The hurdles to a Frank Caprio political comeback are many: the "shove it" comment will be forever attached to his name and the progressive base of the state's Democratic Party seems unlikely to warm up to a candidate who essentially ran as a moderate Republican.

But if Caprio, the former state treasurer, runs for major office again - and I think he could, perhaps as a Republican - he could face another hurdle.

Frank Caprio undoubtedly exits the 2010 campaign a damaged politician. His "shove it" comments and break with Democratic orthodoxy make another Democratic run for governor - or any other major office - hard to fathom. But don't count him out.

Caprio is a smart guy, an able fundraiser. And he could, conceivably, be your GOP gubernatorial nominee come 2014.

I've got a piece in today's Phoenix about Governor-elect Lincoln Chafee's prospects on Smith Hill.

It should be interesting to watch: on the one hand, he takes the office with a rather weak mandate - just 36 percent of the vote and broad public opposition to his signature campaign proposal, an expansion of the sales tax.

The results of the recent WPRI-TV poll, when reviewed in detail, show just what a climb Democratic gubernatorial candidate Frank Caprio faces on Election Day. The survey, most of it conducted before his "shove it" comment, showed him just a slight edge on independent Lincoln Chafee among Democrats - we've known that was a problem for awhile.

In-state, Frank Caprio has been seen as the aggressor for his "Shove It" remark. But outside the state, where the White House political operation is coming under the inevitable fire that accompanies a bad campaign season, the imbroglio is being pinned on the president. Witness this piece on Politico:

Amid the flap over President Barack Obama’s nonendorsement of the Rhode Island Democratic gubernatorial candidate, a pollster for both politicians is defending the White House’s political operation.

Big win for the Caprio campaign - and some Obama/Clinton friction that is sure to attract more national press. From the Caprio camp (note the careful nod to Obama):

President Bill Clinton will campaign with Democratic Gubernatorial Candidate Frank Caprio on Sunday, October 31st.

President Clinton will tell voters that if they want to see job creation and sustained economic growth in Rhode Island, Frank Caprio is the only choice on November 2.

Democratic gubernatorial nominee Frank Caprio said on talk radio this morning that President Obama, who has not endorsed him in the race, can "shove" it - lighting into the president for failing to visit the state during the floods a few months back, only to show up today to raise money for Congressional Democrats.

This is the most dramatic display of Caprio's push to eat into Republican John Robitaille's base.

As I noted in my cover story on Frank Caprio's gubernatorial bid in this week's Phoenix, his competition with Republican John Robitaille for right-of-center votes left some political operatives wondering if he would be compelled to take on the GOP nominee more directly. The danger in such a move is that opens a two-front war - he still has to fight Lincoln Chafee.

We'd heard, as Scott MacKay reports over at WRNI, that the Republican Governors Association is preparing to drop some cash into the Rhode Island gubernatorial race. If the group does, indeed, spend some real money, it'll be interesting to see what its message will be.

The GOP nominee, John Robitaille, has run an above-the-fray race designed to capitalize on the Caprio-Chafee slugfest - and, perhaps, to play to the public mood.

When it became clear that the general election for governor would come down to Frank Caprio and Lincoln Chafee, the conventional wisdom had Chafee faring better among women as the more liberal candidate. But in one of many signs of how tight - and unpredictable - the governor's contest has become, the numbers suggest Caprio is holding his own among women.

Frank Caprio won a high-profile endorsement from Bill Clinton, whose centrist "third way" he's tried to emulate in his own run for governor. But an endorsement from the sitting Democratic president, it seems, is not forthcoming. From the Associated Press:

PROVIDENCE, R.I. (AP) — Weeks before Rhode Island's 2008 Democratic presidential primary, former Republican U.

The Chafee campaign scores, perhaps, it's biggest coup of the election season by robbing the story of campaign manager J.R. Pagliarini's resignation of much of its power - and even turning it into a question about whether the Caprio camp is engaged in dirty tricks.

Caprio's team has proved remarkably adept in its economic messaging and in its message discipline.

GoLocalProv, in a nice little scoop, reported yesterday that Senator Jack Reed would record a TV ad endorsing Democrat Frank Caprio for governor and that the other statewide Democratic candidates had been asked to show up.

Reed's office confirmed the ad last night with an e-mail:

Reed filmed a campaign commercial today with several Democratic candidates.

The new Brown poll gives Democratic gubernatorial candidate Frank Caprio a 30 to 23 percent lead over his closest challenger, independent Lincoln Chafee. But the most worrisome number for the Chafee camp may be elsewhere.

The Brown survey asked voters about a series of proposals for balancing the state's budget. One of them: "raising the state sales tax."

The string of unflattering stories for the Caprio campaign has raised the ire of some supporters, who think Lincoln Chafee is getting a pass in the media. But as one long-time political observer noted in a chat with N4N, this is at least in part a function of the candidates' electoral history.

Chafee faced a reasonably thorough vetting in a high-profile, statewide Senate race four years ago.