CLT
UPDATE
Friday, March 3, 2006
In a 3-way race, taxpayers may be
the losers
Bolting from the Republican Party, wealthy
businessman Christy Mihos said yesterday he will run for governor as an
independent, a decision that delivers a blow to GOP chances of victory
in November....
Republican leaders, both in Massachusetts and Washington, have worked
behind the scenes to persuade Mihos to either stay out of the
gubernatorial race or to run in the Republican primary....
After the event, Mihos was asked by reporters about his wife having told
him in the past that she didn't want him to run for public office.
"She made a deal," Mihos said. "She said, 'You can do whatever you want
as long as I can have a new wardrobe.' It's going to cost me more to
fund her wardrobe than it is to fund my campaign, I think."
The Boston Globe
Thursday, March 2, 2006
In blow to GOP, Mihos to run as independent
Decision seen hurting Healey
In his official launch as an independent candidate for
governor, Christy Mihos stood in front of the State House yesterday and vowed to
change the business of politics from the inside....
Standing with his wife, two children, their dog and a handful of supporters, the
convenience store magnate dismissed the claims of five members of his campaign
team who quit this week and backed Lt. Gov. Kerry Healey’s gubernatorial
campaign, saying Mihos was "unmanageable."
The Boston Herald
Friday, March 3, 2006
Mihos tosses hat into gov race
"I think Kerry Healey should go out there and make the point
that Massachusetts has done pretty well with Republican governors," Cellucci
said before last night's fund-raising event.
"The stake has been driven into the heart of the label Taxachusetts," he said.
"As long as a Republican is in the corner office, that stake will stay firmly in
place." ...
A political scientist who follows state politics agreed. "It is potentially
catastrophic to Kerry Healey," said Jeffrey Berry, a political science professor
at Tufts University.
"Mihos has enough money to make himself a serious candidate, and he will peel
off some votes," Berry said. "It will be more likely that the votes he gets will
come out of her hide than the Democratic candidates." ...
Still, the general consensus among political observers, including a former
chairman of the state GOP, sharply differed with Cellucci's assessment.
"There is no question that this hurts Kerry Healey," said James Rappaport, the
former GOP state chairman who lost to Healey in a battle for the party's
nomination for lieutenant governor in 2002. "Anybody who says it doesn't is
fooling themselves."
The Boston Globe
Friday, March 3, 2006
GOP rallies behind Healey
Mihos launches his campaign
If Kerry Healey wins 85 percent of the Republican vote in
November, and 15 percent of the Democratic vote, she'll have 16.6 percent of the
total vote. To win 50.1 percent of the total vote Nov. 7, she'll have to earn
68.9 percent of the independent vote. This relies on the very reasonable
assumption that the electorate will retain its 49 percent-independent, 38
percent-Democrat, 13 percent-Republican composition....
Meanwhile, if the Democrat gets 85 percent of the Democratic votes and 15
percent of the Republican votes, he or she will already have 33.5 percent of the
electorate. And the race actually gets a bit easier for a Democrat with the
entry of an independent if the Democrat holds most of his or her party base.
If Democrats break 60 percent for the Democrat, that candidate needs to win 32
percent of independents to get 40 percent. The size of the numbers and the size
of the challenge shifts depending on how much the independent can steal from the
bases of the two party-affiliated candidate, but it's always worse news for the
Republican than the Democrat.
State House News Service
Friday, March 3, 2006
Weekly Roundup
[excerpt]
Third party candidacies are traditionally about issues,
engaged in by those so passionate about a cause that they will devote time and
money and energy to putting it and themselves in front of the public to promote
that cause. Think consumer advocate Ralph Nader or Ross Perot and his ubiquitous
charts ...
This might be the first campaign in recent memory where whining is supposed to
pass for a political platform.
A Boston Herald editorial
Friday, March 3, 2006
See Christy run, but why?
Chip Ford's CLT Commentary
I recall 1992, when many activists across the state
and nation worked our hearts out to help elect Ross Perot to the U.S.
presidency. (In full disclosure, I was this state's campaign
"media liaison" and Perot "surrogate" in debates.) It's still
argued whether his 19 percent of the national vote (higher in
Massachusetts) hurt Democrat Bill Clinton or incumbent Republican George H. W.
Bush more -- but Clinton became president.
Then came the 2000 presidential election between
Democrat Vice President Al Gore, Republican George W. Bush -- and third-party candidate
Ralph Nader. That was the year of the "hanging Florida chads," an
election result so close we didn't know who'd be our next president for
weeks after the polls closed, until the U.S. Supreme Court decided.
Ralph Nader has been accused by Democrats ever since of being the
spoiler in that campaign, taking just enough votes away from Gore to tip
the election to Bush, now our president.
Every once in a while lightning strikes, the
"outsider" maverick in a race defies all odds and actually pulls out a
win, for example: Connecticut's Lowell Weicker in 1990; Maine's Angus
King in 1994, and; Minnesota's Jesse Ventura in 1998. But for this
rarity to occur, all the stars and planets must be aligned. More
often, the third-man-in changes only the two-party dynamics.
I've often voted my conscience, knowing that a
third-party candidate can't win in Massachusetts. But this
upcoming gubernatorial race is going to be critical to the future of
Massachusetts taxpayers.
All we have left as citizens, voters, and taxpayers
is the hope of a veto by the governor of bills passed by the
tax-and-spend, Democrat-controlled Legislature.
For all intent and purpose, that Legislature has
stripped us citizens of our constitutional right to the initiative and
referendum process, by simply ignoring or overturning the results.
For now, that right is gone -- but only a Republican governor's veto has
kept them from abolishing it altogether. Legislators have marched
in lockstep with the Democrat leadership for so long it's become
ingrained, so it's not often we can influence votes on Beacon Hill;
legislators have more personal interests than their constituents'
concerns and have little worry about reelection.
But that two-thirds vote in the House and Senate
necessary to override a governor's veto still can be sidetracked, and
that's the tool we taxpayers have had and used for some sixteen years
under Republican governors. Coming up with the other
one-third-plus-one is still achievable. With a Democrat in the
corner office, even getting a veto will be near if not impossible.
Christy Mihos' decision therefore is critical for
taxpayers.
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Chip Ford |
The Boston Globe
Thursday, March 2, 2006
In blow to GOP, Mihos to run as independent
Decision seen hurting Healey
By Frank Phillips and Scott Helman, Globe Staff
Bolting from the Republican Party, wealthy businessman Christy Mihos
said yesterday he will run for governor as an independent, a decision
that delivers a blow to GOP chances of victory in November.
Mihos concluded that the Republican Party establishment and its party
rules for qualifying for the ballot were stacked against him, said a
Mihos adviser who asked not to be named.
Mihos's presence on the November ballot is widely expected to draw
independent voters from Lieutenant Governor Kerry Healey, the probable
Republican nominee.
"I'm running as an independent," Mihos told the Globe last night. "In
the final analysis it was a question of conscience and heart. I'm not
part of the establishment Republican Party, and I had to move on and do
what I think is right. The party has morphed into what the Democrats
are; they are both controlled by special interests."
Yesterday, Mihos, 56, offered a glimpse of the unpredictability he would
bring to the campaign, telling a series of awkward jokes about his wife
and predicting a "very strange election" during an appearance with other
candidates at a forum run by the Massachusetts Biotechnology Council.
His entry into the campaign as an independent candidate is a major
development in the 2006 race, because he brings millions of dollars of
his own money to the contest and could undermine Healey's efforts,
strategists say. He is expected to announce his plans formally late this
afternoon on the steps of the State House.
He joins four other candidates running for governor, three of whom are
also millionaires willing to spend much of their own wealth on the
campaign. The Democrats running are Attorney General Thomas F. Reilly,
who is generally considered the most financially modest of the
candidates; Deval Patrick, a former corporate executive and assistant
attorney general under President Clinton; and wealthy businessman Chris
Gabrieli, who is collecting signatures to mount a run. Healey is also
wealthy.
Healey has acknowledged privately that an independent candidacy by Mihos
would be a major setback for her chances to win the office that the
Republicans have occupied since William F. Weld won election for
governor in 1990.
Asked by reporters yesterday whether Mihos would hurt her campaign if he
ran as an independent, Healey appeared resigned to his presence in the
race. "I can't control Christy," she said. "He's going to do whatever he
wants to do, and I am just looking forward to this race."
Republican leaders, both in Massachusetts and Washington, have worked
behind the scenes to persuade Mihos to either stay out of the
gubernatorial race or to run in the Republican primary.
According to two sources with direct knowledge of the effort, Healey and
her husband, Sean, had dinner with Mihos recently to discuss joining her
ticket as lieutenant governor. Mihos has told reporters he has no
interest in the position.
In addition, Healey campaign supporters offered him a guarantee that he
would get the 15 percent of delegates' support at the GOP convention in
April that is necessary to qualify for the September primary ballot if
he runs as a Republican.
Late last year, national GOP leaders, including White House political
director Sara Taylor and Governor Mitt Romney, also tried to persuade
Mihos to challenge Senator Edward M. Kennedy this fall. Mihos, who lives
in a gated community on Great Island in Yarmouth, across Lewis Bay from
the Kennedy compound, rejected the overtures.
Mihos's disenchantment with the state Republican Party began when Acting
Governor Jane M. Swift tried to remove him from the Turnpike Authority
board after he refused to vote to raise tolls to pay for Big Dig costs.
The Supreme Judicial Court reinstated him. Romney did not reappoint him
to another term.
Mihos would face an electorate that is increasingly independent.
Unenrolled voters made up 48.7 percent of registered voters in October
2004, Democrats accounted for 37.2 percent and Republicans 12.9 percent.
In 1992, independent Ross Perot received more than 22 percent of the
vote in Massachusetts, about 3 percentage points more than the national
average.
In 1998, Mihos and his brother, James, sold 132 of the 142 Christy's
stores in New England to Southland Corp., owner of the 7-Eleven store
chain. He is expected to use his own money to run television ads
beginning in early April. He has hired a Minnesota ad firm to develop
the spots, a campaign source said.
Mihos has also set an ambitious fund-raising goal, aiming to bring in
$350,000 a month. The first major fund-raiser will be March 28.
In the last month, Mihos has assembled a 10-member paid campaign staff.
He has tapped Peter R. Pendergast, a former Turnpike Authority general
counsel, to be his campaign manager. Others on the staff include a
fund-raiser, several field operatives, and a former Bush White House
speech writer. He is negotiating to rent office space in Kenmore Square
for a campaign headquarters.
Mihos is also on the verge of hiring a high-profile Republican political
consultant from Washington, whom aides declined to identify because the
contract has not been finalized.
Mihos must collect the signatures of 10,000 registered voters by Aug. 1
to appear on the November ballot. He is also required to disenroll from
the Republican Party by March 7 in order to run as an independent.
At the Biotechnology Council forum yesterday, Mihos seemed to
acknowledge his long odds. He referred at one point to getting elected
"if lightning strikes." He pledged not to take campaign contributions
from lobbyists, political action committees, or state employees or
contractors.
"I will be unbought and unbossed," he said.
But if Mihos's independent streak will appeal to some voters, it could
also prove to be a liability in his campaign. His impolitic remarks
yesterday at the forum, for example, raised more than a few eyebrows.
Mihos was the last gubernatorial candidate to speak. After giving his
wife, Andrea, a peck on the check, he strode to the microphone and
promised to be brief by saying, "My wife says I'm awful fast, so I'll
try to stick to that." The joke prompted groans from many of the 400
people in attendance.
Moments later, Mihos noted that he had been married for 31 years; he
joked that he married his wife when she was 5 years old. "That will get
me points tonight, too," he said to awkward silence.
After the event, Mihos was asked by reporters about his wife having told
him in the past that she didn't want him to run for public office.
"She made a deal," Mihos said. "She said, 'You can do whatever you want
as long as I can have a new wardrobe.' It's going to cost me more to
fund her wardrobe than it is to fund my campaign, I think."
Return to top
The Boston Herald
Friday, March 3, 2006
Mihos tosses hat into gov race
By Kimberly Atkins
In his official launch as an independent candidate for governor, Christy
Mihos stood in front of the State House yesterday and vowed to change
the business of politics from the inside.
"For all too long it’s been occupied by just two parties ... beholden to
the special interests," Mihos said. He pledged not to accept campaign
donations from lobbyists, state employees, state contractors or
political action committees.
Standing with his wife, two children, their dog and a handful of
supporters, the convenience store magnate dismissed the claims of five
members of his campaign team who quit this week and backed Lt. Gov.
Kerry Healey’s gubernatorial campaign, saying Mihos was "unmanageable."
"These people were Republican operatives," Mihos said of former deputy
campaign manager Ron Vining and four other former campaign staffers, who
denied leaving because of politics. "They felt they needed a Republican
candidacy and only a Republican candidacy."
Mihos outlined little about his platform as a candidate, revealing after
questioning by reporters that he supports abortion rights, gay marriage
and gay adoption, and that the keystone of his campaign would be passing
a mandate banning property tax reassessments until properties are sold.
"We (must) free the homeowners and business owners from these endless
increases and reassessments and property tax increases," he said. "These
are driving people out of Massachusetts."
If elected, Mihos said on his first day as governor he will drive
himself to work, begin his push to "take down those tolls from Weston to
the New York border," and reopen the front State House gates to "return
this building to the people of Massachusetts."
At a fund-raiser for her campaign last night, Healey said of inheriting
the Mihos workers,"I’m very grateful to have their support."
Earlier in the day, she denied ever asking Mihos to be her running mate.
She was joined at the fund-raiser by Gov. Mitt Romney, former Govs.
William Weld and Paul Cellucci and former acting Gov. Jane Swift. Swift
said Healey "would do a great job."
"I think the tax climate is better with Republicans in the corner
office," she said.
Swift, who fired Mihos from the Massachusetts Turnpike Authority only to
have him reinstated by the state’s highest court, declined to comment on
his candidacy.
"I have not been following that very closely," she said.
Return to top
The Boston Globe
Friday, March 3, 2006
GOP rallies behind Healey
Mihos launches his campaign
By Frank Phillips, Globe Staff
As Republican-turnedindependent Christy Mihos officially launched his
candidacy for governor, four current and former GOP governors rallied
support last night for Lieutenant Governor Kerry Healey, part of an
effort to close ranks and stabilize her campaign in the face of Mihos's
defection from the party.
The dueling events highlighted the challenge the Republicans face to
bolster Healey's chances of holding the office the GOP has occupied for
nearly 16 years.
The fund-raising event last night at the Boston Park Plaza, planned
months ago, could not have been better timed for Healey, as she and her
aides battle the perception that her candidacy has taken a serious blow
with Mihos's decision to bolt the party and run as an independent.
The event was hosted by former governors William F. Weld, Paul Cellucci,
and Jane Swift and by Governor Mitt Romney.
Healey's campaign aides said her committee expects to raise $300,000.
Another boost will come shortly when Healey makes a final decision on a
running mate from a short list of candidates. Aides said that will be
announced in several weeks.
A few hours before the fund-raiser, Mihos appeared in front of the State
House to formally announce his candidacy. Setting a populist tone, he
vowed to drive himself to work each day and said that he would not take
donations from lobbyists, state employees, or political action
committees.
He also declared his support for tax and toll relief, gay marriage,
adoptions by same-sex couples, and abortion rights.
"This gate will be forever open to the people's building, and I as
governor intend to return this building to the people of the
Commonwealth of Massachusetts," Mihos said, pointing to the massive iron
gate that sits at the foot of the large granite stairway at the front of
the 18th-century Bulfinch building. The gate and the front lawn have
been closed since the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks.
"This is not a vanity thing whatsoever," said Mihos, a former board
member of the Massachusetts Turnpike Authority who clashed with the
Swift administration over Big Dig cost overruns and toll hikes. He has
asserted that no Republicans came to his defense in his battles at the
Turnpike Authority.
In the eyes of several political observers, Mihos presents a challenge
for Healey as the two battle over Republican and GOP-leaning independent
voters.
Healey's campaign, however, insists that he could draw voters from
Democrats as well.
"It's a bit of a wild card and historically tough to do," Cellucci said
of Mihos's chances. He said Healey should follow the strategy that he,
Weld, and Romney used to win in a heavily Democratic state.
"I think Kerry Healey should go out there and make the point that
Massachusetts has done pretty well with Republican governors," Cellucci
said before last night's fund-raising event.
"The stake has been driven into the heart of the label Taxachusetts," he
said. "As long as a Republican is in the corner office, that stake will
stay firmly in place."
Senate minority leader Brian P. Lees dismissed assertions that Mihos
will hurt Healey.
"I don't buy that at all," Lees said. "It is hard for an independent to
break through.
"Once people realize that the only reason he is running is that he is
mad at those who are running the party, then they will focus on the
Republican and Democratic candidates, and he will be marginalized," he
said.
Still, the general consensus among political observers, including a
former chairman of the state GOP, sharply differed with Cellucci's
assessment.
"There is no question that this hurts Kerry Healey," said James
Rappaport, the former GOP state chairman who lost to Healey in a battle
for the party's nomination for lieutenant governor in 2002. "Anybody who
says it doesn't is fooling themselves."
Rappaport said that Mihos, who is a friend of his, could win in much the
same way that independents Angus King did in Maine in 1994 and Lowell
Weicker did in Connecticut in 1990.
A political scientist who follows state politics agreed. "It is
potentially catastrophic to Kerry Healey," said Jeffrey Berry, a
political science professor at Tufts University.
"Mihos has enough money to make himself a serious candidate, and he will
peel off some votes," Berry said. "It will be more likely that the votes
he gets will come out of her hide than the Democratic candidates."
Meanwhile, Healey told reporters that she would focus on cutting taxes,
improving education, and helping to create jobs.
"I welcome Christy to the race," she said yesterday, according to State
House News Service. "It doesn't matter to me if it's two candidates or
three; my message is going to be the same.... It's not really going to
really change how I approach things."
GOP operatives insisted that Mihos will drain as many votes away from
the Democratic nominee as from Healey.
With no battle for the April party convention endorsement and no costly
primary fight, Healey can focus on the general election voters, who are
generally more moderate than primary voters, they said.
"It gives you more freedom in your policy and political decisions," said
a top political strategist who is advising Healey.
Also, because she is now the only GOP candidate, the party is free to
throw its resources behind Healey.
It can immediately make unlimited contributions to assist Healey, buying
advertising and direct mail and paying salaries for political workers.
Return to top
State House News Service
Friday, March 3, 2006
Weekly Roundup [excerpt]
By Craig Sandler
Let's do the math.
While everyone on Beacon Hill has a rhetorical standpoint on Christy
Mihos and his entry into the governor's race, on Nov. 7 it's not going
to be about rhetoric, any more than the headline after a Red Sox loss
reads, "Schilling Displays Good Location, Velocity, Movement, Stays
Ahead of Batters, But Hangs Slider With Misaligned Leg Drive In Fourth."
No, the headline reads, "Tribe Downs Sox, 5-3." And on Nov. 8 it's going
to be some variation of "Candidate X Gets Most Votes." So: on to the
numbers - the starkest way to examine what confronts the candidates.
If Kerry Healey wins 85 percent of the Republican vote in November, and
15 percent of the Democratic vote, she'll have 16.6 percent of the total
vote. To win 50.1 percent of the total vote Nov. 7, she'll have to earn
68.9 percent of the independent vote. This relies on the very reasonable
assumption that the electorate will retain its 49 percent-independent,
38 percent-Democrat, 13 percent-Republican composition.
This sounds like a remarkably formidable feat - yet no Republican has
failed to accomplish it in the past two decades, and no Democrat has
managed to muster the paltry 35 percent among independents needed to
win.
Taking 40 percent as the threshold needed for victory in a three-way
race - mid-way between Bill Clinton's 43 percent in 1992 and Jesse
Ventura's 37 in 1998 - Healey would need about 48 percent of the
independent vote.
Meanwhile, if the Democrat gets 85 percent of the Democratic votes and
15 percent of the Republican votes, he or she will already have 33.5
percent of the electorate. And the race actually gets a bit easier for a
Democrat with the entry of an independent if the Democrat holds most of
his or her party base.
If Democrats break 60 percent for the Democrat, that candidate needs to
win 32 percent of independents to get 40 percent. The size of the
numbers and the size of the challenge shifts depending on how much the
independent can steal from the bases of the two party-affiliated
candidate, but it's always worse news for the Republican than the
Democrat.
If Mihos runs the same as Jesse Ventura, pulling 33 percent of the
Democrats and 28 percent of the Republicans, he'll have roughly the same
challenge as Healey if she holds her base; he'd need to capture 46
percent of independents to win 40 percent of the overall vote. But if he
really does pull that strongly from the GOP, Healey will finish third.
This implacable arithmetic is why anything that drains independent votes
is a terrible development for a Massachusetts Republican. And the entry
of the first credible independent in memory falls into the "terrible"
category for Kerry Healey.
All this numeracy has an obvious weakness. Elections are only
quantitative for one night of the cycle - and the rest of the time
they're nothing but qualitative, the ubiquitous poll numbers all driven
by questions of style and character and levels of trust and passion and
communication and connection. How's Christy going to pay to keep the Big
Dig's walls from leaking again? What's his health care plan? We need it
by yesterday. He already raised hackles and eyebrows by making "my wife
the clotheshorse" jokes, which is fun, but how does he answer the
Dukakis/Bernard Shaw question: if she were raped and murdered, would he
demand the death penalty, and how would he ascertain it wasn't being
carried out against the wrong person? That's what lies ahead now for
Christy.
Similarly, the race will now be much harder for Healey in far more than
a numeric sense. The realities of politics mandate that if Mihos runs
credibly, Healey will have to come off not just as competent or steady
in order to beat both the Democrat and the independent, but as
remarkable - moving from unfamiliar to unforgettable in one leap.
This all assumes, of course, that Mihos stays in the race for the long
haul and gets the political community to take him more than
semi-seriously, which is where he stands now. But everybody takes $7 or
$8 million seriously, and that Mihos has.
Return to top
The Boston Herald
Friday, March 3, 2006
A Boston Herald editorial
See Christy run, but why?
Third party candidacies are traditionally about issues, engaged in by
those so passionate about a cause that they will devote time and money
and energy to putting it and themselves in front of the public to
promote that cause. Think consumer advocate Ralph Nader or Ross Perot
and his ubiquitous charts or even former Minnesota Gov. Jesse Ventura,
who put down his feather boa to take up the cause of market-oriented
economic reform.
So what is it that drives the independent gubernatorial candidacy of
Christy Mihos (other than a chance to try out his rather odd stand-up
comedy routine)? Well, nearly as we can discern it’s largely about a
major league grumpiness with the state’s Republican Party. This might be
the first campaign in recent memory where whining is supposed to pass
for a political platform.
Return to top
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