Kudos to Patrick and Gabrielli for clean campaigning, but the truth is that neither of them could afford to be tainted with the kind of dark-side machiavellian gambits like the Killer Coke scam.
That doesnt hurt Reilly so much because it doesnt contradict who he is or threaten his power base. It would really damage Patrick.
(On the other hand I think that Reilly has gotten very little lift from being “the only millionaire in the race” because this claim, while true, is at cross purposes to his political-insider strengths. Imagine how it would resonate with Patricks message were he (Patrick) able to make that claim!)
Each candidates theory of power prefigures the kind of Governer he would be if elected–one reason, by the way, that I am for Patrick. I want to believe that his close-to-the-ground outsider campaign can trump connections and big money. (And I think that theme is the strongest of the three versus Healey.)
On that score, it looks as though we have an appealing candidate and a good shot. But, well see, right? Thats politics.
I wish I could hit the Recommend button, but it seems to be missing from this page (!). We need more insightful postings like this, and less of of the trolling that’s been going on lately.
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The three candidates are indeed running very different campaigns, and it will be very exciting to see how that plays out. Like you, I am also hoping that organization can beat out money (both as a Patrick supporter and in general). I think that, at the very least, there’s some evidence that money operates on diminishing returns — that is, you surely need some money to be competitive, but once you’ve over that threshold, the effect of each additional dollar is less than the one before it. After all, Bush majorly outspent Gore in 2000 just to win 500 Floridians (or one Supreme Court justice). That same year, Jon Corzine spent more money than any Senate hopeful in history just to barely eek out a win.
I too looked for the “recommend this post” button, but couldn’t find it. I think this post is a great analysis of how the three candidates are approaching things.