I wrote on Wednesday that national political groups would likely get involved in the Maine governor's race, especially with paid media.

Later that day, party committees on both sides of the aisle began airing ads in Maine, signaling the start of the season during which out-of-state voice actors tell us what it means to be "Mainers."

In a video email sent out to supporters of Organizing for America last night, David Plouffe laid out a Democratic strategy for November that doesn't include Maine.

There's an interesting subtext to Maine Today political reporter Rebekah Metzler's overview of Susan Collins' last two years in office.

It's mostly found clinging to a series of quotes in the article, gathered from a wide variety of political sources:

The Maine Women's Lobby held a press conference at Bangor City Hall today to launch their She Decides campaign, an attempt to energize a powerful demographic in the state electorate: Maine's women.

The campaign, which has a website at SheDecides.org, is focusing on a "pocketbook agenda" of economic issues that affect women in Maine, including the minimum wage, paid sick days, equal pay, family leave insurance, and career-focused education and training.

The Maine Democratic Party was quick to pick up on my piece earlier this week on Eliot Cutler's political vulnerabilities. They sent out a release attacking the candidate for hedging on his work as a lobbyist.

Eliot Cutler seems to be running a very strategic campaign.

Last week, the campaign released a statement saying that the Mitchell campaign or a group supporting her candidacy was doing message testing on Cutler’s ties to a bankrupt financial company, Thornburg Mortgage.

Cutler’s campaign manager, Ted O’Meara, is quick to point out that he never characterized it as push polling, despite reports to the contrary.

We may be more toward the end than the beginning of summer in Maine, but there are still plenty of sunny days left. In case you’ve already exhausted your summer reading list, here are some potential, political additions:

O. Murray Carr is a novel by Neil Rolde about Jonathan Jackson, a former state legislator and historian, and his attempt to understand the murder of his former boss, the governor of a small New England state, never named but obviously Maine.

 

Click image for slideshow.

Something is going on over at Maine Patriots, one of the leading Web sites for members of the Maine Tea Party.

In a message to all members last night, site owner Amy Hale told a strange tale of intimidation:

I was cornered in the parking lot by 10+ people and told that bad things would happen to me if I did not give them the password and hand over Maine Patriots. Therefore, I no longer have control of Maine Patriots.
Amy

Maine GOP gubernatorial candidate Paul LePage's one-day train tour through Midcoast Maine was meant to raise some money and bring some media attention to his campaign. Thanks to an amazing string of gaffes, accusations, and attacks from the candidate, it certainly succeeded in doing the latter and may end up as a defining moment of the 2010 campaign.

Fundraising has switched from being one of the most useful measures of the primary campaign to one of the least useful in the general. Democrat Libby Mitchell is running as a clean elections candidate and will be guaranteed up to $1.2 million for the general. Independent millionaires Shawn Moody and Eliot Cutler are largely self-funding and only limited by the extent of their own fortunes. The only really interesting numbers are those from the campaign of Republican Paul LePage, who must still gather individual contributions.