Retail politics, wholesale fun

Candidates! Voters! Apparatchiks! Crab guts! Tawes shindig has something for everyone

Friday, July 21, 2006

Click here to enlarge this photo Naomi Brookner⁄The Gazette (From left) Lobbyist Bruce Bereano laughs as Sen. Patrick J. Hogan takes a pretend punch from state GOP Chairman John Kane at the annual J. Millard Tawes Crab and Clam Bake in Crisfield on Wednesday. Bereano, the unofficial ‘‘Mr. Tawes,” was his usual understated self this year: ‘‘This is heaven. It’s orgasmic.” Click here to enlarge this photo Naomi Brookner⁄The Gazette Pat Geisendaffer of Edgewood shows her colors and takes advantage of the hospitality at the crab feast. Click here to enlarge this photo Naomi Brookner⁄The Gazette Democratic gubernatorial candidate Martin O’Malley and a group of supporters (including son William, 8, covering his back) happen upon a gaggle of Ehrlich well-wishers. The handshakes prove it wasn’t all Sharks-Jets at Somers Cove Marina.

‘‘It’s a place for the has-beens and the wannabes to get together every summer,” said former Charles County delegate Mike Sprague (D), a fixture at Tawes who arrived at Somers Cove Marina by boat. ‘‘This is the opening of the campaign season.”

The comment drew a snicker from Sprague’s buddy, La Plata businessman Larry Sanders, who said Sprague fits both descriptions — ‘‘he’s a has-been and a wannabe.” Light-hearted banter between businessmen and politicians is what Tawes is all about, and politicians from around the state flocked to the sun-cooked Somers Cove Marina on Wednesday to be part of that tradition.

‘‘I live for this each year,” said Annapolis lobbyist Bruce C. Bereano, a Tawes veteran who had his own corporate tent and wore stickers from eight candidates on his shirt, which was embroidered with ‘‘Bob Ehrlich for Maryland 2006.”

‘‘This is heaven. It’s orgasmic,” he exclaimed in typical over-the-top fashion.

With the odor of seafood — and a light hint of perspiration and crab guts — hanging in the still air, candidates snaked through dozens of tents, chatting up voters and each other, posing for pictures and even guzzling a cold beer or three. Organizers said more than 6,500 people attended this year’s clambake, quaffed 45 kegs of beer, dismembered 350 bushels of crabs, slurped 45,000 clams and devoured nearly 400 pounds of fish.

‘‘This year was probably the biggest political event we’ve had,” said Valerie Mason, executive director of the Crisfield Chamber of Commerce, who thanked the more than 200 volunteers who helped out. The chamber posted nearly $300,000 in ticket sales.

Len Foxwell, a Salisbury University lobbyist and Democratic strategist who has attended 13 consecutive Taweses, called it the state’s most important political event.

‘‘This is one of the last great bastions of retail politics in Maryland,” he said.

Most of the candidates and their entourages did not partake of the culinary delicacies because they were there to be seen and campaign, not to eat.

Martin O’Malley and his lime-green crew were greeted with chants of ‘‘Four More Years” from Ehrlich’s navy-blue-and-white sign wavers. One burly Ehrlich supporter wearing a tank top stuck his arms into the air, creating a human roadblock in front of the O’Malley crowd.

Unfazed, the Baltimore Democrat took the opportunity to tweak Ehrlich, who wasn’t in Crisfield.

‘‘I think everyone is asking why the governor didn’t bother to show and it’s because he’s reluctant to campaign in rural areas and people resent that because he has taken them for granted,” he said.

Dan Powell, a deputy state’s attorney in Somerset County and an O’Malley field guy, predicted that the mayor would win 65 percent of the vote in Somerset County. (Ehrlich won Somerset with 72 percent of the vote in 2002, according to the county’s board of elections, and swept through all the rural counties while losing Montgomery, Prince George’s and Baltimore city.)

Ehrlich aide Henry Fawell said the governor skipped Tawes because he was handling the return of Americans from war-torn Lebanon. Fawell didn’t seem worried about Ehrlich’s chances outside The Big Three.

‘‘The consequences of being the leader of the state is that you spend less time politicking and more time helping people rebuild their lives,” he said. ‘‘Leadership is not a quality that Martin O’Malley is familiar with.”

‘This is the place to be’

The clam bake, held the third Wednesday in July, transforms the remote and usually sleepy seaside village of Crisfield into the hub of Maryland politics, particularly in an election year as intense as this one. Political heavyweights, Republican and Democratic alike, wander among the average Joes interested in eating crabs, watermelon wedges and fish sandwiches under a large pavilion while listening to the live bluegrass bands playing on stage.

Former delegate Charles ‘‘Charlie Mac” McClenahan of Crisfield picked up Sprague, Sanders, former Charles County delegate Van Mitchell, La Plata businessman Lock Wills and Del. John Wood (D-Dist. 29A) of Mechanicsville at Point Lookout in St. Mary’s County on Wednesday morning and boated to Crisfield for the activities.

Del. LeRoy Myers (R-Dist. 1C) drove five and a half hours from Western Maryland to be there. Former House minority leader and state insurance commissioner Al Redmer, a big shot at Coventry, a Delaware insurance company, had a hospitality tent. Scott Rolle, a GOP candidate for attorney general, and Senate Finance Chairman Thomas McLain Middleton made the trip from Western Maryland and Southern Maryland, respectively.

U.S. Senate wannabe Michael Steele rolled out his crime plan in Baltimore on Wednesday morning, trekked the more than 150 miles to arrive in Crisfield by mid-afternoon. Afterward, he hopped a chartered plane in Salisbury to make it to a fund-raiser in Washington later that night.

‘‘This is the place to be ... this is Steele country down here,” the lieutenant governor said as he mugged for photos, shook hands and stopped for interviews.

Neither Ben Cardin nor Kweisi Mfume — Steele’s top Democratic opponents — made it to Crisfield, but their representatives did.

Cardin’s wife, Myrna, worked the crowd and seemed happy to be at her first Tawes. ‘‘Unfortunately, members of Congress are in session and voting comes first,” she said.

At one point, Steele and Josh Rales, the Potomac millionaire running in the Democratic primary, warmly greeted one another. A photo of Debby Rales, Josh’s wife, embracing Steele was published in the Capitol Hill newspaper Roll Call on Thursday, which drew a clarification e-mail from the Steele camp.

‘‘To avoid any confusion, in no way is the Steele campaign claiming to have the support of Josh Rales or any other Senate candidate,” the e-mail says. ‘‘Lt. Gov. Steele is proud of the support he’s received from Democrats so far, and this picture is a sign of his effectiveness at building bridges across party lines.”

The name’s the game

While a throng of campaign workers followed O’Malley, Steele and Rales, smaller entourages accompanied the three Democratic attorney general candidates who also worked the crowd at Tawes.

Stuart Simms sported aT-shirt emblazoned with his name, in a bid to boost his name recognition in a race that he entered only three weeks ago.

Despite beginning with a fund-raising disadvantage, Simms said the campaign is ‘‘moving swiftly” as he promotes his experience as a two-term Baltimore city state’s attorney, a Glendening Cabinet secretary and a private practice attorney. He considers himself the underdog.

Several people stopped to shake hands. One was Larry Litt, campaign manager for Richard I. Martel Jr., a Republican challenging Sen. Edward J. Kasemeyer (D-Dist. 12) of Columbia.

‘‘You’re the only Democrat I’ll vote for,” Litt told Simms.

One of the day’s more bizarre encounters happened as Montgomery County school board member Steve Abrams, a Republican running for comptroller, introduced himself to Simms as the man who filed a lawsuit challenging the legality of Tom Perez’s qualifications for attorney general.

‘‘You and I have something in common,” Abrams told Simms. ‘‘We’re both defenders of the constitution.”

Abrams later said he has no dog in the attorney general race and filed his suit only to uphold the constitution. ‘‘As far as who wins the Democratic primary, I could care less,” he said.

Numbers count

Meanwhile, Perez, a Montgomery county councilman, touted his campaign’s momentum, citing recent endorsements by the AFL-CIO and two Montgomery law enforcement unions. He believes that support will carry him to victory.

‘‘I think the election is going to be won and lost by the person with the best organization, with the best capacity to turn out the most voters,” Perez said.

A Baltimore Sun poll this week of 604 likely Democratic voters showed the attorney general race as wide open with almost two-thirds of those surveyed undecided in the primary. Simms led the way with 15 percent, while Montgomery County State’s Attorney Douglas F. Gansler drew 12 percent, and Perez captured only 6 percent.

After Montgomery County Executive Doug Duncan dropped out of the governor’s race last month, former running mate Simms made a big splash in starting a late bid for attorney general. Key members of the Democratic establishment, including Senate President Mike Miller and Baltimore City State’s Attorney Patricia Jessamy, rushed to support Simms — a rush that Perez said could backfire.

‘‘The winds of change are blowing at gale force,” he said mystically.

Gansler was much more discreet in his politicking. He sported a blue polo shirt and khaki pants with a single campaign sticker that hardly made him stand out among the revelers, many of whom also donned campaign paraphernalia.

Gansler said his low-key approach was intentional because voters are turned off by candidates with an armada of sign-waving supporters.

‘‘You talk to them as a citizen and less as a television commercial,” said the five-time attendee. ‘‘... I can get to talk to people in a much more frank way and really learn the concerns of people.”

Like Simms and Perez, Gansler said his legal track record gives him an edge.

‘‘We’re not overconfident, but we’re well-positioned,” he said.

Franchot the Trekkie

Del. Peter Franchot is vowing to go where ‘‘no Democrat has gone in a generation” in his bid to unseat Comptroller William Donald Schaefer.

Apparently that means ratcheting up his rhetoric against Schaefer and Anne Arundel County Executive Janet Owens. In Crisfield, Franchot passed out ‘‘scorecards” that compared his record with Owens’ and Schaefer’s in three categories — slots, sprawl and ‘‘on Ehrlich.”

Franchot, who is polling a distant third in the race for comptroller, said, referring to his campaign, ‘‘This insurgency is not going to be stopped.” He called Owens’ campaign ‘‘inauthentic” and slammed Schaefer by saying that if he wins, he’ll do away with the ‘‘felons and liquor lobbyists.” He named no names.

The Sun poll showed Schaefer, who has spent 50 years in public life, leading at 31 percent with Owens at 22 percent and Franchot at 11 percent.

Owens, the only Democratic woman running statewide, is taking on the mantle of being the candidate most likely to beat Schaefer. Schaefer and his people continue to act as if there is nothing to worry about. And Franchot is running hard.

Schaefer supporters like former Gov. Marvin Mandel and Bob Douglas, a top aide to Schaefer during his years as governor, said voters would re-elect Schaefer because the comptroller’s office is running smoothly.

‘‘It’s very interesting to me that with all the criticism, no one has ever criticized him for the job he’s doing,” said Mandel, who wore a green print shirt with yellow flowers and salmon-colored shorts to Tawes.

Douglas, donning a sun-blocking cowboy-styled hat, discounted Schaefer’s sagging poll numbers. ‘‘We’re confident that once the voters focus on the job performance and not the political rhetoric of his opponents, they will decide he is the right man for the job,” he said.

In one of the best exchanges of Tawes, Franchot asked Schaefer aides, Christine Duray and Kevin Kane, if he could have a Schaefer T-shirt. Duray and Kane politely ignored the request and kept walking.

Later in the day, Kane said he would be happy to give Franchot a shirt.

‘‘A jersey with the number 11 on it,” Kane said. ‘‘It would match his poll number.”

A flavor of District 21

Sen. John A. Giannetti Jr., who is locked in a heated Democratic primary duel 150 miles away in Prince George’s County with former ambassador Jim Rosapepe, strolled around the Tawes grounds and sang a cheery tune about his campaign.

Giannetti has clashed with his District 21 colleagues and formed his own slate. He scored a major coup this week in picking up the endorsement of Progressive Maryland.

The endorsement came as a mild surprise since Giannetti has been criticized for voting against an assault weapons ban in 2004 and being too conservative for his district.

He said he may use the much-publicized restaurant encounter with Rosapepe in Annapolis earlier this year a campaign theme.

‘‘Our underlying message is, ‘Senator Giannetti is there when you need him. Just ask Jim Rosapepe,’” he said.

Transitioning

Josh Rales, a visible presence at Tawes, recently launched television ads in Washington and Baltimore, ads that he said are beginning to pay dividends.

‘‘We’re in a transition phase,” he said. ‘‘We went from being relatively unknown to being on the field and in the game and now we have to show that we can knock the ball out of the park.”

Voters are ‘‘frustrated with the inertia and complacency on Capitol Hill” that only a political outsider like himself can change, he said. Despite his weak showing in polls so far — he’s pulling in the single digits — Rales is confident that he can perform well on Sept. 12, particularly in rural areas.

Old buddies

Tawes may be the only place in Maryland where Democrats and Republicans can yak about politics and find common ground. Of course, that might be the beer talking.

Proof is the conversation between Dels. Murray Levy and Christopher Shank.

‘‘I think the governor’s race is going to be a lot tighter than the current polls indicate,” said Levy (D-Dist. 28) of La Plata.

‘‘I’ll concur with that,” said Shank (R-Dist. 2B) of Hagerstown.

Just in case

Steve Abrams said the reasoning behind his decision to run for comptroller despite the governor’s disapproval has been proved prescient.

‘‘In the event that the incumbent gets knocked off, the Republican Party needs to have a credible candidate in the comptroller’s race,” he said.

But even if Schaefer wins, Abrams said, he won’t withdraw ‘‘because you can never tell about health concerns ... but it will be the nicest race you will ever see.”

And finally ...

In addition to the Ehrlich shirt and his tent being littered with Ehrlich, Schaefer and George Johnson for Anne Arundel County Executive signs, it was interesting to note that Bruce Bereano was wearing the following stickers: Stu Simms, Page Elmore, Rich Colburn, Beau Oglesby (Worcester County state’s attorney), Don Schaefer, George Johnson, Ben Cardin, Dick Sossi.

‘‘I live for this event,” Bereano said. ‘‘When I’m driving home, I’ll be counting down the days to next year.”