working families that all three politicians are pointing to and what do these promises actually mean.
'Working families' gain political focus
Ambiguous term becomes rallying cry in race for governor
Take a soccer mom, add a NASCAR dad, blend them together in a heated election year and what do you get?
A working family.
Working families, a deliciously ambiguous segment of society, are hands-down the most coveted demographic among candidates vying to be Maryland's next governor.
When Gov. Robert L. Ehrlich Jr. strives to mitigate the electric rate increases, he's doing it "for Maryland's working families."
Baltimore Mayor Martin O'Malley's recent win in his lawsuit against the Public Service Commission is "a victory for working families."
And Montgomery County Executive Douglas M. Duncan? He has "a plan to begin to give hard-working families the affordable health care they deserve."
The working family. So noble, so needy. So politically perfect.
As Marylanders become increasingly anxious about paying more for electricity just as they're paying more for gasoline just as they're paying more for health insurance just as interest rates rise and the stock market goes iffy, this term could be the right thing at the right time, says Keith Haller, president of the Bethesda polling company Potomac Inc. Whichever candidate lassos that angst-filled Zeitgeist, Haller thinks has the best shot of being elected governor in November.
"I can't recall an issue in modern Maryland history that has been so searingly omnipresent," Haller says of the rates scare. "Everyone is flailing about trying to be more the advocate for the working family. But to the average person, they see no one has come up with a workable approach. There's a lot of skepticism and a lot of anger."
Working families were not born overnight, though a casual observer of the political firestorm surrounding the impending electricity rate increase might think so.
Sharpened debate
The gubernatorial troika has largely boiled that debate right down to working families: Who will be their white knight? Who will save them from big, scary utility bills? Who's on their side?
The story continues by looking at what each of the three has been saying and doing on the campaign trail, tailoring their message to working families.
However I found one line rather bothersome.
Ehrlich knows exactly what a working family is because he grew up in one, says Henry Fawell, his spokesman. The dad sold cars. The mom was a legal secretary. They called Arbutus home.
Nowhere else in the article does it mention that both O'Malley and Duncan also grew up in working families. If you didn't know better, you'd think Ehrlich grew up in a modest working family and they grew up with silver spoons. I mean after all, they were both raised in Montgomery County. Everyone in Maryland knows that people are rich in Montgomery County. [/sarcasm]
Another Baltimore Sun article previews the upcoming special session of the General Assembly that will be tackling the problem of skyrocketting electric rates for BGE customers.
Political victory is at stake
Gubernatorial hopefuls look to special session on BGE's rate increase
All of the candidates for governor say they want the General Assembly to craft a winning plan to ease in Baltimore Gas and Electric Co.'s pending rate increase.
But who will emerge from the state legislature's expected special session next week as the political winner will depend on what resolution - if any - is reached.
BGE electric rates are set to go up 72 percent July 1 with the expiration of rate caps instituted in 1999 as part of Maryland's energy industry deregulation. The state legislature is expected to reconvene to fashion a plan to soften the blow of the increase.
By virtue of incumbency, Gov. Robert L. Ehrlich Jr. could bear the brunt of political anger among BGE's more than 1 million ratepayers - no matter how much their bills go up next month, said James Gimpel, a professor of political science at the University of Maryland, College Park.
Others say Ehrlich has done an effective job reminding voters that it was the Democrat-controlled legislature - including the running mate of one of his Democratic rivals, Mayor Martin O'Malley - that approved the rate increase in 1999.
"If I could draw a picture of this, it would be of the General Assembly, the governor and the mayor all pointing fingers at someone else," said Donald F. Norris, a professor of public policy at the University of Maryland, Baltimore County. "There are almost no political losers here, and that's what makes the political theater so great."
Norris added that Montgomery County Executive Douglas M. Duncan could benefit from the high-profile posturing of Ehrlich and O'Malley. "He's above the fray, he's the adult," Norris said.
However, Gimpel said that Duncan, whose Montgomery constituents mostly get energy from a Washington-area utility, has not been as engaged in the debate as he should be.
Still, others say O'Malley has staked out an envious political position by orchestrating Baltimore's lawsuit against the Ehrlich-appointed Public Service Commission, which drafted details of the steep rate increase.
Finally, I'd like to point to the ongonig woes of Gov. Bob Ehrlich, who's office is still being investigated for illegal hiring and firing practices.
State sues over employees' testimony
Two refused to answer questions from panel probing hiring, firing practices of Ehrlich
At a May 11 hearing by a legislative committee looking into Gov. Robert L. Ehrlich Jr.'s hiring and firing practices, two witnesses refused to answer a series of questions asked by lawmakers.
Last week, the state filed a lawsuit against the two state employees, hoping to force them to provide those answers.
The committee has spent nearly a year investigating whether state workers were fired because they were Democrats or to make way for people who would be loyal to Ehrlich, the first Republican chief executive in Maryland in decades.
-snip-
One person the committee wanted to have testify remains elusive. Committee staffers have not been able to locate former Ehrlich aide Joseph F. Steffen Jr., who has said the governor dubbed him the "Prince of Darkness," to send him a subpoena.
In court papers, attorneys say they want Maddalone to tell them about "the creation of a database pertaining to termination of state employees and whether he was paying for private counsel," two things he declined to answer at the advice of his attorney J. Donald Braden in May.
In another filing, attorneys say they want Chesek to tell them "about specific terminations at the PSC and the Department of Natural Resources and provide information about Joseph Steffen, a major figure in the Special Committee's inquiry," which he, too, would not discuss on Braden's advice.
Both men asserted "privilege" in not disclosing the information, but Assistant Attorney General Bonnie Kirkland said that only information in personnel files need be kept private. "That does not cover oral testimony or testifying about information you know from sources other than personnel records," she said.