Boy oh boy, AG Reilly's campaign for governor gets each day. First, there was the whole brouhaha over his calls to Worcester County DA John Conte to keep the wraps on details of a fatal car crash involving the daughters of one of Reilly's friends. Then Reilly surprised everyone yesterday by jilting Chris Gabrieli and Worcester Mayor Tim Murray and choosing Dorchester State Rep. Marie St. Fleur as his running mate. This morning, Bostonist learns from the papers (well, the Globe, anyway; we would have figured the Herald would be all over this) that St. Fleur is in a whole mess of financial trouble - she owes back taxes and student loans. This last revelation, though, might not be so bad for team Reilly as it first appears.
The savvy folks over at Blue Mass. Group feel like Reilly's failure to find out ahead of time about St. Fleur's issues is indicative of a less-than-stellar leadership style, especially since St. Fleur's selection was, itself, done without much tact. And notwithstanding Reilly's suggestion to the Globe that he intends to stick with St. Fleur, some people are already waiting for a replacement candidate for Lieutenant Gov. But St. Fleur and Reilly clearly think there's something to be gained from this revelation, or at least not much to be lost, and Bostonist is inclined to agree.
We're accustomed to fairly well-off candidates for public office, so when news comes out of their financial improprieties, it tends to smack of greed and hoarding. St. Fleur, by contrast, seems decidedly middle-class, and her debts are related to her house and her education, not questionable land deals or high-flying investments. Now Bostonist isn't trying to make apologies for tax evasion or debt defaults of any kind - we're big fans of abiding by the laws of the Commonwealth and the Republic. But maybe a running mate with middle-class debt on her middle-class home (in Dorchester), who used her expensive law degree to work as an Assistant District Attorney while raising three kids, isn't half bad for Tom Reilly. He and St. Fleur obviously see the angle. He's quoted in the Globe as saying, "She'll connect to ordinary people. . . . She'll understand their struggles." And St. Fleur makes the point more directly, as the Globe reports:
She recalled that when she recently met with a group of 120 poor women, some of them ''looked at me as if I don't get it."Bostonist isn't trying to say that this whole thing was planned by Reilly et al., because frankly, we don't think they're that on top of the game. But it may not be much of a liability in the end.She said she told them: ' ''I know what it's like to lose everything, to lose your home.' We talked about shame. I know about shame."
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