Bad news for Baldacci (continued)
	The other cloud over Baldacci There is yet another big risk looming over Baldacci that has little to do with state government: the fallout onto politicians if the Portsmouth Naval Shipyard were to close, the Brunswick Naval Air Station were to be downsized, and the military’s Defense Accounting and Finance Service center in Limestone were to be shut down — as the Pentagon recently recommended and the Base Realignment and Closure Commission (BRAC) will determine this year. Historically, 85 percent of the military’s recommendations are upheld by BRAC. Because thousands of jobs are at stake, big base closures would be, economically, "such an overwhelming disaster for Maine" that the effects would be "cataclysmic," says pollster Chris Potholm, straining for adjectives dark enough that could also describe the political effects. Although Baldacci appears to have little choice but to be in the front of the protests to the potential closings, as a state officeholder he has no say in what will happen. Nevertheless, should the cuts go through, his visibility on the issue could come back to haunt him politically. The mood of the state’s voters could turn sour toward every high official in sight. — LT

THE POLITICAL IMPLICATIONS

"If you see a governor with poll numbers like that, the Republicans previously might have thought of a token candidate, but now there’s a good chance of a three-to-four-person primary race with quality people," says the Chamber of Commerce’s Chris Hall, "and people could run as independents."

"The Republicans are seeing a lot of open options for running a strong candidate," says Representative Millet.

Says Senator Davis: "The Republicans will put on a vigorous campaign. They will work very hard. It will be a close election."

Will he be a candidate? "We’ll see."

Besides Davis and Peter Mills, Baldacci’s 2002 challenger Peter Cianchette, former US Representative David Emery, former State Senate president Rick Bennett, and businessmen Les Otten, Kevin Hancock, and Joe Boulos are mentioned by legislators and pollsters as Republican possibilities. Representative Lerman says "there is talk about the possibility of presenting a challenger" in the Democratic primary, but "there are no names yet." The Green Independent party will field an entry. Also on the left, activist Nancy Oden is already running as an independent. Re-election seemed a shoo-in for Baldacci a year ago; now potential opponents have been animated. He seems vulnerable.

But a year from now? That’s a famously long time in politics.

"It’s inevitable as you govern you lose some people," says, philosophically, lobbyist Jim Mitchell, a staunch Baldacci supporter.

"Given the state of the economy, clearly he’s got some real challenges," Mitchell admits, but he sees Baldacci’s recent decline in popularity largely due to the political wear and tear of a rough legislative session, and he expects the governor to recover.

It’s true that Baldacci’s popularity as registered in the polls declined during previous legislative sessions. In April 2003, Market Decisions had Baldacci at a 59 percent job approval. In the spring of 2004, Critical Insights had him at 54 percent. These numbers were down from highs in other seasons of those years in the 60s and 70s. Still, to be now in the 40-percent neighborhood, if true, is an unusually steep decline. A rule of thumb in politics is that you need at least 50 percent in your job-approval rating to be re-elected.

Baldacci’s aide Lee Umphrey doesn’t deny that the governor has suffered politically, and Baldacci, he says, is "not pleased he appears to have dropped so much."

The governor thinks, he adds, that the polls are reflective of the tough budget decisions in this legislative session as well as tough economic times. "And it rained every day in May," Umphrey jokes.

After the session, Baldacci plans to tour the state to reconnect with people, and "by Halloween he’ll be back up," Umphrey promises.

No one doubts that the governor — he of the famous campaign spaghetti suppers — has considerable ability to reconnect. "It’s a little premature to count Baldacci out," says liberal lobbyist Christopher St. John of the Maine Center for Economic Policy. Although Senator Raye feels "there’s definitely an opportunity for the Republicans to elect a governor in 2006," he feels Baldacci’s "strength is not in governing but in campaigning."

But will a new round of spaghetti suppers be enough? More substantive actions may be needed — and they are being worked on. Many legislative Democrats think that if they can rescind the unpopular borrowing scheme before this session ends and thereby head off the Republican-backed people’s veto referendum in November, it will be good for Baldacci politically as well as good for their own political futures. Statutorily, the session is supposed to finish June 15, but it can be and usually is extended by at least a few days.

Democrat Michael Brennan of Portland, the Senate majority leader, says flatly that Baldacci will rebound because "we’re going to deal with the borrowing." Put another way, "The best thing [for the Republicans] is for the Democrats in the Legislature not to get their shit together and not get rid of that borrowing," says pollster Potholm, who is also a government professor at Bowdoin College.

It looks now as if Brennan and his Democratic colleagues will get rid of the awkward borrowing plan, but it remains to be seen whether the damage done by it will linger — and if the alternative they come up with will be more palatable.

Potholm thinks Baldacci faces another big risk if the anti-gay-rights people’s veto effort succeeds in putting its question on the ballot in November. Its proponents have until June 28 to collect about 50,000 signatures of registered voters. If a gay-rights question passes in November, it would be a big slap in the governor’s face.

This November, state and federal officials are not up for election, so turnout is likely to be all-important, and the anti-gay-rights side has shown in the past, with those two successful statewide votes under its belt, that it can turn its people out. If the anti-borrowing question is also on the ballot, the two questions might reinforce each other by bringing out droves of conservatives.

In trying to explain his boss’s difficulties, one of the things mentioned by Lee Umphrey is that "the governor has a tendency to try to please everybody — in doing so, the governor’s office may have overextended."

To express this point another way — with a less apologetic view of Baldacci than his aide’s — the governor has appeared to go down his predecessor Angus King’s economically conservative, socially liberal, middle-of-the-road path. This path is nowadays the conventional political wisdom for Maine. Following this trail, independent King wound up with only token Democrat and Republican opposition when he ran for a second term. The entire Maine establishment backed him.

But King benefited greatly from the economic boom of the 1990s. He escaped from office just after the last recession hit the state with full force, and his biggest legacy was a $1-billion state budget shortfall that Baldacci inherited. State government has been in a fiscal crisis since. Meanwhile, the effects of economic globalization — especially the enormous loss of manufacturing jobs — have been harsh on Maine.

Baldacci may be discovering now that there is be a fundamental problem with following the conventional political wisdom in bad times. In such times, such wisdom — invariably, this is the advice of the conservative economic elite, Republican or Democrat, which incidentially provides the money for political campaigns — is not working for most people.

The particular sagesse that says everybody will benefit if a state gives more money to the corporations may be especially dangerous politically when the corporations appear to be bringing the bad times. Voters may ask themselves: Why should we pay tribute to our tormenters? In any case, very few economists would say a governor of a small, out-of-the-way state should trumpet that he can counter the effects of global trends.

In bad times, with the middle path, instead of pleasing everybody you risk pleasing nobody — or, at least, the majority.

"People want to see a broader vision," says Democratic House majority leader Glenn Cummings of Portland, reflecting on Baldacci’s travails. Then he quotes the Bible: "Without vision the people starve."

The exact quote from Proverbs is: "Where there is no vision, the people perish." But Cummings may have got the message right for Maine by accentuating our economic plight.

Lance Tapley can be reached at ltapley@prexar.com