You didn't have to be a genius to realize that the publication of Steve Laffey's book would mark his formal reemergence on Rhode Island's political stage. So, not surprisingly, he turned up last week on RIPBS' A Lively Experiment and was the subject of two pieces in the Sunday ProJo. He's also slated to talk Thursday to the South Kingstown Republican Town Committee.
With Laffey shaping up as an all-but-declared gubernatorial candidate in 2010, the big question remains: what's next for Linc Chafee? Does he butt heads with Cranston's former maximum leader in a rematch of their 2006 battle? Does Chafee remain ensconsed at Brown, or run for another office, like mayor of Providence or general treasurer?
Being a bit less of a telegrapher than Laffey, Chafee is likely to make the answer to these questions known later, rather than sooner.
Meanwhile, writing in the ProJo, Brown's Darrell West has some kind words for the fresly minted author of Primary Mistake:
This book is vintage Steve Laffey. Smart, energetic, and hard-hitting, the former mayor of Cranston presents a funny and well-written account of recent state and national political history. When national leaders attempted to get him to run for lieutenant governor instead of the U.S. Senate, he describes an awkward meeting with National Republican Senatorial Committee chairperson Elizabeth Dole in which she buttressed her argument against a Senate run by saying that she was a Christian and that somehow their shared religious values should lead Laffey not to run against Lincoln Chafee.
Yet West also takes the former Senate candidate to task for a lack of introspection:
This book will endear Laffey to some, but will enrage others. It is not a humble or soul-searching reflection as much as a condemnation of those who contributed to the author’s defeat. If I lost my home precinct and barely carried my home city with 52.7 percent of the primary vote, I would ask myself tougher questions about what went wrong in my Senate campaign.
Mark Arsenault, meanwhile, delves into some of the content of the book:
Chafee is also called: a “backstabber,” a “confessed cocaine abuser,” “fickle” and “a dull fellow,” a “limousine liberal,” a “Ted Kennedy Republican,” a “possible member of a Neville Chamberlain fan club” and “the most spectacularly failed investment of the 2006 election cycle.”
Responds Chafee: “He’s still smarting over the whippin’ I gave him, I guess.”
Laffey’s argument is flawed at its core, Chafee says, considering the hurricane-force headwind, driven by an unpopular war, blowing into the face of Republicans in the last election.
“Nobody ever thought Steve Laffey could win a general election race in Rhode Island in 2006,” says Chafee. “He had no chance and everybody knew it. I voted against every major Bush initiative and I still lost. Imagine what would have happened to Steve Laffey. He would have gotten 20 percent of the vote, tops.” Laffey lost his home precinct in Cranston. “The people who knew him the best voted against him — his own neighbors.”
Latest Slideshows
.jpg)
