Black Box Report

Apparently the waters are finally warm enough. After almost months of speculation, teasing and pseudo-campaigning, Fred Thompson has decided he'll announce his candidacy Wednesday, September 6. Why next Wednesday? Oh, no reason, really. It certainly wouldn't have anything to do with this recent editorial from the conservative New Hampshire Union Leader:

FRED THOMPSON has flirted from afar with Republican voters for long enough. It's time for him to accept a date. And there is no better first date than the New Hampshire Republican Party's presidential debate on Sept. 5.
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If Thompson announces before the debate, New Hampshire voters will expect him to be at the University of New Hampshire with the other announced candidates. A no-show will be counted here as a snub.

If Thompson waits until after the debate to make his announcement, it will appear to some as if he timed the announcement just to avoid the New Hampshire debate. That would give his foes the chance to say he is either not serious about running for the nomination or is too unprepared to be considered a credible candidate.

Well, there's your answer, Union Leader. It's probably safe to say that's one newspaper endorsement ol' Fred won't get.

But I'm sure that's just a coincidence. Just like this rather convenient series of dates regarding ol' Fred's campaign finances:

It's really all about money:

- By waiting until September 6th, Thompson buys himself 15 days to officially declare his candidacy with the Federal Election Commission (FEC). Fast forward to September 21.

- Then, the Thompson campaign has ten more days to officially register his campaign committee with the FEC. That magical date is October 1.

- By waiting until October 1 to be an official candidate, Thompson is not required to submit any disclosure papers until January 31, 2008. That is AFTER the caucuses in Iowa and Nevada, and the primaries in SC, FL, NH and WY.
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Republican primary voters will be forced to choose their candidate without the benefit of seeing who Thompson's donors are. And you can bet it will be a hodge-podge of special interests from all over the political map.

Ol' Fred may be ready for his closeup, but it won't be in New Hampshire. And his donors won't be ready for their closeups until next year. But again, these are just random coincidences...It just happened to take this long for Fred to test the waters, and to finally put a jamb on the revolving door that is his campaign:

Fred's campaign will be going forward with the third spokesperson in as many months, which is not exactly helping to fight the rumors of a campaign gone amok.

I don;t know about "amok." It sounds like Fred calculated his announcement pretty carefully.