As regular readers surely know, I have two primary addictions: Politics and sports (well, three addictions if you include cheese, but that isn’t relevant to this particular item). So when the two overlap with what I get paid the big bucks to cover, I get all geeky about it.

That’s why I devoted a few posts late last year to the senatorial aspirations of Steve Pagliuca, the Bain Capital managing director who also owns a slice of the beloved Celtics. Now that the campaign is over – Pagliuca came in fourth out of four major candidates in the Democratic primary – I wanted to know what he took away from it, the pros/cons of a PE pro running for public office and if he might run again.

Get his thoughts after the jump…

Steve Pagliuca has not yet caught fire with voters in Massachusetts, where he’s running to succeed Ted Kennedy in the U.S. Senate. Most recent polls put him in third place (or tied for third), at least 15 points behind frontrunner Martha Coakley.

But one place Pagliuca has lots of support is among his private equity peers. His September campaign report shows a total of 96 contributions for the primary campaign, of which 23 come from individuals currently employed at private equity firms. Most of this is from Bain Capital colleagues, but there also are outside notables like Kevin Landry of TA Associates and Bill Egan of Alta Communications.

Then there are several more contributions from spouses of PE professionals, from Bain portfolio company executives (e.g., Weather Channel CEO Michael Kelly), Wall Street execs (e.g., Goldman Sachs CEO Lloyd Blankfein), attorneys (e.g., Matthew Steinmetz of Kirkland & Ellis) and HBS professors (e.g., Michael Porter).

Finally, Pagliuca also has tapped contacts made during his stint as co-owner of the Boston Celtics. These include NBA Commission David Stern, Memphis general manager Chris Wallace, Celtics GM Danny Ainge and Celtics coach Doc Rivers. Get the full list after the jump…

Steve Pagliuca, a managing director with Bain Capital, today announced that he’s running for the Democratic Party nomination to succeed Ted Kennedy in the U.S. Senate.

We discussed his potential candidacy earlier this week, including how it would affect ongoing operations at Bain. We’ve since received a copy of a letter Bain sent to its limited partners, which says Pagliuca will take a leave of absence rather than tender his resignation. What follows is a copy of the letter:

Dear Bain Capital Private Equity Investors:

Yesterday afternoon, I tweeted my surprise that “some self-funded biz type isn’t jumping into the Mass senate race on the Dem side.” Apparently Bain Capital’s Steve Pagliuca is one of my followers, because news leaked several hours later that he was seriously considering a run at Ted Kennedy’s vacated seat.

I’m told that candidate Pagliuca is a near-certainty, which raises two questions: (1) How will this affect Bain; and (2) Does he have a shot to win?

The first answer is “relatively little.” Bain has lots of experience with this sort of thing, based on the electoral ambitions of firm co-founder Mitt Romney. In fact, Romney’s first race was for this very seat, against Kennedy back in 1994. That campaign included the regular apparences of laid-off factory workers from a Bain portfolio company, who were none too pleased with the future governor.

When Romney ran for president, Bain conducted an in-house investigation to uncover any skeletons from the Romney era (PR or otherwise) that might have embarassed the firm. Expect Bain to do the same again, but for the more recent era.

Bain Capital’s Steve Pagliuca has emerged as a potential bidder for The Boston Globe, which is being shopped by The New York Times Co.

peHUB has learned that Bain Capital itself is not involved, as Pagliuca is said to view the opportunity more as a civic rescue than as a profit-driven investment.

“A lot of folks [in Boston] want to see the Globe saved, because of what it means to the community,” says a source familiar with the situation. “But this is not the type of deal that would work within a private equity model… the financial objectives probably would only be to return the paper to cash-flow breakeven.”

News of Pagliuca’s interest was first reported by the Globe’s website, which also identified advertising executive Jack Connors and former Globe executive Stephen Taylor as likely suitors (we hear Taylor’s interest and ability to actually buy the paper are overstated).