There are always two sides to any political activity—appearances, and actual motivation.
Paul “Tax-on-gas” Tsongas was unelectable, he had cancer in 92 and would not have carried the Democratic nomination regardless of delegate count. It was their year w/ or w/o Slick Willy and they weren’t willing to lose.
Without necessarily having all the facts in hand
$250 for a congressional candidate, even in 1992, was essntially a joke in terms of contributions, and may have been done for access or to keep communication channels open with a representative working on something which Romney had an interest in.
Romney’s business interests had a substantial presence in New York, as well as nationwide, and John LaFalce was on a number of committees whose regulatory oversight affected his business interests. At this time, he was neither Gov. nor Senate candidate, but citizen Romney, and as a private citizen had every right to maintain good relations with persons in power (via campaign contributions) who could either make business go smoothly for them or put their foot on their nuts.
IIRC, Doug Anderson couldn’t get elected dog catcher.. Also its a common practice to contribute to the weakest democrat candidate to give them a shot at the general election to be clobbered by the GOP nominee. Think that doesn’t happen, its a REGULAR practice here in Kentucky, I know that much, I contributed to Bruce Lunsford’s unsuccessful primary campaign last year for Governor (paltry sum, only $50) because i thought he would get clobbered by ANY Republican here in the Gubernatorial race.
“$250 for a congressional candidate, even in 1992, was essntially a joke in terms of contributions”
100% of Romney’s support went only to democrats for years, when you couple that with his anti Reagan position and opposition to the Contract with America, and the fact that he was not even a republican, and that he chose all this during the years of our great conservative battles, it means something, we cannot just suspend all common sense.