Ehrlich's Closest Aide Now Has The Title

Having grown up in a family of Democrats, he did not become a registered Republican until after graduation. DiPaula said the switch was inspired by President Ronald Reagan's fiscal conservatism and advocacy of pushing government decisions down to the local level.

Despite serving a governor who ran as a moderate in 2002, DiPaula has not shied away from his admiration for Reagan, which has left him open to charges that he tries to push Ehrlich right on some policy issues.

Miller last year derisively referred to him as "a Ronald Reagan incarnate in a little teeny body," a reference to DiPaula's physical stature. The bespectacled DiPaula good-naturedly asked Miller to sign a copy of the newspaper in which his quote appeared.

DiPaula spent nearly his first decade out of college working for a real estate development company, designing and later managing a large retirement community. It was there that he got to know Ehrlich, then a state delegate whose district included the company's headquarters.

Their bond was cemented in 1994, when DiPaula made an unsuccessful run for the House of Delegates and Ehrlich first won a seat in Congress. Ehrlich took the unusual step of endorsing DiPaula in a crowded GOP primary. DiPaula finished second.

"When he campaigned door-to-door in my district, he invited me to go with him, and he handed out my literature," DiPaula recalled. "That, to me, defines Bob Ehrlich: sticking by his friends. Quite frankly, it was one of my major motivators to come back and help him in his [2002] campaign."

In the eight years in between, DiPaula's stock rose within GOP circles. In 1996, he served as assistant manager of the Republican National Convention in San Diego. Four years later, he was given the top management job for the 2000 convention in Philadelphia at which Bush was nominated.

In late 2001, Kendel Ehrlich called, inviting DiPaula to come to the Ehrlichs' home to discuss over homemade lasagna her husband's prospects for winning the governorship in the heavily Democratic state.

"I told him that night, it was about a 40-60 chance," DiPaula said. "But I knew he could do it. I knew if he ran a solid campaign, he could do it. It was just intuition."

After he came on board in early 2002, some members of DiPaula's skeletal staff initially were surprised to find their leader wearing rubber gloves and cleaning the office bathroom with a toilet scrubber. Committed to running a lean operation, DiPaula decided to share chores rather than hire a janitorial service.

Another staff member brought in the base of a water cooler, but DiPaula decided not to spend campaign money on jugs of water, so it sat empty.

Helped by the missteps of the Democratic nominee, Ehrlich prevailed, prompting a congratulatory call from Bush placed to DiPaula's cell phone.