Briefly chatted tonight with House Minority Leader Lawrence Cafero, R-Norwalk, about some of the folks lining up to replace retiring GOP Chairman Chris Healy.
Cafero said he’s trying to stay out of it, but has been spreading the word about what he considers the role of the chairman.
“I don’t think the role is to be a talking head, with all due respect, or someone setting policy,” Cafero said. “Work on party building, grassroots, infrastructure, recruiting, fund raising, that kind of thing.”
Healy has been an often very quotable talking head and unafraid to issue statements, solicited and unsolicited, about lawmakers’ decisions in Hartford, particularly when they were Democrats.
But Cafero – who with Senate Minority Leader John McKinney, R-Fairfield – represents their party in the halls of the capitol, said when a chairman talks policy there is a risk he or she dilutes the message.
Cafero is 100% correct – Our state chair should not be in the forefront of supporting the policy our party adopts at convention or in our deliberative forums – Cafero and McKinney are smarter than us and should be able to make things up to get press hits at the capitol – a much better plan – expecially at times when they publicly disagree with CT business leaders in public and run a public policy agenda that conflicts with our big money supporters.
Speaking from the trenches, Cafero has it right. Let’s hope there’s someone with fire in the belly to turn the GOP around.