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Connecticut is ready to rumble - Linda McMahon storms the polls in the nation’s wildest Senate race
New York Post ^ | August 15, 2010 | Maureen Callahan

Posted on 08/15/2010 3:37:15 AM PDT by Zakeet

Of this season’s crazy, contentious, wide-open Senate races — in Ohio, Florida, California, Arizona, Nevada — none is as wild as what’s going on in Connecticut. In one corner: Democrat Richard Blumenthal, 64, state attorney general since 1991 and favored to win, up by over 40 points in the polls until this spring, when he was caught lying about having served in Vietnam. In the opposing corner: Republican Linda McMahon, 61, until last fall the CEO of World Wrestling Entertainment (WWE), billionaire and political neophyte.

Since spending $22 million of her fortune, McMahon beat out GOP contenders Peter Schiff (campaign slogan: “Schiff Happens” — seriously) and former congressman and decorated Vietnam vet Rob Simmons, who’d been drafted by the party to run. Ultimately, he lost the party’s backing — to McMahon — for the primary. Simmons suspended his cash-poor campaign in May, then re-entered a few weeks ago, showing up at Connecticut commuter hubs and passing out potholders, a sadly literal example that, for him, there was no issue “too hot to handle.”

McMahon won Tuesday’s primary with 49% of the vote and has since shrunk Blumenthal’s formerly capacious lead to 7 points. She spent three hours on Wednesday morning, beginning at 6 a.m., sitting in front of a camera, doing interviews via satellite with outlets nationwide. She has suddenly become a political supernova, one to watch, and she has done it by positioning herself as the quintessential outsider, sick of politics as usual, quid-pro-quos, the ever-expanding reach of the federal government.

[Snip]

What’s the key difference between her and Blumenthal? “He’s clearly liberal big-government,” she says. “I’m clearly conservative small-government. It’s a real clear choice in that regard.”

(Excerpt) Read more at nypost.com ...


TOPICS: News/Current Events; Politics/Elections; US: Connecticut
KEYWORDS: 2010election; connecticut; mcmahon; peterschiff; schiff; senate
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She's an outsider who's using her own money to buy a senate seat. It would be much better if she were an insider who was using George Soros' money to buy a senate seat.

1 posted on 08/15/2010 3:37:19 AM PDT by Zakeet
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To: Zakeet

Schiff is a good guy and smart too.


2 posted on 08/15/2010 3:40:09 AM PDT by DontTreadOnMe2009 (So stop treading on me already!)
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To: DontTreadOnMe2009
"...and smart too."

“Schiff Happens”

Really?

3 posted on 08/15/2010 3:52:57 AM PDT by Paladin2
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To: Zakeet

I am split here. Has it become so that only the godaweful rich can run?Here is a person spending 22 mil of her own cash to get a senate seat that pays what?
But it is her cash and as long as she dont break any laws, its legal.
I dont know.


4 posted on 08/15/2010 3:53:31 AM PDT by Yorlik803 (better to die on your feet than live on your knees.)
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To: Yorlik803

Blame it on the voters if a senate seat can be bought.

Frankly if someone is sick and tired of what government is doing and is willing to put their money where their mouth is, more power to them.


5 posted on 08/15/2010 3:58:13 AM PDT by DB
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To: DontTreadOnMe2009
Schiff is a good guy and smart too.

Primary is over.

6 posted on 08/15/2010 4:03:01 AM PDT by speciallybland
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To: Yorlik803
I dont know.

Personally, for me.....I'll take Linda McMahon over Cris "Countrywide" Dodd, any day

7 posted on 08/15/2010 4:05:01 AM PDT by OBXWanderer
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To: Yorlik803
Has it become so that only the godaweful rich can run?Here is a person spending 22 mil of her own cash to get a senate seat that pays what?

Our founders pledged their lives, their fourtunes, and their sacred honor......

Could it be that she takes the job that seriously?

8 posted on 08/15/2010 4:20:32 AM PDT by cbkaty (Never yield to force. Never yield to the apparently overwhelming might of the enemy---W Churchill)
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To: Zakeet

what do you suppose the usual entrepreneurial return on 22 million is out there? Or are things so bad a senate seat is the best deal going?


9 posted on 08/15/2010 4:22:57 AM PDT by mo
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To: Yorlik803

At least we have a system where wealth allows the possibility of “buying” into the political system in a fairly open transparent way. That is, she’s using her money to promote herself and her message to the voters. No matter how much a candidate spends - they still have to have a some position on issues to win over voters.

If the Dems had it their way, (and probably some Republicans too) only political elites would be eligible for office.


10 posted on 08/15/2010 4:24:27 AM PDT by crescen7 (game on)
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To: DontTreadOnMe2009

I voted for the guy but he didn’t make the cut.

I just hope that Linda is as close to a conservative that we can get because I will not vote for Blumenthal.


11 posted on 08/15/2010 4:32:14 AM PDT by puppypusher
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To: puppypusher

“No Blumen Way”


12 posted on 08/15/2010 4:35:24 AM PDT by homegroan (Proud member of the Hoi Polloi......ILLIGITIMA NON CARBORUNDUM..... -that's 4U Dad!))
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To: Zakeet
Funny, no one yelled at Jon Corzine for doing the same exact thing when he ran for Senate from New Jersey all those years ago.

Oh wait, he's a Democrat, and Mrs. McMahon is a Republican. Never mind!

13 posted on 08/15/2010 4:44:38 AM PDT by pnh102 (Regarding liberalism, always attribute to malice what you think can be explained by stupidity. - Me)
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To: homegroan

14 posted on 08/15/2010 4:47:39 AM PDT by Brugmansian
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To: DB

“Blame it on the voters if a senate seat can be bought.”

Yes and no. I know people who work for Bill McCollum, who is running for the GOP nomination for governor of Florida. According to people I know and trust, who have known Bill for years, he’s totally honest and a genuine conservative. But he’s running against Rick Scott, a billionaire. Bill McCollum raised 4 million dollars. Rick Scott put aside $300 million. Three-hundred million, incidentally, is the exact amount that McCollum proved Rick Scott got from his frauds against the government. McCollum, as attorney general, shut down Rick Scott’s Medicaid/Medicare operation, but Scott has gone free as he was just the company president and unaware of any wrongdoing.

I talk to my sixty-five year old sister who is a savvy, intelligent voter. She’s watching the commercials and she believes Rick Scott is what he says he is and, because of the advertising blitz, that Bill McCollum is what Rick Scott says he is. We live in a media driven culture. We rely on the honesty and integrity of the media to balance out the candidate’s advantages in money. As we know, the media has its own agenda, which happens to correspond with the Prius driving, COEXIST, Birkenstock wearing hippies who have no kids, but six expensive dogs and a bumper sticker reading “It’s a Choice!”

It turns out that Rick Scott is a spectacularly bad candidate. His closet is so full of bloody skeletons that he has to lean against it 24/7 to keep it from springing open. As soon as Scott becomes the GOP candidate, the media will kick him away from the closet door and standby as the skeletons come tumbling out; cataloging each one. But, for now, they say nothing; hoping for McCollum to lose so that then Scott will lose to a Democrat.

If you have an honest candidate, like McCollum, he isn’t going to attract the millions in donations to fight a billionaire like Scott. The reason is simple. People who donate millions expect something for those millions. An honest man isn’t going to give that something to them and they know it. A dishonest man, though, never, never has enough money. Why is it you think the Clintons are worth 100 million dollars?


15 posted on 08/15/2010 4:50:23 AM PDT by Gen.Blather
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To: Yorlik803

Linda is “giving something back”.

She made her money on Democrats. The WWE audience is solid red. Only Woman’s Professional Basketball skews further left.


16 posted on 08/15/2010 4:51:13 AM PDT by Brugmansian
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To: Yorlik803

Meg Whitman has already spent $100 million!


17 posted on 08/15/2010 4:53:01 AM PDT by Joann37
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To: Brugmansian

If the audience is red,how did she make money off of dems?


18 posted on 08/15/2010 4:55:52 AM PDT by wiggen (The teacher card. When the racism card just won't work.)
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To: wiggen

Red in the classical sense of course.


19 posted on 08/15/2010 4:57:34 AM PDT by Brugmansian
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To: Zakeet

Sounds to me that they are Both a Couple of Clowns. I see more of the same crap coming from either one of these two pampered Millionares who now want perks from the Taxpayers.
If McMahon has to go around to listen what the Peons are talking about she is so out of touch who the Hell would vote for her if she hasnt got a Clue.
As for the other sleezebag ,the Drug store Hero,he is the only one I know who can beat Chucky Schmucky Schumer to a TV camera to spew his left wing Garbage.
Not much Hope for the Country coming from the NUTmeg state.


20 posted on 08/15/2010 4:59:19 AM PDT by ballplayer
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