Now it’s time to hear from a folo favorite, Anita Lee of the Sun-Herald, with Sources of Mississippi candidates’ money often difficult to trace:
GULFPORT — Republican Mike Chaney said he spent around $1 million to win the Mississippi insurance commissioner’s race in 2007.
“It’s obscene to spend that much money on an election for a job that pays less than $100,000 a year,” Chaney said, “and you try to be impartial and you know much of the money comes from the business side.”
But it’s not always easy to find out where candidates get their campaign money. Even they have difficulty tracking the funds.
Chaney estimates that almost half his money came from the Republican Party. The party reports its contributions, distributing the funds among candidates. It is impossible to say whose donations went to whom. …
Right. To get a job, you spend more than ten times its annual salary exactly why? I don’t suppose anyone need answer out loud. Nope, betcha we just silently mind-meld over that one.
Anyhoo, early on in her story, Lee takes up the issue of campaign ads and the great sums involved in financing them . . . and cor blimey if here don’t come a familiar name!
In the insurance commissioner’s race, groups ran advocacy ads that attacked the candidate they wanted to defeat.
Stop Lawsuit Abuse in Mississippi Inc. attacked Chaney’s opponent, Democrat Gary Anderson, the weekend before the Nov. 6 general election. A group called Mississippians for Fair Elections attacked Chaney.
Chaney said his campaign, through media contacts, traced funding for the Fair Elections ads to attorney Richard “Dickie” Scruggs. Scruggs had earlier acknowledged giving the group $250,000 to run attack ads against Anderson’s opponent in the Aug. 7 Democratic primary, incumbent Commissioner George Dale.
Dale lost to Anderson in the primary and blamed the attacks for his defeat after 32 years in office.
Anderson said after the primary that his polls showed election funding from the insurance industry was the biggest issue in the commissioner’s race. Dale never made a secret of the fact that insurance companies contributed to his campaigns.
Chaney and Anderson pledged to eschew insurance industry funding, but Chaney said he did accept money from insurance agents and their companies. Because of Mississippi’s weak campaign reporting laws, the candidates have to be taken at their word.
I didn’t know until today that Mississippi is one of only 11 states (plus the U.S. Virgin Islands) with an elected rather than appointed insurance commissioner.
Um . . . howzat been workin’ for ya?
“Right. To get a job, you spend more than ten times its annual salary exactly why? ” How many times the annual salary do our Presidental candidates spend? I think its all proportional to the power you will wield.
For a point of refence to the non-Mississippians (whew! the first time *I’m* not the “non)… Chaney was a former Senator (R) in MS, declared that he wouldn’t be seeking re-election. George Dale (D) was the long-time MS Ins Commish. On the final day of qualifying for the election, Chaney filed his papers to run for Ins. Commish as the R candidate. Gary Anderson was the D candidate that Scruggs funded with hundreds of thousands of dollars in donations to put the hit out on Dale. Scruggs went so far as to publish a, if I recall correctly, full page ad with a cartoon of Dale, which he paid for of course. He put out quotes in newspapers against Dale. He was by far Anderson’s biggest donor. Dale lost in the primary to Anderson and Chaney went on to beat Anderson in the general.
My opinion here about Chaney—couldn’t meet a better guy.
Oops–seems that this info is included in the second part of Lee’s article.. sorry. I jumped the gun
Speaking of full page ads, does anyone remember the full page ads/ statements that Scruggs put out during the Paul Minor investigation? Anyone got the text of it? I think it ran in the Clarion and the SH.