Pearce: Shakeup wasn't ideological, just different management styles

GOP Senate candidate Steve Pearce said Tuesday that his campaign had not found a new manager to replace Tom Carroll, who held the post for a short period. Pearce, who will face Democrat Tom Udall in the general election, added that his campaign will likely keep the team that is assembled now and not replace Carroll.

"We've got our team," Pearce said Tuesday at the Hotel Albuquerque as he waited for the start of a Town Hall meeting showcasing the GOP presidential candidate John McCain.

Pearce said Carroll's departure had nothing to do with ideological differences, but was "just a crossing of management styles." The Republican declined to go into more details about the differing styles.

He also said the shakeup caught him by surprise.

"I looked behind me and saw the dust," Pearce said.

Pearce also talked a little about his media consultant, Arthur Finkelstein, who has worked with him for six years. Finkelstein is a famous political operative who gained notoriety over the past 30 years for waging hard-edged and often very successful campaigns to elect conservatives in the U.S., including a stint as Ronald Reagan's pollster for a period.

As Wikipedia notes:

Finkelstein is known for his hard-edged political campaigns, which often focus on hammering home a single message with great repetition. He is credited with helping to make "liberal" a dirty word in the late 1980s and 1990s.

"He can say in 10, 15 seconds what it takes me ... I'm a two, or three-hour Town Hall meeting kind of guy," Pearce said of Finkelstein.

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