1. Joe Lieberman is not running for re-election. Good riddance.
2. Chris Murphy has announced that he will run for U.S. Senate in 2012.

I was pleased by the first thing, and so thrilled by the second that when I saw @ChrisMurphyCT’s announcement tweet [image below], I re-tweeted it to my loyal followers in the Twitterverse and then tweeted about it myself.

To my surprise and delight, I received a video response to that tweet from our future junior Senator:

Thank you Chris Murphy, for the kind words. And thanks also to anyone reading this who still has a bookmark to spazeboy.net or subscribes to the RSS feed. I haven’t forgotten about this blog, I’ve just been focusing most of my free time on graduate school lately. As the saying goes though, since Chris Murphy’s entry in the U.S. Senate race has re-energized my will to blog, “I’ll be back.”

Sometime after graduation.

In a not so surprise (if you’ve been following the news over the weekend) announcement, Ned Lamont is announcing today that he will run with Mary Glassman as his Lt. Governor candidate of choice. I’ll have more to say about this later, because this is a post from my phone, but for more info in the meantime visit www.nedlamont.com

[UConn College Republicans recruitment chairman Joseph] Gasser emphasized there was no intention to promote the drive as a McMahon event and said he recognized there might be some concerns about the payments.

“I approached this extremely carefully. The last thing I want is to be embroiled in some scandal,” he said. “I’m making sure to approach this on a very non-partisan basis, making it clear she may be funding (the registration) but it’s not a Republican-leaning process and we’re following the Secretary of the State’s guidelines.”

But McMahon spokesman Ed Patru said the intention of the drive and others being planned is to help McMahon.

“We’re absolutely registering voters on college campuses and growing the party through voter drives. Every student who is brought on to help with this effort signs a participation agreement — a legal document. Students cannot pressure a potential voter register with a party affiliation,” Patru said. “Having said that, their job is to promote Linda McMahon and people who come and ask about Linda and say they want to support Linda, we share with them we’d love to have your support but you have to be registered as a Republican to vote for her in the primary.”

I’m all for paying college students for their time, but a $5 bonus for Republican registrants raises all kinds of red flags. It also sets up some perverse incentives that may result in fraud.

Update [2010/04/26]: Linda has decided not to pay the $5 bonus after all. The fact that she was ever considering it should raise serious questions about her critical thinking skills and sense of right and wrong.

But it’s not all good. Joe Lieberman’s failed strategies are making a comeback as well.

You see, in 2006 Joe Lieberman’s strategist was Roy Occhiogrosso. Roy drove the message of the Lieberman campaign all the way to defeat in the hotly contested Democratic primary. His two key strategies were…

1. To accuse Ned Lamont of trying to buy the election:

   “Ned Lamont has decided that his only chance of defeating me is to try to buy this election with millions of dollars in negative ads full of distortions and deceits about me,” Lieberman said at a news conference. “A lot of it is going to be nonsense and lies, so beware.”

2. To obsess over Ned Lamont’s wealth:
   

   Facing his first serious challenge in 18 years as a senator, Mr. Lieberman has sought to brand Mr. Lamont as a wealthy dilettante who is trying to buy his way into office, and who is out of touch with ordinary Americans. One of Mr. Lieberman’s first advertisements began: “Meet Ned Lamont. He’s a Greenwich millionaire.”

Occhiogrosso is now working for Malloy, and he’s using the same strategies against Lamont in 2010 that didn’t work in the 2006 primary. Take a look:

1. Accuse Ned Lamont of trying to buy the election? Check.

   “Ned’s strategy is clear: he’s trying to buy the Convention with TV ads. Dan’s trying to win the Convention the old-fashioned way: talking with delegates about his values and his experience. In the end, all the ads in the world can’t hide the difference in this race: Dan Malloy has the values and experience that money can’t buy.” [Dan Malloy for Governor Press Release - 4/8/2010]

2. Obsess over Ned Lamont’s wealth? Check.
   

   “Ned seems to think his millions of dollars and his background as a cable executive are why Democrats should choose him over me.” – Dan Malloy

These strategies didn’t work in 2006, and they won’t work in 2010. Democrats have their best chance in decades to win the Governor’s office, and we can’t do it if our candidates are doing Chris Healy’s job for him. What we need is a campaign about ideas, not a bloody primary.

In the past week or so, Lamont released a plan to create jobs, and Malloy has started an online ad campaign to talk about his life and experience.

This is the kind of thing I’d like to see more of, but instead, we’re getting a replay of 2006.

Today Lamont announced the start of a television ad campaign, and the Malloy campaign responded by having staffer Matt Gianquinto send an under-the-radar e-mail to supporters using the ol’ Lieberman ‘06 strategies that Occhiogrosso sold ‘em. An excerpt:

Hey Team,

[...]

I heard a supporter once say they are supporting Dan because he has the values and experience that money can’t buy.

[...]

We have the best candidate, the best team, and the best supporters. Ned can buy a lot of ads, but no amount of money can buy the candidate, the team, and the supporters that we have.

[...]

PS – Feel free to forward this message as a heads up to any of our supporters, donors, and friends.

The only good reason to keep using Lieberman’s old strategies for the primary is if you plan to use his post-primary-loss strategy of forming a vanity party. Dan Malloy is not Joe Lieberman, and we will not see a Connecticut for Malloy Party forming this summer. But by using Lieberman’s failed strategies, Malloy is very likely to meet the same fate in the primary.

It is always critical for the state to tap the business insights and experiences, as well as the professional training and certifications, of our corporate citizens for public service…By enlisting such corporate leadership, government weaves the business community into the everyday rhythm of our state, thereby ensuring long-term, public-private cooperation and success.

Although it reads like a glowing endorsement of Ned Lamont’s gubernatorial candidacy, it’s not. It’s actually an excerpt from Dan Malloy’s letter in support of WWE CEO Linda McMahon’s appointment to the State Board of Education.

The fact that Dan believes he is the most qualified candidate for governor is neither surprising nor objectionable. What’s objectionable about this is not the fact that Dan heartily endorsed Linda on the basis of her private sector experience, but that he believes that hers would be an asset to public service and that Ned’s would not be.

Here are two examples of Dan diminishing Ned’s private sector experience:

     From the New London Day [link]

Malloy is a government believer, and says it is naive to think that the state can run efficiently on business acumen alone.

“This argument that Foley and Lamont are making that all you need is a business leader to run government is being rejected,” he said.

     From DanMalloy.com [link]

Ned seems to think his millions of dollars and his background as a cable executive are why Democrats should choose him over me. I think he’s wrong. I think Democrats want a nominee who has the right kind of experience for the job.”

So he’s gone from thinking that business experience is critical to being critical of business experience.

The reason I point this out is because we have a great field of differently qualified Democratic candidates coupled with the best chance in decades for Democrats to win the Governor’s race. I think it’s important for them to differentiate themselves without tearing each other down. It’s no secret who I’m rooting for, but I would prefer to see the Democratic primary unfold as a contest of ideas rather than a battle to undermine everyone’s chances of winning in November. I think it’s fair to expect that Dan’s high regard for the value of Linda’s business experience would translate into at least some respect for Ned’s.