Annapolis Capital Punishment

Trial Attorney and Democrat Judd Legum is raking in big bucks from out of state while pronouncing that he is the only local candidate not taking Maryland PAC money. That may be true, but he sure does not mind investing a lot of time and energy to get investors from inside-the-beltway.

But first.....although it is time consuming to search the official databases on campaign finance filed by candidates, it can be telling. However, I must also say that the database is way more complicated and cumbersome than it has ever been. It's got way too many levels and search parameters and should clearly aggregate information in context to save we the people from having to search for it. For example, the web page could  put together for each candidate, the total amount contributed from each state on a state by state basis.

When you go to the state board of elections at www.elections.state.md.us/campaign_finance/index.html
...it takes you automatically to www.mdelections.umd.edu/campaign-finance/candidate which is the University of Maryland's Center for American Politics and Citizenship. They should know better and should make this page much more user friendly and accessible!  (If I got paid for doing this, I'd "spend" all week pulling this stuff apart, but it's more appropriate for the reporters who actually get paid to do this...or you can see for yourself).

One candidate in particular, Democrat Judd Legum who is running for District 30 delegate is doing what can only be described as building a "war chest". The first time candidate, a trial attorney with strong ties to the inside-the-beltway Democrat establishment was research director for Hilary Clinton's presidential bid and is close with former chief of staff John Podesta and his Center for American Progress.   

Entire pages of contributors show nothing but Washington, DC addresses and often with amounts of $250 or $1000 in contributions. According to the blog Redmaryland.blogspot.com "Of his total contributions......597 came from residents of Maryland. 555 came from outside of Maryland.....Of his total cash raised, Judd Legum raised $73,551.84 from out of state interests. He raised $59, 510.51 from in the state of Maryland."     READ ON.....


Not only are there consecutive pages of exclusively contributors from Washington, DC, there are similar pages and pages for New York, Virginia and Pennsylvania. Why are so many Washingtonians, Pennsylvanians and New Yorkers interested in this young guy running for delegate?  Could it be simply that a lot of people in DC must figure we need another politically ambitious trial attorney representing Marylanders? Or could it be that Legum is entangled with and working closely with outside and special interest groups that help certain candidates of certain political sways and affiliations to raise as much money as possible by targeting certain political districts and specific donors? Legum has the connections within the Democratic Party and other organizations to do this--and he can continue to state that he takes no PAC money!  Ultimately what does it say about our political campaign process and about Legum?

In July, conservative attack dog Mark Hyman, who incidentally is an Annapolis area resident but never identified himself as such, wrote an expose' on Legum. The original article appeared here: http://spectator.org/archives/2010/07/07/nationalizing-local-elections.  I both critically analyzed and debunked part of that, which was a highly opinionated piece and even wrote a letter in response to The American Spectator. Flawed though it may be, Hyman's piece still is provocative and interesting. I  believe my two-part analysis is more credible than Hyman's because Hyman comes from a decidedly conservative perspective out to attack Legum for his views. He would not have done this if Legum were a Republican. I go after Legum not for his views, with which I am certainly more in agreement with than is Hyman, but because of what I believe are Legum's fast-and-loose and very aggressive campaign tactics that focus on raising lots of outside money while making it appear that he is really a local, home-bred boy:

http://annapoliscapitalpunishment.blogspot.com/2010/07/hot-airand-lots-of-itand-vast-left-wing.html

and part two here:

http://annapoliscapitalpunishment.blogspot.com/2010/07/marylandian-candidatewho-deals-in.html

He raised $133,000 and has spent only $66,000 so the big questions remains--for what does he need all this money? Can you say "war chest"?And will he be indebted to all those folks from all over the map who gave him $500 or $1000 or more?


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