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An Opponent Who's Worthy Of Pat's Jitters

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By TOM JACKSON tjackson

@tampatrib.com

Published: February 8, 2009

It cannot be described with certainty how Pat Mulieri took the news that she had drawn a serious, well-schooled and demonstrably successful challenger for her presumed bid to return to the county commission in 2010. But the betting here is that it involved brown paper bags.

Describing the pre-emptive, arguably premature, challenge of former state Rep. Ken Littlefield for the District 2 seat she's owned since 1994, the normally voluble board member was uncharacteristically cryptic in her remarks to reporters. But if her reaction to having drawn rivals in the previous two elections is any guide, hyperventilation likely ensued.

To refresh: In 2002, bare mentions of Land O' Lakes civic activist and former New England television reporter Amye Cox, the then-Democrat wielding the unlikely first-name spelling and outlandishly large campaign signs, drove Mulieri toward apoplexy, even as she rode experience, name recognition and widespread county contentment to a 26-point victory.

And in 2006, when dissatisfaction with her rose exclusively from her own party ranks, Mulieri treated the handful of pre-primary candidates' forums as if they were family reunions for her in-laws: disdainfully, as events to be endured and forgotten as swiftly as possible. Again, the electoral wind was at Mulieri's back.

Circumstantial Evidence

Still, with overreaction her default modus operandi, it defies history to suspect this seasoned pol greeted the Littlefield announcement as anything less than a five-alarm campaign emergency. After all, as everyone associated with a dynasty can attest, you stick with what works.

But what to make, then, of Littlefield, who, in his trademark leather bomber jacket, began bouncing around in Pasco's political circles in 1999, when he parlayed his familiar name, GOP popularity and muscle and an abbreviated campaign season into a special-election triumph that catapulted him into the state House District 61 seat opened when his brother, Carl Littlefield, joined Gov. Jeb Bush's nascent administration.

Loquacious, inarguably conservative in word and policy objective and a fundraising powerhouse, Littlefield nonetheless was undistinguished across his six-plus years in the statehouse. Solid, yes. Reliable, yes.

But he was also susceptible to me-tooism, as in his anti-constituent vote favoring unconscionable rate increases by Big Telecom. It was an aye House leadership, whipsawed by Bush, wanted, but the public was unimpressed. In one of his first acts as "the people's" governor, Charlie Crist cited the vote as a reason to pry Littlefield from the Public Service Commission.

Littlefield soon found lucrative work as a $95,000-a-year seniors advocate within Crist's administration, but with legislators still looking for places to trim the budget, no bureaucrat's job is safe.

A 1st High Hurdle

It is not This Space's intention to suggest, as others have, that, at 64, Bombardier Ken is looking for a soft place to land. It is simply to point out that the circumstances are interesting, more than a little circumstantial and, once the campaign heats up, probative.

Indeed, we fully expect Littlefield's timely motivation to become one focus of contention. How well he manages that aspect of his campaign may well decide whether voters will be obligated to access all the other planks of his platform.

That said, even Mulieri - for all her edginess - would have to concede that she has been fortunate in her opposition, all of whom suffered from limited public exposure and modest campaign treasuries. Now, maybe, not so much.

In these tough economic times, who wouldn't love to have the brown paper bag concession in the Mulieri household?

Tom Jackson can be reached at (813) 948-4219.

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