A lot of things in today's paper could potentially...

set Humble Elias off...he has a famously short political fuse after all.
But there was a teensy weensy little quote in Eileen McNamara's column today that won out over all others. In it, Eileen accuses the AG of flip-flopping on illegal immigration when he asserts that his office has limited authority over the issue.
McNamara then goes on to make this observation:

"It will prove to be a more uncomfortable place if Reilly makes it to the general election, when he will face voters who have been whipped into an anti-immigrant frenzy by the Republican right and its handmaidens on talk radio. They do not want to hear that immigration is not his job."

DUUHHHHHHH NO SHIT SHERLOCK!

So if Reilly is somehow nominated, he won't have friend one on the airwaves and elsewhere??? I'm SHOCKED SHOCKED SHOCKED to discover this!!!???
And just when was the last time any Boston Globe columnista went to bat for an embattled democratic candidate for statewide office anyway?
Nope, McNamara, Lehigh, Vennochi & McGrory are absolute masters of the art of sitting on the sidelines tsk-tsking as our nominees are hacked to pieces without hope of assistance. They then write some of the best political obituaries in the country full of vulgar self satisfaction and all the usual death-of-liberalism imagery.

My Ghod these people are useless and malevolent!

If Eileen McNamara is so god-damned worried about talk radio's rightward slatn why doesn't she devote a few columns to the advertising that keeps shit-house stations like 96.9 FM talk afloat? Or the flagrantly corrupt guest booking practices that keep brainless hags like Nancy Grace in perpetual rotation? Or Bill O'Reilly's casual use of the airwaves to issue what amount to personal threats to specific individuals?
Any one of a number of vile and reprehensible mores are countenanced on rightical chic talk radio, but all Eileen can do is "warn" Tom Reilly about the impending shitstorm and then sit back licking her chops with relish.
Well, thank you, Eileen I've seen this one before, its the usual cut and run tactics so beloved by the Boston Globe's columnists. I wouldn't mind so much, but when the gong sounds, even a nattering twit like Kerry Healey and a certifiable nut like Christy Mihos will have their apologists...but Reilly or Patrick or Gabrieli...they'll get bupkiss from the Globe's punditariat.
So spare us all your "helpful" warnings.