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Michigan Challenger Plays the Mom Card
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Race
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| Contributor | Craverguy |
| Last Edited | Craverguy Oct 09, 2008 10:25pm |
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| Category | News |
| News Date | Tuesday, October 27, 1998 04:00:00 AM UTC0:0 |
| Description | What do you do in politics when your opponent is beating you 2 to 1 in the polls and 65 percent of all voters say they have an ''unfavorable'' view of you -- the election equivalent of being ''hated,'' as one pollster put it?
If you are Geoffrey Fieger, you play the mom card.
Mr. Fieger is the bombast-and-bile, high-decibel lawyer who represents Dr. Jack Kevorkian, the advocate of assisted suicide, and who once had high hopes he could unseat Michigan's popular Republican Governor, John Engler.
But those hopes are pretty low now. It turns out that a lot of voters think Mr. Fieger, a Democrat, should have kept his mouth shut, shouldn't have called Mr. Engler a ''moron,'' shouldn't have said his own party was full of ''wimps and oatmeal,'' shouldn't have speculated that people living during the time of Jesus might have considered him a ''goofball'' rather than the Savior.
So, like a lot of sons who get into trouble, Mr. Fieger has turned to his mother. And, of course, mom -- June Fieger, 74 -- is there for him, trying to make the hurt go away.
In television ads now showing across the state, she determinedly works to soften her boy's image, saying he is, well, a good boy and she is ''furious'' that those Republicans are calling him a ''religious bigot'' and who knows what else.
In one ad, Mrs. Fieger leans toward the camera, glares, and wagging a finger says:
''As for you John Engler, you should be ashamed. I know your mother raised you better than that.''
What Mr. Engler knows is that moms make good campaigners.
Back in 1990 when Mr. Engler first ran for Governor, he persuaded his mother, Agnes, to appear in an ad intended to deflect negative advertising that had been aimed at him. And he went on to win, in an upset. |
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