The former St. Mary’s commissioner president had come to view the video documentary entitled “The Close Race That Wasn’t Close: The Story of the Tommy McKay for Maryland 2006 State Senate Campaign” at the Cole Cinema of St. Mary’s College Wednesday night.

“I said I will consider [running for commissioner president],” McKay told The Bay Net, “But I am not making a commitment yet.”

This was McKay’s first public appearance since he handed over the reins of the commissioner president to Jack Russell (D. St. George Island) last December.

The documentary was produced by one of McKay’s campaign workers Liz Lewis, who is a senior at the political science department of St. Mary’s College and by her own admission a thoroughbred Republican from Cecil County. “I come from a very political family. Politics runs in my blood,” Lewis said.

McKay made it clear he had no intention to run against Senator Roy Dyson if and when he makes a political comeback, but that he will start over as commissioner president.

In the documentary, McKay supporters, including House of Delegates Minority Whip Tony O’Donnell, Dyson supporter and Democratic Club President Cindy Slattery, and independent journalist Alan Brody, among others, spoke about Dyson’s invincibility in grass-root politics.

Brody said McKay’s family background, financial wherewithal and name recognition all made him qualified to throw the gauntlet at Dyson. “I thought the time was perfect,” McKay said.

Lewis had tried to interview Dyson for the video documentary, but the senator declined and Lewis said she could well understand why he did so.

The film shows McKay sitting at the new family grocery store in Leonardtown at the time when work was still under way in the background. The new McKay outlet opened its doors recently.

An ambitious McKay, with his eyes set on the senate seat, his worst detractors agree, galvanized the office of the county commissioner president like never before. Lewis said McKay admitted to her it was a political mistake for him not to run for commissioner president for a second term.

McKay had soundly defeated Democratic candidate Julie Randall in the elections for St. Mary’s commissioner president in the 2002 gubernatorial elections. In that election McKay bagged nearly 15,000 votes, compared to Randall’s less than 10,000.

The video documentary bares that at one point McKay realized his chances of winning the senate seat were slim and decided to throw in his towel by recalling his press ads, but changed his mind when former governor Bob Ehrlich and O’Donnell persuaded him to fight to the finish.

The documentary honestly admitted McKay’s false claim of having a business degree from the University of Maryland cost him heavily at the polling booths.

Another factor identified was the role of the “gutter” press. This scribe, who was a reporter for a local tabloid at the time of the November elections, confessed in the video the manner in which the tabloid attacked McKay was completely unethical.

McKay described the views expressed by the interviewees, both Democrats and Republicans, in the video documentary as candid and fair.

St. Mary’s voters exhibit a peculiar behavior that cuts across party lines on almost any seat. Republicans Bob Ehrlich beat Governor O’Malley by more than 5,000 votes, Anne McCarthy beat State Comptroller Peter Franchot by more than 2,800, Michael Steele beat U.S Senator Benjamin Cardin by more than 3,700 votes, and O’Donnell beat Norma Powers by more than 650 votes.

Among the Democratic victories, other than Dyson beating McKay by nearly ten thousand votes, Congressman Steny Hoyer bagged 81 percent of votes with no Republican rival at all, Attorney General Doug Gansler beat Scott Rolle by more than a thousand votes, Delegate Johnny Wood beat Joe DiMarco by nearly four thousand votes and Delegate John Bohanan beat Noel Temple “Tim” Wood by a margin of more than 3,500 votes.

During the question-answer session, Lewis admitted that as she worked for McKay on Election Day she knew he would be defeated. However, she had never imagined the margin would be so huge. In St. Mary’s County, McKay mustered only 9,240 votes (32.6 percent) against Dyson’s 19,087 votes (67.3 percent)—much less than what Barbara Thompson, who like McKay was county commissioner president, got against Dyson in the 2002 elections.

For reasons best known to Lewis and Professor Zach Messitte, who acted as her faculty adviser, one major factor that led to McKay’s massive defeat in the elections never got any mention in the documentary – McKay’s son Eric and a racetrack buddy Larry Adkins Jr. produced counterfeit currency that McKay later kept at his office, drawing enormous negative publicity for him in an election year.

Lewis said Wednesday she has now set her sight on the presidential campaign and said she would love to get a job working at Capitol Hill.

“She did an excellent job of documenting a great piece of history,” McKay said of Lewis’ work. Messitte said the documentary captures a feeling for a future historian: what it was like was to run for public office in St. Mary’s County. “What Liz tried to do was to capture the political culture of St. Mary’s County, so you can bury that in a time capsule,” he said.