Posted on 03/19/2002 1:45:52 PM PST by mac_truck
BOSTON (AP) -- Acting Gov. Jane Swift dropped out of the governor's race Tuesday rather than fight for the Republican nomination against Mitt Romney, the acclaimed Salt Lake City Olympics chief.
Romney formally entered the race a few hours later. He thanked Swift for her years of work and said he didn't want to take attention away from her on ``her day.''
``I also think it's admirable that she's decided to focus her resources on managing the state during tough economic times and also to help raise her family with all her energy and heart,'' Romney said, surrounded by his wife, Ann, and other family members.
But he was quick to add: ``Lest there be any doubt, I'm in. The bumper stickers are printed, the Web site's going up. The papers are going in today.''
Swift, who has been plagued by personal and political controversies, said she decided not to take on the simultaneous tasks of being a mother of three, running for election and governing during a budget crunch.
``Having said early on the time with family was nonnegotiable, something had to give,'' Swift told reporters. She plans to serve out her term, until the end of the year.
Swift said she had spoken with Romney and pledged her support.
Romney, 55, has been riding a wave of popularity since successfully leading last month's Winter Olympics. A longtime Massachusetts resident who graduated from Brigham Young University in Utah and sent his children there, Romney graduated from Harvard Business School and went to work in Boston at Bain & Co., where he rose to chairman.
The venture capitalist has remained active in Belmont's Mormon community, which constructed a 70,000-square-foot temple in 2000.
There had been growing speculation that he would run for governor.
Last month, after a Republican activist tried unsuccessfully to get Swift a job in the Bush administration to ease her out of the race, she told reporters: ``I guess I should be accustomed to powerful men trying to tell me that they know better than I do what it is I should be doing.''
A Boston Herald poll published Sunday showed Romney, whose only political experience is an unsuccessful challenge to Sen. Edward Kennedy in 1994, leading Swift 75 percent to 12 percent.
White House spokesman Ari Fleischer said no one from the Bush administration urged her to drop out.
Swift said she would not take a federal job. She said she reached her decision to drop out on Monday.
``There isn't a working parent in America that hasn't faced it -- when the demands of the two tasks that you take on both increase substantially, something has to give,'' she said.
Her voice trembling, Swift added: ``Serving as governor of this great commonwealth has been an honor and a privilege and one for which I'll always be grateful.''
Swift said she did not know what she planned to do next, but told reporters, ``You guys keep telling me I'm young.''
Swift, 37, became Massachusetts' first female chief executive, and the nation's youngest, last April, succeeding Paul Cellucci when he became ambassador to Canada. She is the first U.S. governor to give birth in office when she had twin girls in May. She also has a 3-year-old daughter.
Until recently, Swift had said she was undaunted by a challenge from Romney. The Republican primary is Sept. 17.
The birth of Swift's twins produced a wave of favorable national publicity and a bounce in the polls. But when she returned to work at the end of June, she continued to find herself with little political capital and a Statehouse dominated by Democrats.
That made tough challenges even tougher: a worsening budget crunch, calls for added security measures after Sept. 11 and a controversial decision not to commute the sentence of a convicted child molester.
Earlier, as lieutenant governor, the state Ethics Commission ruled she had created an appearance of impropriety by allowing aides to baby-sit for her older daughter and fined her $1,250. She also used a State Police helicopter to fly home for Thanksgiving to care for her sick daughter.
More recently, she was sued by two members of the Turnpike Authority board whom she fired after they voted to delay toll hikes.
Five Democrats also are running for governor: Senate President Thomas Birmingham, former Labor Secretary Robert Reich, state Treasurer Shannon O'Brien, former state Sen. Warren Tolman and Steve Grossman, a former national Democratic Committee chairman.
Within moments of his announcement, Romney was challenged on his stand on abortion, a hot-button issue in a state that recently has supported fiscally conservative, socially progressive governors.
He said he would support a woman's right to choose.
Carla Howell won 308,860 votes in her Libertarian 2000 bid for U.S. Senate challenging 38-year incumbent Ted Kennedy in Massachusetts.
Campaigns and Elections magazine recognized her campaign as the most successful third party U.S. Senate race in 2000.
I'm not positive (trying to find the stats), but I believe she may have even beat out the Pubbie candidate for Senate in 2000. If not, it was a near even match. Regardless, the Pubs had pretty much thrown in the towel in this state.
I'm sure the Tax Repeal Initiative is going to be BIG news in Mass. And I don't know about you, but if I had a candidate that would leave a few thousand dollars in my pocket every year, I would vote for 'em. She has a VERY good chance in this race.
Yeah, a bunch of fat queer foot soldiers and hysterical dykes heaped abuse on signers of the petition.
They physically blocked signers from the petition. The funny part is that they can scream at you if you are a normal person, they can even physically harass you but if you raise your voice or one fingr to them, its a freakin' hate crime.
Since when was making ME a second-class citizen doing anything about hate?
As I said above, the libs will use ANY means neccesary.
...er....
I don't thing that is exactly the case. I have worked for Carla and the libertarians on a couple of issues and on 85% of the issues I think that most conservitives would have no problem with their stance on the issues.
The other 15% I think that they are anarchists, with a rather strange view of the Constitution, probably because few of them have read the Federalist Papers, to much Tom Jeff and not enough Madison and Hamilton. On the whole I tend to think of them as Conservitives who haven't grown up yet and like to smoke dope.
Do you really think that the Massachusetts media, led by the Boston Globe, and his DemocRAT opposition would leave it at that? If Romney mentioned it once, the Massachusetts media and the DemocRATs would mention it every damned hour of every damned day between now and election day. And if you don't believe that, I think you should get an education.
That's the most hilarious aspect of the MA idiots. They continue to vote in people who raise taxes and then they move to NH to avoid the taxes and vote in people who will increase taxes in NH.
For Gerald Amirault of Massachusetts, who got, for crimes that never took place, a prison sentence far longer than the one Abbott got for murdering a fellow prisoner, there are, of course, no hopes of a parade of celebrities urging his release. Neither a Maoist, nor a murderer, nor a writer who saw in prison a metaphor for the corrupt nature of American society, nor, above all, a criminal guilty of the charges against him, his is not a case likely to have commended itself to the attention of literary society, as Jack Abbott's did back in the 1980s. His sole revolutionary act was to refuse, as his similarly guiltless mother and sister did, to "take responsibility" for molesting minors, and go and sit in classes for sex offenders.Literary society might, of course, if it were disposed, have found much of interest in Gerald Amirault, his prosecutors, and the corrupted Supreme Judicial Court that has kept him imprisoned. For those interested, we have the case of the state's current governor, Jane Swift. Six months after her own parole board unanimously called for commutation of his sentence--and pointed out, in a way unprecedented for such a body, the ludicrous charges, the grave doubts as to the justice of this prosecution--Gov. Swift has still been unable to bring herself to act one way or another.
A variety of reasons have been offered--one being that she had promised the accusing children and their families she would make no decision over the Christmas holidays, in order to avoid causing pain, whatever that decision might be. Then the governor was busy finding a willing running mate for the gubernatorial election in November--a grueling effort evidently, considering the number of her choices who decided it might be best to let the opportunity pass. Now there is talk that the scandal of child abuse charged to priests in Massachusetts could cause the governor to decide the political risk is too great to agree to commutation for Gerald.
The rest of that column is at http://www.opinionjournal.com/medialog/?id=100001695.
A site dedicated to spreading the facts about the Amirault case is here: http://cltg.org/cltg/amirault/amiraults.htm.
I hope Romney is willing to take some action on this travesty. The way Swifty sleazed out on it is disgusting.
It amazes me that people think the two are exclusive, or think it is somehow useful to elect Leftwing Socialist Democrats as a way to "teach" moderate Republicans lessons. Simple Rule: Always vote for most conservative candidate in primary. Always vote Republican in general election, unless Democrat is definitely more conservative. A third party vote is a vote for the major party you like least. And if no Republican is running, get in there and run yourself.
It is a consequence of having an overly weak GOP.A properly constituted GOP party in Massachusetts that challenged the dominant leftwing ideology and went after the Irish voting block could dominate or at least be competitive in Mass. politics. But without political competition (like with any monopoly) the consumers/voters end up under-served and fed lies.
The distinction you see in initiatives and legislative voting patterns is also seens Cali. It tells you that actual voters are more conservative than their Representatives. If this is pointed out to people they would change voting patterns. But media bias keeps them in the dark and/or cows them into voting for Leftists. Again, GOP competitiveness could break this destructive haibt.
Good one! ... Good luck on that... it is a plus to have a big Dem field and a clear GOP candidate. Didnt Romney run in 1994 vs Kennedy???
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