State's political campaigns begin revving up for real

Hebron - With eight weeks to go before an election that will put new occupants in some of Connecticut's most prominent political offices, including those of governor, attorney general and U.S. senator, a slew of candidates descended Tuesday on the Russell Mercier Senior Center to make new introductions and try out their ever-refining campaign pitches.

With Labor Day and the campaign's late-summer idyll come and gone, congressional and gubernatorial campaigns are preparing for the long slog to Nov. 2.

On Tuesday they largely avoided direct combat, but the campaign season that lies ahead could be as pitched as any since 2006, when Democratic victories - including two in Connecticut - helped propel Congress back into that party's hands.

This year, Democrats sense their best chance to retake the governor's office in years, even as party insiders and congressional staffers grow increasingly concerned that Republicans could sweep back to power in both the House and Senate this fall.

Attorney General Richard Blumenthal, the Democrat hoping to fight off a fierce and well-funded assault by Republican Linda McMahon in the Senate race, pledged to oppose any effort to cut benefits from entitlement programs for the elderly, a promise that went over well in an audience dominated by senior citizens.

"If I am lucky enough to get this job, I will fight any effort to cut Medicare or Social Security, unequivocally," Blumenthal declared, throwing his hands forward and repeating the final word for emphasis.

McMahon, like Blumenthal before her, didn't mention her chief opponent by name, instead regaling her audience with the tale of her rise from bankruptcy to the pinnacle of a billion-dollar business, World Wrestling Entertainment, from which she resigned as CEO to run for the Senate.

While McMahon has lambasted Blumenthal in television commercials and a flurry of direct mailings to voters that attempt to brand him as a liar on issues ranging from his military service record to his fundraising practices to his embrace of healthcare reform proposals, the two have avoided hostile exchanges in person.

Instead, McMahon stressed the need to reduce the national debt and said her experience as a business owner reinforced her belief in loosening government laws and regulations on employers.

"If you've been on the other side of that, and you've experienced the effect those laws and those regulations have on you, then you think twice," McMahon said.

McMahon's most concrete policy proposal was a call to repeal the healthcare reform bill passed this spring and "start over" on a different package. In a subsequent interview, however, McMahon declined to say specifically which aspects of the existing reform she would be willing to let stand.

"I'm not going to get into a step-by-step" discussion of the issue, McMahon said when asked whether she would support repeal of some of the healthcare reform bill's more popular components, like the provision banning insurance companies from denying coverage on the basis of pre-existing health conditions.

That is a major bragging point for Democratic supporters of the healthcare bill, like Rep. Joe Courtney, D-2nd District, who is hoping to fend off Republican Janet Peckinpaugh, Green Party candidate G. Scott Deshefy, and Libertarian Dan Reale to win his third term in Congress.

Courtney said he and the Democratic Congress had delivered much-needed defense spending to sustain jobs in eastern Connecticut, doubling funding for submarine production at Groton-based Electric Boat to more than $5 billion, among other funding victories.

Courtney also boasted of his most high-profile vote against the Democratic leadership: his two votes against the TARP bill to bail out the nation's largest financial institutions, which was spearheaded by the Bush administration with support from leaders of both parties in Congress, along with presidential candidates Barack Obama and John McCain.

That didn't stop Peckinpaugh from criticizing Courtney for voting overwhelmingly with House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., and the Democratic leadership - 98.1 percent of the time, according to Peckinpaugh's account.

Moments later she declared, "Partisan politics has got to stop."

Also on hand were the three candidates for governor, Republican Tom Foley, Democrat Dan Malloy and Independent Tom Marsh, as well as candidates for attorney general, treasurer and comptroller.

Candidates of all parties played to the crowd.

Democrat Nancy Wyman, a candidate for lieutenant governor, expressed solidarity with the crowd, gesturing at her own gray hair. Republican Sean Sullivan, taking on the legislature's most vigorous advocate of seniors' interests in Sen. Edith Prague, D-Columbia, vented concern that his adult children might follow good jobs out of state, and take his grandchildren with them.

"Now what good are the golden years if you can't spend them with your family?" Sullivan said to knowing murmurs.

Deshefy went perhaps the farthest, lamenting the absence of televised "heroes" and role models real and fictional like those who prevailed in earlier eras. (Fess Parker, John F. Kennedy and Alan Shepard were among those mentioned.) This was worst for senior citizens who are forced to watch TV programming aimed at the young, he said, adding that the elderly represent "the most discriminated-against group in America."

t.mann@theday.com