Notes on a Some Republican Campaigns

Former Ambassador Tom Foley is providing a vivid demonstration of the folly of Connecticut’s public campaign finance scheme. He is reaching voters, including ones who vote in Republican primaries, with no interference or dissenting points of view.  To borrow a thought from F. Scott Fitzgerald, the rich are different.  They can finance their own campaigns.

The other serious Republican candidates are trying to qualify for funds, but they won’t receive them until after the May party convention.  Until then, they are hobbled on the sidelines hunting for contributions at a $100 a throw.

We understand that Peter Schiff’s campaign tried to do a solid for former U.S. Representative Rob Simmons.  Schiff, who knows something about numbers, included a Simmons-Courtney 2nd district match-up in a recent campaign survey.  The numbers would gladden the stony hearts at the National Republican Congressional Committee.

Simmons runs far ahead of Courtney.  The same, however, cannot be said of how the three term former congressman who lost to Courtney in 2006 fares in the Republican Senate contest.  All those millions Linda McMahon has been spending reminding Republicans of Simmons’s voting record on cap-and-trade, late term abortions, ACORN activists, budget deficits, and ending the secret ballot in some union elections have made the race a toss up.

What if you gave a fundraiser and nobody came? Longtime trial lawyer lobbyist Jay Malcinsky, no slouch in coaxing dough out of members, couldn’t do much for state Senator Sam Caligiuri’s uninspiring bid for the Republican nomination for Congress in the 5th district.  Malcinsky was the big dog on the bill, along with Vernon Mayor Jason McCoy and New Haven lawyer Kenneth Rozich as co-hosts, of the February 22nd cocktail party that wasn’t.  Seems nobody wanted to show at the slippery family values champion’s $250 a ticket New Haven event.

Maybe the above-mentioned Tom Foley will have better luck selling some Caligiuri ducats.  We hope this has nothing to do with the Francophone politician getting out of the Senate race while Foley was still in it last year.