Why is Steve Forbes Fundraising for Rand Paul?

As a heat wave rollicked across the United States over the least few days, Kentucky senatorial candidates Jack Conway and Rand Paul left their state to build their campaign war chests. According to the Associated Press, Democrat Jack Conway traveled to a Vancouver-based convention of U.S. trial lawyers, where he raised an unspecified amount of funds:

Kentucky Democratic Senate candidate Jack Conway ventured outside the country briefly for a weekend fundraiser in Canada with a group of trial lawyers.

Conway was among several Democratic Senate candidates to benefit from the Sunday evening fundraiser in Vancouver during a conference of mostly U.S. trial lawyers, Conway campaign spokeswoman Allison Haley said Monday night.

Alerted that Conway was courting the ever-elusive Canadian-Kentuckian vote, the National Republican Senatorial Committee (NRSC) issued a press release excoriating the Democrat for leaving the state to fundraise. The NRSC neglected to mention Vancouver’s pristine beaches and world-class hiking trails, but did manage to shamelessly evoke the false specter of Canada as a progressive mecca:

While families and small businesses struggle with lagging job creation in Kentucky, Democrat Senate hopeful and trial lawyer Jack Conway (D-KY) was listed as a recipient of a swanky campaign fundraiser hosted by his liberal trial lawyer friends, who met during their convention in Vancouver, Canada yesterday.

Lest we forget the convention is in Canada, the NRSC mentions it four times in the press release, the basic implication being: ‘How dare Conway travel to the country characterized by Jonah Goldberg with an unimprovable description: ‘the Puerto Rico of the north’”!

No Canadian Tea Partiers were present, but one imagines that if they did protest Conway’s arrival, they would have used a slightly toned down version of the Gadsden motto: ‘We’d very much appreciate it if you would not tread on me, please…’

Republicans made much less of a fuss about the location of Rand Paul’s swanky fundraiser, which was located in the distinctly less liberal hamlet of New York City, in a quintessentially ‘real America’ venue:

Senate Republican hopeful Rand Paul likes to tout his outsider status. But last night, the favorite of the anti-tax “Tea Party” movement rubbed elbows and accepted checks from supporters at the tony Harvard Club in New York City… Paul, the nominee in Kentucky’s hotly contested Senate race, raised at least $40,000 from the event hosted by multi-millionaire businessman Steve Forbes.

On the other hand, it shouldn’t be all that surprising that both candidates went north to raise cash, considering the recent revelation that Canada – with 1/10th the population – generated more jobs than the United States in the last quarter.

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