posted on July 19, 2006 08:14:11 PMBut leaders hope anoining new candidate can overcome setback
BY BILL SALISBURY
Pioneer Press
DFL Leader Rep. Matt Entenza's abrupt withdrawal from the attorney general's race Tuesday gave the Democratic-Farmer-Labor Party a black eye.
It cost the party one of its most promising young leaders and called attention to the foibles of DFL candidates.
Nonetheless, the party's graybeards breathed a sigh of relief after he stepped down. They believed, as did Entenza, that he was tangled up in a controversy that would have plagued his campaign through Election Day.
"Matt was pretty much fatally wounded," said former state DFL Party chairman Mark Andrew. "He was not electable under the current circumstances. He would have been a significant drag on the statewide ticket."
Three things did Entenza in. First was the revelation that he had hired a Chicago opposition research firm to investigate Attorney General Mike Hatch, the DFL-endorsed candidate for governor.
Second was his mishandling and misstatements about why he hired that firm.
Finally, if elected, he would have faced a conflict of interest because the attorney general's office is conducting an investigation into UnitedHealth Group, the Minnetonka-based firm where his wife, Lois Quam, works as a high-level executive who has received millions of dollars insider stock options.
"I see no way of thinking of this as anything but bad news" for the DFL, said Larry Jacobs, director of the Center for the Study of Politics and Governance at the University of Minnesota's Humphrey Institute of Public Affairs. "It's another way that they shot themselves in the foot."
With President Bush and the Republican-controlled Congress losing public support, Democrats nationally and in Minnesota should have the wind at their backs, Jacobs said. But with a series of damaging news stories plaguing Entenza for the past week, DFLers have been "trying to do damage control on self-inflicted damage."
Moreover, he said, they just lost a candidate who had spent years preparing for this race and appeared to be the front-runner.
A gleeful state Republican Party chairman Ron Carey said Entenza's withdrawal is yet another sign that the DFL is in disarray. Other recent indicators were Senate DFL Majority Leader Dean Johnson's public apology for misstatements about conversations he claimed to have had with Minnesota Supreme Court justices about gay marriage and 5th District DFL congressional candidate Keith Ellison's traffic tickets and campaign finance law violations.
"It's one bombshell after another for the DFL," Carey said. "It's hard for them to make the case right now that they are ready to lead the state of Minnesota."
But DFL leaders believe they have put Entenza's problems behind them and now have plenty of time to find another candidate and shift attention back to the issues that work in their favor. State DFL chairman Brian Melendez said the party's setback is momentary and it should fully recover by the time it endorses another attorney general candidate in a few weeks.
THIS IS THE SAME CRAP THE DEMOMORONS GET CAUGHT RIGHT BEFORE EVERY ELECTION. EVEN IN THIS LIBERAL STATE, PEOPLE ARE WAKING UP TO THE NATURAL CORRUPTION OF THE DFL PARTY.
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Many misleading tricks in 2006. The new Demomoron slogan.
posted on July 20, 2006 05:19:26 AM
Never mind, I looked them up and stand corrected.
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Now We Know... Uninformed People Elect Uninformed Presidents
[ edited by profe51 on Jul 20, 2006 05:21 AM ]
