Mike versus Tom round II

Well...credit Michael Flaherty with brains enough to realize that he cannot win without the goodwill and support of Sam Yoon. Running as a "team" (Flaherty for Mayor, Yoon for "Deputy Mayor") bespeaks some ability to think outside the box on the part of Citizen Flaherty. Alas they are gonna need a lot more ideas like that one if they are gonna flatten the Great Golem of City Hall, Tom Menino.
Yoon seems to be playing the good soldier this time, win or lose he will politically profit from this election down the line.

Flaherty needs to: Hammer away at Menino's age, endless tenure in office and paucity of ideas, leaven everything with a few new proposals and look energetic & upbeat in all things.
Menino needs to: Put aside his ego, remind all and sundry he came to your Aunt's wake in Charlestown last year, stay focused on his accomplishments and mastery of the details that comprise city governance.

Have at it boys, it all looks good from Robbin's Farm Park in Menotomy.

Bill Safire RIP...

Others are remembering the wry and puckish wordsmith, that de-lightful conservative contrarian who was nonetheless hell bent on avenging Richard Nixon no matter what the cost the polity.
Indeed Safire's dishonest war-hawkery lead him to become Dick Cheney's servile stenographer in the lead up to the second Iraq War and then bluster incontinently afterwards when caught out.
That is how I will remember Bill, as a liar whose lies formed a body blow from which American journalism has yet to recover.
Honestly, in thought and deed he was a Nixon man unto the last.
Peace to his ashes.

I'm with the Governor on the whole Hyatt Affair

Housekeeping is back-breaking labor set to a blistering pace at most hotels, and the "excessive" $15 an hour these women were making is a meager pittance by which to raise a family.
So hell yeah Deval Patrick was right to threaten a boycott of the Hyatt, replacing those women with $8.00 temps with no benefits constitutes the worst sort of economic piracy. You can bet Hyatt Hotels Inc (or whatever the corporate parent is called) is CRAMMED with six figure VPS whose job is it to dream up "cost saving measures". Ass-clowns like this LOVE a recession it is a golden opportunity to squeeze the paychecks and health benefits of the company's housekeepers, bus-boys and maintenance staff.
Humble Elias has an idea lets cut back on some of those six figure salaries they got up in executive country, payroll efficiency should start from the top down anyway let the ass clowns set an example for once.
As for the Governor, this was a gut-check Harry Truman moment on his part, the Joanie Vennochis and Scot Lehighs will snark but the plain people out there, the service staff at Dunkin Donuts, the charwomen or the legions of temps that swarm Boston's financial district will know one of their own.

Senator Kirk...? Meh.

He will vote the right way, oppose the inevitable filibuster and keep Edward Maximus' formidable constituent services office humming.
I'd a preferred former governor Mike Dukakis who has made an effort to court the democratic base at the town and city level and thus deserves some recognition but in the end it is a token appointment of four months, no big thing.
Still...I think nomination papers can still be handed in for any further senatorial candidates (the cut off date is October)and the Duke does look fit as a fiddle for a man of seventy-five.
Why take a four month appointment when one can enjoy a six year tenure in office, a chance to serve the Commonwealth anew, and a national platform as well?
Plus Mike Dukakis is honest and incorruptible, we need fear no chiseling from him.

Besides, think how it would piss off Howie Carr....that ALONE recommends the whole project!

And ANOTHER THING...

Mike Dukakis is akin to Teddy Kennedy in one very important respect, you couldn't bribe him to save your life. Instead of these other well-heeled types who go hunting for monied clients after public life the Duke has happily consigned himself to a modest teaching position at Northeastern where by all accounts he has acquited himself honorably.
Besides that, the Duke makes himself available to moderate candidate forums and other democratic party events at the town and city level. We've seen quite a bit of him in Menotomy, can't say the same of Paul Kirk.
Governor Patrick, if by some miracle you are reading this, FORGET what those useless dingbats in the political consultancy are telling you, go with the Duke, appoint Dukakis, even his enemies know his word is good!

The New York Times reported yesterday

that former Massachusetts Governor Michael Dukakis is no longer in the running to serve as an Interim US Senator in Edward Maximus' bow vacant seat.
Un-named sources cited the Duke's rep for "independence" and his concurrent association with an era of "democratic defeat".
In the words of Olde Misanthrope "What rubbish!"
How can one be too independent and yet somehow symbolize defeat and rejection at the same time? Both De Gaulle and Petain in one go?
Moreover, the Duke would be serving for a short time with John Kerry as his senior senatorial colleague, Kerry had the Presidency stolen from him in '04 does that associate HIM with "democratic defeat?"
For that fact this is Teddy Kennedy's old chair we are filling, he got whipped by Jimmy Carter in 1980, does that associate the late Senior Senator with "democratic defeat?"
No mah frenz, this is more of that consultant-think that has been dragging down the party for decades now, I urge the Governor to flip off this kind of idiot-reasoning and reconsider the candidacy of former Governor Dukakis, whatever his faults may be, the Duke is an honest man in extremis, if he says he will resign by a certain date he will do it and damn the consequences. It is a short list of pols in this state whose word is that good.
Meanwhile the papers all say Paul Kirk now has the inside track, I don't know the man from a cord of wood, maybe he is honest maybe not.
Nonetheless, conscience dictates I remind my readers that Kirk was once DNC chair, back in 1988 if I am not mistaken, and we didn't win that year, doesn't that taint him with "democratic defeat"???

So it is Mike versus Tom

and then it'll be Tom and then maybe...who knows? Tom all over again.
Hate to say it kids but short of the Sons of Ragnar sacking the City of Boston on election day, this mayoral contest is a foregone conclusion, it will be Menino Uber Alles all over again.
At this point our best hope is for a spirited and open debate of all the issues because the outcome seems pretty certain.
I hate to write it like that, but facts are facts, Menino has a huge organization, he can project power into wards and precincts and he has 900,000.00 to spend.
Sure, Menino sounds like a recovering stroke victim with an addiction to cliches, but that doesn't matter in Boston, flowers at wakes, wedding greetings, a little help with a zoning problem, reverence for neighbors and neighborhoods those are the decisive factors in the Hub even today.
Michael Flaherty sounds like a well informed man with a strong desire to run an honest administration but he is about to join a very long list of mayoral also-rans in the Shining City on a Hill.

My Prediction:

that it will be Flaherty versus Menino starting tomorrow, I don't think Hizzoner will get 50% of the vote today, but don't take that to the bank.
Sam Yoon is running an interesting campaign, if I lived in Boston I might vote for him, but his election day battle plan depends on rousing thousands of new voters and ushering them into the polling stations. This is a dubious proposition at best, in Boston at the ward and precinct level the old politics rules the roost, the cohorts that marched for Barack Obama in 2008 are not necessarily passionately engaged with the question of who gets to be Mayor.
Therefore the decisive constituencies will be the buzzcuts, their wives and such minority groups as are organized for a city wide political fight.
Given that, I think it'll be Flaherty versus Menino with Menino clearing the boards come November unless some gale from out the shoals of scandal hits the Mayor.
Of course, a good old fashioned upset tomorrow does feed my need for "bloggable chaos", so here is to chaos!
:D

Brief thought on the current healthcare debate

The one thing that is not being discussed, indeed everyone avoids this core aspect like the plague, is the essential class based character of the problem.
Oddly enough, that stalwart pragmatist, Mike Dukakis gets close to the class aspect of the issue whenever he goes on the Jeff Santos Show to discuss health care but other than that pfft!
You'd think the government was proposing to hand out new white wall tires to everyone the way the debate has been framed.
Of course this is the USA and we like to believe that class divisions don't really exist here, even if the data suggests otherwise. So it is natural if somewhat irrational to frame the debate without a class context.
This hamstrings advocates for health care reform unduly sez Humble Elias.
Frankly we'd do better to simply assert freely that that thirty million of our fellow citizens are either bankrupt from the current health care system or else too poor to buy effective insurance, healthcare is an anti-povery measure and ought to be framed as such explicitly.

Assuming WWE President Linda McMahon

really does get the GOP nomination in 2010 then all Connecticut Democrat Chris Dodd has to do to beat her is sponsor a new round of hearings in congress investigating steroid abuse among professional athletes. Promise new laws, discuss the evil health effects of steroid drug abuse, condemn the steady undermining of the games integrity that sorta thing.
If he could get a few former pro-wrestlers to discuss on camera the widespread abuse of performance enhancing drugs & sundry narcotics in the locker room, so much the better.
Linda McMahon has made her fortune by turning a blind eye to rampant drug abuse among the wrestling talent she has know about it for years and done nothing about it at all. It is akin to the GOP nominating a pimp or a drug lord for the US Senate plain and simple.

He voted for Romney in 1994??

In my best Major Hockstedter voice I bellow "Who IS this maaa-an??!!!"

Honestly I can't say Pagliuca is off to a good start with his Senate race, nobody knows him from a cord of wood outside of the basketball court and he has been giving Romney money and even voting for dat mook. I mean hey did he really think Willard would be a better Senator than Edward Maxiumus?

Seems to me Stephen has some explaining to do.

The usual dingbats in the punditariat are all a-swoon about Pagliuca's money but access divine cashola has yet to boost Chris Gabrieli to statewide public office...Think about that for a moment.

Rep. Joe Wilson "Rebuked"

by the US House of Representatives, well it is the least they can do sez Humble Elias.
Otherwise money-hungry congressmen will be tempted to pull similar or even worse stunts the next time the President speaks on Capitol Hill in hopes of reaping a big cash windfall has Congressman Wilson has done.
Frankly they ought to censure the guy, he has made congress look ridiculous which all too easy these days and made it profitable as well, bad mojo all around.

My Ghod!

Doesn't anyone WANT to be a United States Senator from Massachusetts anymore??

Now Steve Lynch has bailed on the project, a few frowns from the AFL-CIO and he tears up his nomination papers sans demure.

I'm beginning to think that Hillary Clinton's rear guard in this state has a lot more pull than was originally estimated, a bunch of serious machers have dropped this race like poorly rate sitcom, so I wonder if serious fundraising pressure wasn't brought to bear on some of these guys. Seems to me very significant that the only ones left of note on the democratic side are Martha Coakley, the Jock Itch guy who owns the Celtics who can self finance and Mike Capuano, who'd charge the Battleship Yamato in a rowboat with a slingshot if it suited his fancy.
I suspect in, short, arm twisting behind the scenes to the advantage of Coakley.
At the rate we are going, Humble Elias will have to get into this race, I mean for no other reason than to raise high the flags of old timey Bay State Lunatic Ambition. This is a seat in the US Senate, you DON'T get an open shot at this sinecure more than once in a generation in Massachusetts!
Good Ghod I NEED some bloggable chaos here guys, don't let me down!

Congressman Tierney sez "no"

to running for Edward Maximus' seat.
Didn't even know he was thinking about it qquite frankly.
Anyone else out there wanna decline to make the race?
Congressman Olver?
Average Joe Malone?
Whitey Bulger?
Ben Affleck?

Meanwhile who is this mook Stephen Pagliuca and other than money and a stake in the Celtics what is his claim to office?

Three and some change?

I thought this was gonna be a bigger democratic primary so far the heavy hitters are Steve Lynch, Mike Capuano and AG Martha Coakley plus Alan Khazei and some other small fry.
No Ed Markey no Barney Frank no Joe Kennedy, I thought for sure this was gonna be all out donnybrook among the gods, with four or so congressmen waging relentless battle with those huge warchests of theirs.
Nope, it took Teddy Kennedy's untimely demise to remind Ed Markey, Barney Frank and Marty Meehan that there is "no place like home", or at least the US House of Representatives or whatever cinchy gig they've grabbed onto.
Meanwhile the state GOP fares no better, State Senator Scott Brown has announced for the seat but he faces long odds in terms of public recognition and fundraising...and Jacky Robinson is supposedly taking out paper with some other ne'er do wells to climb in as well.
Is it me or wasn't this supposed to be a bigger louder show-down? I mean open US Senate seats are a once in a generation thing in this state, you'd think more people would be tempted.

Sorry Jeff...

If a fetus has a "right to life" then it also has a "right to affordable health care".
You can't be a bleeding heart about the fetus and a social Darwinist about the resultant child or adult.
And your precious free market has had forty years now to cover thirty five million uninsured Americans, time to let someone else have a crack at the problem.

Jock Itch Part 2

Couldn't Curt Schilling run as a "Petitioning Republican" in the special election? Technically he is registered as an independent in the Commonwealth and cannot run as a Republican, but as a "petitioner" he could promise to caucus the GOP once elected and switch in as soon as the law allows.
This is exactly the horseshit that got Joe Lieberman re-elected, so why wouldn't it work for Schilling?
That is IF he is serious about running, so far the only people truly excited about his notional candidacy is the usual sportsfascists on the AM dial, one hardly hears a peep of "Run Curt Run" from any other quarter.
Nope seems to me he is self stroking his ego nothing more, if he does get in I think he'll go great guns for about three weeks and then the meagerness of his ideas and his lack of any political skill will start to stalk him. Like Sarah Palin, Schilling will be a sugar high most likely. I mean imagine what a two way debate would look like, the first question about monetary policy and the man will fold up like a cheap suit.
Meanwhile, the Annual Andy Card boomlet has flared and died in exactly five days, you can set your watch it quite frankly.
Oh and Congressman Markey has made the entirely sensible decision to decline the senatorial special election, he has amassed too much clout in the House since 1976 to hazard on a return to freshman status in the Upper House. Sometimes wisdom takes years to ferment in one's soul, I am glad Markey finally figured things out for himself he made a statesman like choice.

If Representative Joe Wilson is so darn apologetic

over his outburst ("You Lie!" he screamed at the Chief Executive) at the President Wednesday night, then why doesn't he call a moratorium on his congressional fundraising?
It seems he has raised hundreds of thousands of dollars from joyful birthers and other vengeful book worshippers in the wake of his ill tempered fugue on national television.
You'd think if he was truly sorry he'd send such tainted money back....
Well, the reality is, Rep. Wilson isn't the slightest bit apologetic about any of it, his amends reads like the sorrowful note to the principal after a kid gets caught roughing up a smaller boy in Elementary School. No, Wilson is plumb happy, he has harvested wingnut props, money and some national camera time plus the goodwill of the GOP's prefecture, Rush Limbaugh et al.
Given all that we can look forward to the whole GOP congressional delegation wallowing in even more degraded antics during future speeches.
All this merely reinforces what I wrote yesterday, Obama, Pelosi & Reid have no reliable negotiating partners in the matter of health care, not with the good lawd of tawk radio telling the republicans how to f*ck us on a deal.
No if the matter is to go forward it must be moved by democrats and independents, the GOP has decided to wallow in it's praetorian anger, I ssay leave em' behind.

A-Andy Card for the US Senate?

That old golem? Good grief the state GOP really is scraping the bottom of the barrel aren't they?
Wait til they find out that his decades as a Bush family lackey didn't make him a wealthy man at least not enough to self finance a campaign for the US Senate.
Oh well, at least Andy has name recognition, of course it is as a shameless toady for La Famiglia Arbusto a political clan with all the popularity of the red death in Massachusetts.
Maybe GWB will fly up from Texas to campaign for his old cup-bearer, wouldn't that be a scene???
At this point a blunt simple question needs be asked, in all the twenty nine or so years of being the Bush Family's preferred Yes-Man, just what did Andy Card ever manage to do FOR Massachusetts with all that prized access?

If Max Baucus is really serious about

going forward on a healthcare bill with or without GOP support, then all Humble Elias can say is, he is gonna want that "Interim" US Senator's vote from Massachusetts at some point in the process.
As the stakes get higher in this fight, the necessity of that 60th vote becomes clear and incontrovertible.
I mean, the GOP's congressional contingent is calling the President a liar to his face catcalling him and putting on a rare display of churlishness at Obama's speech before congress last night, are these the actions of people who are willing to negotiate in good faith?
Hell, things must have reached rock bottom behind closed doors when a quavery old middle of the road golem like Max Baucus has realized that GOP can't be relied upon.

Back in the mid-1950's

whenever his TV ratings took a nose dive or his producers would hound him to freshen up his material, Red Skelton would hit the vodka bottle hard, strip down to his shorts, arm himself with a loaded pistol and defy the whole world by climbing the nearest tree on his estate clutching his prized joke file.
Sometimes he wouldn't come down for hours despite pleas from his wife or children.
Marty Meehan is a little like Red Skelton, he has climbed himself a very nice tree up there at UMass Lowell and won't come down even for a wide open shot at the US Senate.
As a breed comedians are eccentric, but Massachusetts' politicians are downright inexplicable.
Now supposedly a shot at the US Senate was Marty Meehan's life's dream, allegedly he can't spend that five million large on a run for Governor it has to be the US Senate or Congress or...The Presidency.
Well Marty was a pretty good congressman once, and the White House seems like a long shot so the only game in town left is this special election to the US Senate.
He has to realize that as politics in the Bay State goes, the stars will not again be in alignment for a shot at the senate for fifteen or twenty years.
There is no other explanation for it, Meehan has lost his taste for the big game, it happens to the best of them, they getout, the pressure comes off and pretty soon the nine to five schedule seems like paradise.
***
Meanwhile, Crazy Christy Mihos is conjuring with taking a flyer in the US Senate special election, which is the sort of impulsive act we've come to expect from the former gubernatorial candidate of the Olde Milk Partei. With his vast fortune and Dick Morris to advise him look for some hard hitting adverts from Mihos this fall, but given his nervous Frank Gorshin like giggle and inability to master the "indoor voice" Crazy Christy has some liabilities that won't wear well on the electorate over time.

The wingnuts are

in a lather about President Obama's speech to the nation's school children this week which is nothing but mute testimony to his fearsome powers of persuasion. Neither they nor even I, as a liberal blogger could care less when it was George Bush Jr. touring elementary schools making a patent simian fool of himself in every way as the ex-President was a stupid unpersuasive man and a bit of a fraud.
But Obama, he is different, he might actually put a useful idea or two into the children's wee noggins and since the remnants of movement conservatism are profoundly anti-rational, this then becomes an intolerable state of affairs for the rightical chic among us.

GAWD DAMMNIT!

Joe ain't gonna run!

I had my Grenadier's uniform dry cleaned and my assegai professionally sharpened!
***
All bombast aside, today officially marks the end of the Kennedy dynasty one or the other in that family has represented this Commonwealth in DC since 1946, the curtain has at last fallen.
***

Well there is nothing else for it, we could well have a ten way primary as a consequence of this, a lot of congressmen from Massachusetts can hear the wings of destiny beatin' over their heads tonight...Between all the money they've raised for uncontested re-elections and redistricting next year at least four of ten could pile in before next Friday. Oh and Marty Meehan hasn't ruled it out either!
Yeeesh!

***
Barney Frank seems to be strangely quiet all of a sudden, very much out of character.
I'd love it if he piled in, smartest and ablest man in the congressional delegation. The wise guys will wail about his religion and his orientation but if a meshuggah yap like Romney can go wild state wide why not Barney?
Well the answer is obvious, Barney Frank has a good thing goin' in congress why risk all the superlative work he has been doing for a gaudy ten way brawl in the Commonwealth? The only force that might change his mind is redistricting and he has survived that challenge before.
Pity...Hope I'm reading this wrong but suspect time has made Frank too good a congressman to chance all on a seat as a Junior Senator from Massachusetts.

Joanie Vennochi in Love?

It would appear that the Boston globe columnist has found her candidate for the US Senate, and that would be Attorney General Martha Coakley.
No venom aimed at the candidate's supposed bullying tendencies, no snarkage at their lack of political courage...I mean you'd think Joanie had fallen in love or something.
It is a big change from her usual diet of sour grapes.
So if this somehow becomes a two way race between Ed O'Reilly (remember HIM?) and Candidate Martha Coakley disdains to pay him much attention with a debate Joanie won't hav a problem with that will she?
This paragraph though, is a partcular gem:
Kennedy’s role in electing the country’s first black president is an important part of his legacy. By endorsing Obama, Kennedy built a bridge to the next political generation. It happened because Obama had the audacity to not only hope, but run for the White House; and because Ted Kennedy had the audacity to back him up.

Well never mind the fact that John Kerry endorsed Barack Obama first and then went to work on Edward Maximus, where does all this luv for Barack Obama come from??
Back in July in 2008 all Joanie had to say about Citizen Obama was that he was a narcissisist of the first order, now however The President has become in Vennochi's mind, an avatar of hope.
"Wow" is all I can say, forget Martha Coakley's audacity for the moment, Joanie's sheer gall takes the cake.

This just in...

Apparently per Massachusetts electoral statute, Curt Schilling can't run in the special election for Ted Kennedy's seat as a republican.
It seems that he is still a registered independent and missed the deadline to change up before the primary...
If so, I bet the Schilling for Senate meme dies out by Sunday, I doubt the Knight of the Bloody Sock is so quixotic to attempt an independent bid for Senator.

Jock Itch...

Curt Schilling wants in as a GOP candidate for Edward Maximus' senate seat?
Didn't see that one coming...
On paper though it makes some sense, he can self finance a race and as far as the local republican's are concerned he is a reliable wingnut in his views.
However, a born again christian has never gone state-wide in Massachusetts (that I know of, feel free to correct) and that is a unknown factor to be sure.
On the other hand Romney's Mormonism was no great impediment but then he knew how to market his religion as an advantage.
I think Schilling could do some populist business out there until he started saying dumb-ass stuff on the stump. I mean, solicit his views on Darwin's theory of evolution or Asimov's three laws of robotics if you wanna find out.
But the man is a hero a veritable Knight of the Bloody Sock, let us give him that, however politics is a great breaker of heroes.

Coakley Piles In...

Kudos to the AG for decisiveness, she has made up her mind while others mull & dither.
She has clearly internalized that notion that a long tenure as Attorney General of the Commonwealth can be an impediment to a wider career in politics, you just make too many enemies in that job. Besides how often does a shot at the big time open up in the Bay State...the temptation is a strong one to hazard all in an off year election wherein one's power base is not at risk. Hell, I can barely resist the urge to announce and I'm an obscure rhetorical incendiary with a bizarre pseudonym!

Among the Spartans up in Menotomy, Martha (Who has been an ubiquitous presence at local democratic event nigh these ten years) has many many admirers in and around Spy Pond many of them women who went to the mat for Hillary in 2008. On the other hand Seventh District Congressman Ed Markey is counting on a good show in the Northwest suburbs to get himself nominated should he announce for Edward Maximus'seat. Thus Coakley & Markey share the same base in some respects.
Of course if Victoria Reggie decides to bid on her late husband's sinecure then it becomes really interesting from the perspective of gender politics in the democratic primary.

Meanwhile, back at the Boston Globe, Scot Lehigh shows his true colors with a snarling incontinent attack on Former Congressman Joseph P. Kennedy.
This would be the same Scot Lehigh who repeatedly tried to convince the Globe's readership that Mitt Romney was a nice toothy moderate republican even as the Viceroy was touring the nation howling imprecations at the Commonwealth.
This would be the same Scot Lehigh who thought Scary Kerry Healey was a "nice girl" who fell in with a bad crowd in campaign 2006...in short this is the same old dupe who has been wrong about everything since the Fall of Man, pay him no mind Joe.

Orrin Hatch on Imus in the Morning today...

Despite the recent death of his best pal Teddy Kennedy, the Senator for Utah remains remarkably sound of wind and even a bit fey.
He combined a sentimental remembrance of his old friend Edward Maximus with a long sorrowful denunciation of "government run healthcare on a single payer plan". His dissection of the numbers when it came to the thirty five or so million who have no health coverage whatsoever was breathtakingly discalcular. For sheer effrontery delivered in a hurt and earnest tone, Hatch has no equal. He might've missed out on being GWB's Vice President but he will definitely be in line to drive a stake thru health care in the US Senate this year, count on it.
The man's devotion to spreading illness, despair and bankruptcy among the uninsured is shining example to us all.
Which does raise an important point, if Orrin Hatch (normally a fawning pouter pigeon of a man) cannot display soo much as an ounce of compromise, then why are we as democrats wasting so much breath on this phantom utopia called bipartisanship? Nothing accomplished in a spirit of bipartisanship has pretty much the same malign outcome as ye olde partisan gridlock, the American people get screwed thass all.
It is worth remembering that when the GOP had a fifty five vote majority in the US Senate they did nothing but run their electoral steamroller over the democrats amid demented screams in praise of the coming One Partei Conservative State.
We have to accept certain realities, they are hard to internalize when they lead us away to the natural tendency to dicker and compromise. Right now though, the partisan divide is so wide and deep we as liberals and democrats have no one with whom to negotiate. What GOP Senator would dare with three hundred de-facto Rwandan DJ's waiting to howl up a lynch mob outside their offices?