Gov. Lamont’s Free Advice vs Mom's Free Advice

Your mom, in a moment of brute honesty, may have told you that money can’t buy everything. But this was because she was not Ned Lamont or Michael Bloomberg.

Lamont is the millionaire from Greenwich who wants to be governor of Connecticut, and Bloomberg is the present redundantly rich mayor of New York. During the recently concluded New York mayoralty race, Bloomberg almost didn’t buy the election. It was a close shave but, in the end, money spoke loudly.

Chris Cillizza of the Washington Post now tells us that “Prominent Democratic operative Howard Wolfson is advising Ned Lamont's candidacy for governor of Connecticut, adding a high-profile element to what is rapidly shaping up to be one of the most interesting Democratic primaries in the country in 2010.”

“Wolfson comes to Lamont directly from his role as the senior strategist of New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg's bid for a third term, a race that the media tycoon spent more than $100 million on to win by five points.”

In an e-mail exchange with Cillizza, Lamont remarked, “Howard is a friend and I have many friends giving me plenty of free advice,” a friendship no doubt formed on the battlefield of Lamont’s primary challenge against present Connecticut U.S. Sen. Joe Lieberman.

One hopes that in that contest Wolfson, a member of Hillary Clinton's inner circle during her 2008 presidential bid, was paid for his efforts.

Your brutally honest Mom may have told you that nothing is free. But she wasn’t a multi-millionaire.

The bright side of the Lamont gubernatorial bid might be that, with Wolfson’s invaluable though free advice, Governor Lamont may yet be able to figure out a way to persuade the state’s progressive Democratic leaders in the legislature that the millionaires in Greenwich are necessary to the prosperity of the state.

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