Ruffling Feathers in Arkansas

[elleng]

Lara Bergthold, a left-wing political consultant, has a word of advice for the labor unions and national liberal groups that recruited the challenger who is giving Senator Blanche Lincoln the fight of her political life: caveat emptor.

Senator Lincoln, a two-term Democrat, had been judged too conservative, and her critics found a willing alternative in Lt. Gov. Bill Halter, whom they hailed as a “true progressive.”

But Ms. Bergthold, who spent weeks in 2003 working with Mr. Halter on Gen. Wesley K. Clark’s presidential campaign, said Mr. Halter had been among the most conservative voices in the room, even pooh-poohing the importance of meeting with labor unions and other key segments of the Democratic base.

Now, Ms. Bergthold worries that the groups that have poured millions of dollars into his campaign might not know what they are getting.

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/06/07/us/politics/07halter.html