There are some really stupid people in Maine politics.
But Mike Michaud isn’t one of them.
Michaud, the Democratic US representative from the 2nd Congressional District and his party’s candidate for governor, is never going to be invited to join Mensa. But the myth that he’s a dope stems from misinterpretations of a couple of his personal traits and one very big character flaw.
Not his flaw, though. It belongs to his critics.
The issue of Michaud’s alleged lack of smarts got thrust into the mainstream media a couple of weeks ago when Democratic state Senator Geoffrey Gratwick of Bangor was surreptitiously recorded by a constituent as he campaigned door to door. In the heavily edited clips released by the state Republican Party, Gratwick can be heard saying Michaud is “not a brain guy.”
Gratwick then goes on to say that if the gubernatorial contest were a two-way race between Michaud and independent Eliot Cutler, he’d prefer Cutler.
In the wake of this controversy, I’ve heard comments to the effect that Gratwick may not be a “brain guy” himself for having been coaxed into making such ill-advised remarks. But I‘ve also been told repeatedly that his assessment of Michaud’s intelligence was, if anything, too kind.
I haven’t spoken with Michaud since his days as a Maine legislator more than a decade ago, but during his years in Augusta, I interviewed him dozens of times. My assessment: He was uncomfortable when a microphone was thrust in his face. Even when he knew the reporter, he was rarely at ease during an interview, and he certainly wasn’t articulate. Most of his vocabulary seemed to consist of “um” and “ah.” If you were looking for punchy soundbites, you’d best keep searching.
Michaud graduated from high school, but never went to college. His lack of higher education is a rarity at his level of politics, and probably contributes to his inability to be glib. But over the years, he’s schooled himself in the way government works, and he has a solid, practical understanding of issues. If I made enough of an effort in my interviews with him, I often got some insight into what was really going on in the Legislature, because he understood the process better than most of his colleagues.
That should be obvious to his critics. Michaud learned how the strings were pulled from John Martin—at that time the autocratic, all-powerful speaker of the Maine House. Michaud put that knowledge to good use, serving credibly as both chairman of the Appropriations Committee and president of the state Senate. Those are complicated jobs. No stupid person could fake his way through them.
That doesn’t make him a “brain guy,” but it places him several notches above the average legislator.
So how come the perception he’s a clunkhead has such staying power?
In Gratwick’s case, I think there were two factors at work. First, he was campaigning in Bangor, Cutler’s hometown and a city he carried in the 2010 governor’s race. Gratwick said nice things about Cutler because he was sucking up to a voter. Legislative candidates do this all the time, and it’s hardly worth noting their petty dishonesties.
The second reason Gratwick might disparage Michaud’s intelligence is considerably nastier. It’s called elitism, and there’s a lot of it going around.
