Maryland Politics -- The Odd Couple, Steele and Mfume

The Maryland senatorial race gets curiouser and curiouser....

The Baltimore Sun reports:

Democratic U.S. Senate candidate Kweisi Mfume was fielding questions on WBAL radio when the leading Republican contender phoned in.

But instead of a scrap, what ensued was a cross-party love feast. Lt. Gov. Michael S. Steele, the GOP's likely nominee for Senate, said he wanted WBAL listeners to know just how fond he was of Mfume. Steele spoke glowingly about a recent speech on economics and development given by Mfume, a former congressman and national president and chief executive officer of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People.

When he got done, I went up to him, I said, 'Yo, brother, you sound like a Republican,'" Steele recounted last month on the Ron Smith Show. "He just looked at me and started laughing. I said, you know, so we have this kind of relationship that is a good one, it's a strong one. I think it's good for Maryland. You have two, you know, smart, energetic, African-Americans running for the United States Senate. I think that's exciting for our state. It's certainly exciting for the country."

Read the whole thing here.

This certainly is exciting; the two black candidates teaming up against the anointed representative of the State Democrat power structure. The Sun attributes this simply to Republican calculation that Steele would run better against Kweisi than Ben, and indeed polls bear that out. If Mfume is at the head of the ticket about 10% of white Democrats will vote Republican.

But there are two deeper observations to make: First, I have been watching Kweisi for some time and he has moderated with age. Progressives like to think of him as "one of us..., one of us..., one of us...." but on many issues Mfume has been willing to reach out across racial and party lines. Second, the monolithic Black Democrat vote is fracturing. Polls show that if Cardin was the Democrat candidate one in four Blacks would vote Republican and more than half would seriously consider voting for Steele.

How did that old anthem go...? Oh yeah..., "the times, they are a'changing."

Stay tuned..., things are getting interesting.