Word: lazio
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...that soccer mom who's had it up to here with Hillary couldn't have put it better! But the ink on the letter was barely dry before Lazio was trying to put a smiley face above the i in his signature. "Frankly," Lazio said, always a tip-off that a politician is about to fog up your glasses, "these letters are written, you know, not by me." Riding on his newly christened Mainstream Express, he went on to explain, "It's not what you send some donor list that matters. What matters is how you are conducting yourself...
Conducting himself like the plucky boy next door has worked well for Lazio, who has risen quickly from being a local prosecuting attorney to a Suffolk County legislator to becoming a Congressman at age 34. He also knows from a lot of recent history that going negative can be dangerous. The easiest way for a candidate with serious character flaws to neutralize them is to have an opponent point them out. Bill Bradley began his descent when he called Al Gore a liar. And Hillary began her rise in the polls when dark forces--Ken Starr, the Congress, the vast...
...also perilous in a place like New York not to show a little grit? Lazio's greatest vulnerability may be the perception that he remains, even after eight years in the House, a lightweight. This doesn't hurt him among regular Republicans, who love him to pieces for staying close to his roots, remaining polite to his elders and not rocking any boats. His supporters admire him for straddling factions, sticking with Speaker Newt Gingrich through a failed coup to depose him while staying cozy with insurgent leader Dick Armey, who led it. In a safe seat, it's fine...
...little gravitas, a bit of Olympian detachment or at least a few outsize personality quirks help. Hillary has the latter in spades and rock-star fame. And while Rudy Giuliani may have been too knee-in-the-groin nasty to attract all the anti-Hillary votes, the fresh-faced Lazio could be just too aw-shucks nice, a slice of Velveeta on white in a state with a decided taste for roquefort on rye, a place where full-frontal egomaniacs like Ed Koch, Bella Abzug and Al D'Amato have thrived and from where larger-than-life figures like Daniel...
...Lazio may be more willing to add some rough edges to his Little League, High School Stamp Club and Youth for Ford persona if his early successes hadn't come without his having had to bare his teeth. While Lazio rightly gets credit for a David vs. Goliath victory over 18-year veteran Tom Downey in 1992, Downey largely defeated himself. In the memorable words of the national Republican Party chairman, the party was willing to "stuff money into every orifice" to capitalize on the weakness of an incumbent already hemorrhaging from self-inflicted wounds, like overdrafts at the House...