According to a Baltimore Sun article, it sounds like Lieutenant Governor Steele is going to throw his hat in the ring for the United States Senate seat vacated by the retirement of Senator (and Eastern Shore native) Paul Sarbanes. I guess the question is - if not him, then who? I would guess the distant #2 is State Sen. E.J. Pipkin, who lost to Barb Mikulski in 2004.
I liked this comment though:
"Steele is more conservative on social and moral issues than Ehrlich and many Marylanders. He opposes the death penalty, as well as abortion rights."
Interesting juxtaposition since most conservatives I know support the death penalty, although I can buy the argument for one to be both anti-capital punishment and pro-life. I'm not sure what that will get him in the U.S. Senate, though. Maybe a better place to affect change on those issues would be the judicial system, at least in this day and age. Now if he can start to rein in the judiciary as is the proper role of the legislative branch (as outlined in the Constitution) from a Senate seat, that may be newsworthy. And I notice it's "many" Marylanders, but not a majority, otherwise I'm sure the liberal powers-that-be at the Sun would have stated so.
Guess I better get the checkbook out, I need to put myself on the rolls of opensecrets.org. I'm already in followthemoney.org for contributions I made in Ohio (to Ohio Supreme Court candidate Terrence O'Donnell in 2000.) I'm sure there's going to be a fundraiser of some sort in Wicomico County. (I'm partial to golf scrambles.)
I tell you, like bees to a field full of blooming flowers, open seats attract a lot of politicians. I also heard about a race in Ohio that could be a harbinger of events in 2006. Ohio's 2nd Congressional district had a primary yesterday to replace outgoing Rep. Rob Portman. In what is probably a pretty safe Republican district, Mike DeWine's son Pat (a Hamilton County commissioner, Hamilton County predominantly being the city of Cincinnati) lost bigtime, coming in 4th of 11 candidates. Can you say an initial payback for being one of the "Sellout Seven" and caving to the D's? That's an interesting contest now, with a GOP woman being matched up against a Iraq war veteran Democrat.
But if Steele wants to join Mike DeWine in the Senate ranks (assuming DeWine's reelected in 2006), it is high time to get the campaign going. Even with his office, he'll need all of the $15 million it's projected he needs to raise to get name recognition and something to counter all the mud slung at him by the D's. They've already started on that if you believe one of my previous posts regarding his book endorsement. And that's not all they'll do. If there's one thing I've seen in politics, it's that Democrats play pretty dirty.
