t was nearly overlooked in all the ruckus over US Senate hopeful Jack E. Robinson's appearance at the George W. Bush presidential fund-raiser last week, but Governor Paul Cellucci continues to shake some serious cash out of Massachusetts for the GOP presidential candidate.
Cellucci hit up every Republican donor and big-time special interest in Massachusetts and generated, according to his aides, $1.5 million for Bush's candidacy.
There were the usual $1,000 donors, but more important was the $20,000-a-couple dinner for soft money contributions. About 30 people wrote $20,000 checks, with the proceeds going into the presidential trust, which, by law, can finance up to $14 million of Bush's campaign.
What's significant is that, while his popularity has taken a hit in the Bay State, Cellucci's all-out effort to help Bush will be yet another chit for him, if the Texas governor wins the presidency.
Most everyone on Beacon Hill, including Cellucci's closest allies and friends, are convinced, given the right choice of an ambassador's post or even a federal appointment in Washington, the governor will be gone in a minute.
Defining a campaign expense
Seems the House Government Affairs Committee's chairman, Daniel Bosley, a Democrat from North Adams, did some fudging at a hearing last week on the voter-passed Clean Elections law, which he opposes. Appearing before the Committee on Election Laws, Bosley complained that the new campaign finance system will make it hard for lawmakers to afford constituent services. When asked how much he spends on those services, Bosley replied: ''I raise and spend about 30 [thousand dollars] a year.'' But campaign finance records show Bosley has spent more than $40,000 in each of the last three years. In the nonelection years of 1997 and 1999, Bosley spent $46,747 and $41,154, respectively. Bosley also explained that defining such expenses can be difficult. ''If you send flowers to a funeral, is it a campaign expense or a constituent expense?'' Bosley asked. ''It might sound a little jaded, but I would say it's a campaign expense.''
At the State House, for a free cup of coffee, don't ask and don't pay
That's a politician for you. At least that's what one State House coffee shop employee said last week after state Representative Antonio Cabral, Democrat of New Bedford, breezed into the fourth-floor shop about 3 p.m., poured himself a cup of coffee, and walked right back out - without bothering to pay for it. Coffee shop staffers, accustomed at this point to politicians with often-empty pockets, said they didn't mind that Cabral did not pay, just that he left without asking.
A national boost for Kerry as VP
Bay State Democrats and loyalists of Massachusetts Senator John Kerry have plenty of self-interested reasons to talk up Kerry's chances at becoming Al Gore's running mate. But now even some top Beltway pundits are beginning to agree. In his Thursday column last week, the Wall Street Journal's Al Hunt declared Kerry ''a good and safe choice who comes closest to replicating what Al Gore thinks was the best choice ever - Bill Clinton's in 1992.''
After a moment in the spotlight, Jack Hart is in the back seat again
Poor Jack Hart is back to trailing his senior colleagues from South Boston. A week after City Council President James M. Kelly and state Senator Stephen F. Lynch put him out front as their spokesman for their development agreement with the mayor, the state representative was put back in his place by Kelly, who spoke, at the Gavin School community meeting, of earlier development discussions that had occurred while Lynch was in the State House and Hart was in Little League.
The slight wasn't quite as bad as the one Hart suffered during the Convention Center groundbreaking: Mayor Thomas M. Menino forgot his name.
Menino's son is joke's punch line
Though Menino was spared much of the heat at the Gavin School meeting of about 1,000 South Boston residents Tuesday, his son took a hit. Brian Mahoney, of the Lower End Political Action Committee, said developers don't care where their development money will end up. ''It could go to the mayor's son's defense fund, for all they care.'' The swipe was a reference to news reports that Thomas M. Menino Jr. is among the officers being sued for allegedly chasing a drug suspect down a street and slamming him into a phone booth. An internal affairs investigation cleared Menino and the other officers.
Mark D. Smith leaves AG's office to take job with Boston law firm
Mark D. Smith, first hired as an assistant attorney general by James Shannon and who later led many high profile criminal investigations under former attorney general Scott Harshbarger, is moving on after 12 years. As chief of Harshbarger's Public Integrity Division, Smith investigated former Mayor Raymond L. Flynn's campaign finances, corruption in the Middlesex Superior Court criminal clerk's office, and former Representative John McNeil's illegal fund-raising activities. Smith will become a lawyer for Faxon & Laredo, a small Boston law firm, to specialize in cases involving white-collar crime, state regulatory practice and commercial litigation.
Frank Phillips, Hillary Chabot, Michael Crowley, Stephanie Ebbert, and John Ellement contributed to this report.
