Campaign finance and campaign rhetoric
We’re now abut 24 hours out from Martin O’Malley’s official campaign kickoff down in Fells Point. We already know what his key talking points will be, based on this e-mail sent to supporters this morning:
You can see from that first paragraph that “big money” and “special interests” are the key talking points. Fortunately, we have ways of quantifying and qualifying such statements, with campaign finance reports from the State Board of Elections. Unfortunately we won’t see the first reports of this campaign until August 17.
This is not to say the Ehrlich campaign has been without some unverifiable statements. The first one to jump out is the assertion in Ehrlich’s post-session comments that Maryland Democrats will raise your taxes next year. There is literally no way of checking that statement until months after the election is decided. Like all good political rhetoric (and I say “good” here indicating cleverness and efficacy) it’s bought on faith.
