Photograph by Andrew Harrer/Bloomberg

Eric Schmidt

Senate Republicans’ campaign arm outraised its Democratic counterpart last month for this first time this year, aided by donors including Google Inc. chairman Eric Schmidt.

Schmidt gave $32,300 to the National Republican Senatorial Committee in April, helping it outraise the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee, $3.56 million to $3.54 million, according to reports the campaign committees filed this week with the Senate public records office.

Schmidt gives to candidates and committees in both parties, a pattern consistent with some executives and companies nurturing political alliances in both parties.

Schmidt has a current estimated net worth of $8.6 billion, making him the 136^th-richest person in the world, according to the Bloomberg Billionaires Index.

Ivan Seidenberg, a former Verizon Communications Chief Executive Officer, and IntercontinentalExchange Inc. Chairman and CEO Jeffrey Sprecher each gave the maximum $32,400 to the NRSC. Chevron CEO John S. Watson donated $32,300.

The NRSC gave $45,400 to Gabriel Gomez, the Republican nominee for the Senate seat that Democrat John Kerry vacated in February to become secretary of state. That amount is the maximum that a national party committee can give directly to a Senate candidate, though it may spend unlimited sums on so-called independent expenditures.

Gomez faces Democratic Rep. Ed Markey in the June 25 election.

Republicans hold 45 Senate seats and need a net gain of six seats to win a majority.

Original post is Google’s Schmidt Helps NRSC Edge DSCC in April Fundraising by Political Capital.

Photograph by Steven Senne/AP Photo

Republican candidate for the U.S. Senate Gabriel Gomez, right, points toward the audience as he takes the stage with his daughters Olivia, 13, left, Antonia, 10, second from left, and wife Sarah, behind, before addressing an audience with a victory speech at a watch party in Cohasset, Mass., on April 30, 2013.

The year was 1976, Gabriel Gomez remembers.

He was playing Little League.

Rep. Ed Markey was first running for Congress in Massachusetts.

Now Gomez, a former Navy SEAL and son of Colombian immigrants, will face Markey in a contest for the former Senate seat of Secretary of State John Kerry.

In a bilingual victory address last night, the Republican who defeated a former federal prosecutor with a good old Boston name of Sullivan and a state representative in their party’s primary spoke of the brief campaign ahead.

The special election is June 25. The Republicans already are on Markey’s case. And Markey is already on Gomez’s:

“In a sign of how seriously the Markey campaign views the upcoming challenge,” Bloomberg’s Annie Linskey reports,  his staff took just four minutes after Gomez was declared the victor to put out a statement accusing him of being “the first domino for the national GOP seeking to take control of the U.S. Senate and enact an extreme agenda.”

Gomez, 47, asked supporters last night to think back to 1976.

“Gerald Ford was president. The Internet did not yet exist,” he said. “Eight-track players were big. Boston’s first album had just come out. The first Rocky movie debuted in theaters.”

“The median price of new homes was$44,000. Our national debt, which today is over 16 Trillion, was not even 1 Trillion. Al Gore had not yet invented the Internet.”

“Einstein famously said that the definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over and expecting a different result,” he said of the 36-year House veteran he will face in June. “Congress has enough politicians. If we keep sending politicians to Washington we will keep getting the same results.”

“If you are looking for a rigid partisan, I’m not your guy,” Gomez said. “If you are looking for a person who will take orders from party leaders, I’m not your guy. If you are looking for someone who refuses to work with the other party, I’m not your guy. If you are looking for someone who will participate in driving our national debt higher, I’m not your guy. If you are looking for an experienced slick talking politician, I’m definitely not your guy.”

“But, if you are looking for a person that will reach across party lines…I’d be honored to have your support. If you are looking for a person who will put principle ahead of politics…join our campaign. If you are looking for a person who believes we can turn this country around and grow our economy…it’s go time.”

In the bluest of blue states, a Republican named Scott Brown succeeded the long-serving and late Ted Kennedy for a time. Brown, who lost last year to the first female senator from the Bay State, Elizabeth Warren, campaigned with a working man’s profile. Gomez will campaign with a service man’s profile (and, oh, a Harvard Business School degree). He supports gay marriage and a path to citizenship for the undocumented.

In 1976, Massachusetts was as Democratic as a state came.

Today, Republican activists like what they see:

congrats to a fresh new face in republican politics @gomezforma. b.globe.com/16kU2hY

— Alex Castellanos (@alexcast) May 1, 2013

Original post is Gabriel Gomez: The Year was 1976 by Political Capital.

Photograph by John Tlumacki/The Boston Globe via Getty Images

Rep. Ed Markey gives Sheila Decter, of Newton, a hug while he campaigns at Johnny’s Luncheonette.

The day after Rep. Ed Markey won the U.S. Senate Democratic primary in Massachusetts, the Senate Republicans’ fundraising arm has released an ad portraying the congressman as a baby — the infant on the cover of Nirvana’s “Nevermind” album, no less.

In a new ad entitled “Ed Markey’s Worst Hits,” the National Republican Senatorial Committee uses the template of a greatest-hits CD commercial to dance all over the 36-year House veteran’s voting history.

“Ed Markey came on hot like disco, kicking it off in the ’70s by voting to raise debt and helping Washington influence-peddling,” the narrator says over an electric guitar riff. “Markey really took ’80s excess and big spending to a whole new level by voting to raise the debt ceiling 31 times.”

Markey won his party’s nomination Tuesday by defeating Rep. Stephen Lynch, by 57-43 percent. Lynch endorsed Markey today.

Lynch: I’m eager to be a full throated supporter of Ed Markey twitter.com/AnnieLinskey/s…

— Annie Linskey (@AnnieLinskey) May 1, 2013

Markey will now face Republican businessman and former Navy SEAL Gabriel Gomez in a June 25 dance-off special election for Secretary of State John Kerry’s former Senate seat.

Markey’s staff took just four minutes after Gomez won his primary yesterday to release a statement accusing him of being “the first domino for the national GOP seeking to take control of the U.S. Senate and enact an extreme agenda,” Bloomberg’s Annie Linskey reported.

Dominoes and disco attacks are just the beginning of an intense campaign period: Markey has $4.6 million in campaign funds to spend, which is nine times as much as Gomez.

“And don’t forget his blow-out hit: voting to raise his own pay by 40 percent,” the NRSC ad narrator says of Markey. “Oh yeah, he’s bad.”

It’s just that crazy little thing called politics.

Original post is Republican Attack Ad Gives Markey Disco Fever by Political Capital.

Photograph by Steven Senne/AP Photo

Rep. Stephen Lynch, D-Mass., center, greets people at a rally to save six-day mail delivery on the Boston Common on March 24, 2013.

Massachusetts Rep. Stephen Lynch faces an uphill battle in tomorrow’s Democratic U.S. Senate primary against his House colleague Ed Markey.

Lynch has less cash. He’s down in the polls. A terrorist attack has Bay State residents thinking about other things.

And now Lynch is sick. Really sick.

The former Ironworker canceled his entire day-before-election schedule save one final 7 p.m. rally in South Boston’s Ironworkers Hall, where he launched his candidacy in January.

The candidate’s wife Margaret gamely offered to step in on the hustings this morning — but now she too has had to bow out due to the unspecified illness, Lynch campaign spokesman Conor Yunits said.

Asked how the malaise would affect the outcome of the race, Yunits said: No comment.

Meanwhile, Markey’s camp put out release titled: Markey Riding Wave of Momentum Into Primary Election.

Original post is Lynch Calls in Sick Day Before Massachusetts Special Election by Political Capital.

Almost 669,000 votes were cast in the Democratic race won by Martha Coakley. By contrast, Scott Brown snagged the Republican nod in a primary that attracted about 165,000 voters. Given that disparity in party affiliation, how could Brown even dream of winning the special election a month later? He did, of course, catching political lightning in a bottle and defeating Coakley, 52 percent to 47 percent.

With John Kerry leaving the Senate to become secretary of state, Massachusetts Democrats have vowed to avoid a repeat of three years ago. Yet their plans to hang onto Kerry’s seat may be complicated by an intra-party skirmish.

A new poll of the state’s Democrats shows that in less than a month, support for the frontrunner, Rep. Ed Markey, has dropped by 9 percentage points while backing for his main challenger, fellow House member Stephen Lynch, has risen by the same amount. With more than two months remaining until the April 30 primary, that’s not a trendline that Markey, who Kerry has endorsed, wants to continue.

Markey had 43 percent in the latest survey, compared with 28 percent for Lynch.

A tightening battle between the two could leave a disspirited losing side that undercuts enthusiasm for the winner. That could be a moot point. With Brown taking a pass on running in the latest race after losing to Elizabeth Warren last November, some Massachusetts political observers are skeptical that any other Republican can gather by next week’s deadline the 10,000 petition signatures needed to qualify for the ballot.

State Rep. Dan Winslow, former U.S. Attorney Michael Sullivan and Gabriel Gomez, a former Navy SEAL, are trying to clear that bar. Assuming Republicans are able to field a candidate, the party’s nominee will start out with little statewide name identification and face long odds in the June 25 special election.

Massachusetts voters have seen that scenario before, and responded to it by surprising the nation.

Original post is As Massachusetts Senate Race Gears Up, Will History Repeat Itself? by Political Capital.

Photograph by Nicholas Kamm/AFP via Getty Images

A T-shirt reading ‘Osama Got Obama’d’ at a souvenir stand near the White House in Washington.

A former U.S. Navy Seal who was critical of President Barack Obama for politicizing the killing of Osama bin Laden is now stepping into politics.

Gabriel Gomez said today he’ll seek the Republican nomination to replace Sen. John Kerry, who left his seat to become Secretary of State. The seat is being filled on an interim basis by William “Mo” Cowan until a June special election.

Gomez, 47, was a spokesman for the Special Operations OPSEC Special Education Fund during the 2012 presidential election. The group released a 22-minute video called “Dishonorable Disclosures” in August 2012 in which a series of ex-military officials criticized Obama for taking too much credit for the assault on bin Liden’s Abbottabad compound and for releasing too much information about it. The video has been viewed over 5 million times on YouTube.

Democrats accused the group of trying to “swift-boat” Obama by creating doubt about one of his most significant foreign policy victories. OPSEC includes Paul Vallely, a retired Army major general who has said he does not believe Obama was born in the United States.

Gomez does not appear in the “Dishonorable Disclosures” video, but he went on MSNBC’s “Hardball with Chris Matthews” in August 2012 to defend it, saying the president “focused a majority of the comments on himself as opposed to the troops,” when Obama addressed the nation about the raid in May 2011.

“A big majority of the presentation was focused on him and his administration,” Gomez said in the interview.

Gomez said he donated to Obama’s 2008 primary campaign and has “voted for Republicans and Democrats.”

A spokesman for Gomez did not immediately return a phone call or email inquiry about whether he is still associated with the OPSEC group.

In an emailed statement sent to reporters today announcing his candidacy, Gomez said, “As I look at Washington I see a lot of unproductive noise and bickering, and I see two parties attacking each other at all times over every issue. I see gridlock, I see a partisan atmosphere where very few are willing to work together.”

Gomez will have to collect 10,000 signatures by Feb. 27 to qualify for a Republican primary on April 30.

Two Democratic members of Congress, U.S. Rep. Stephen Lynch of South Boston and U.S. Rep. Ed Markey of Malden, are competing for the Democratic nomination. The special election is set for June 25.

Original post is Former Navy Seal to Seek Republican Nomination for Kerry’s Senate Seat by Political Capital.

Photograph by Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images

Sen. John Kerry testifies during his confirmation hearing before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee to become the next Secretary of State on Capitol Hill on Jan. 24, 2013.

That’s how many votes Sen. John Kerry received yesterday as he was confirmed by the Senate to be the next secretary of state.

Kerry, a Massachusetts Democrat, received the same number of votes for confirmation as his predecessor, former Sen. and first lady Hillary Clinton, who became the top U.S. diplomat in 2009.

After Kerry’s easy confirmation, “attention will turn to Obama’s more contentious choices for other national security positions,” including Chuck Hagel for defense secretary, Bloomberg’s Indira A.R. Lakshmanan wrote yesterday.

Kerry’s confirmation also paves the way for him to resign the Senate seat he has held since 1985. Massachusetts Democratic Gov. Deval Patrick will appoint an interim senator who will serve through a special election on June 25. Democratic Rep. Ed Markey is running in the special election.

The dissenters were Republicans Jim Inhofe of Oklahoma and Texans John Cornyn and Ted Cruz. Kerry voted “present.”

Original post is Bloomberg by the Numbers: 94 by Political Capital.

Photograph by Candice Towell/Getty Images

National Rifle Association (NRA) President Charlton Heston holds up a rifle during his address at the 131st NRA convention at the Reno-Sparks Convention Center in Nevada, in this April 27, 2002 file photo.

Wayne LaPierre was channeling Charlton Heston today.

LaPierre, the longtime executive vice president of the National Rifle Association, issued a defiant speech today in Washington with the NRA’s answer to the schoolhouse shootings that felled 20 first-graders in Newtown, Connecticut, a week ago: Arm the nation’s school guards.

“The only thing that stops a bad guy with a gun is a good guy with a gun,” said LaPierre, urging Congress “to appropriate whatever is necessary to put armed police officers in every single school in this nation.”

The answer to gun violence, the NRA suggests, is more guns.

“On the same day families lay three more children to rest in Newtown, the National Rifle Association wrongly called for increasing the number of guns around vulnerable children,” said Rep. Ed Markey, a Democrat from Massachusetts. “The NRA says they want armed guards in our schools.”

Rep. Carolyn McCarthy, a New York Democrat who lost her husband in a mass shooting on the Long Island Railroad in 1993, said she was “saddened” by LaPierre’s speech: “The NRA’s leadership had an opportunity to help unite the nation behind efforts to reduce gun violence and avert massacres like the one at Sandy Hook Elementary School but it instead showed a disconnect between it and the majority of the American people.”

It was 12 years ago, during another presidential campaign year, when then-NRA President Charlton Heston, the actor, warned that the organization was under attack. Al Gore “is going to smear you as the enemy,” Heston said at the NRA annual convention in Charlotte, North Carolina, on May 20, 2000. “He will slander you as gun-toting, knuckle-dragging, bloodthirsty maniacs who stand in the way of a safer America. Will you remain silent? I will not remain silent.”

Today, LaPierre was sounding a similar call to arms. He spoke of Americans as a modern-day militia.

“Sacred stuff resides in that wooden stock and blue steel, something that gives the most common man the most uncommon of freedoms,” Heston said, recalling farmers who rose to fight at Concord. “When ordinary hands can possess such an extraordinary instrument, that symbolizes the full measure of human dignity and liberty.”

Holding a shotgun in his right hand and then above his head, and naming Gore again, the old actor voiced an old refrain: “From my cold, dead hands.”

Jonathan Salant contributed to this report. 

Original post is NRA’s `Cold, Dead Hands:’ 2012 by Political Capital.