Politicians may not have the insight of Buddhist monks but is anyone less self-aware than Republican 3rd CD nominee Rick Green? He keeps announcing how he will protect democracy in the district, actively ignoring that his dark money front Massachusetts Fiscal Alliance’s mission is to emasculate democracy. A dark money shop like Mass Fiscal operates…
Category: Massachusetts Politics
Democratic Primaries Showed the Route to Beating Baker
Charlie Baker is likely to win re-election this November, just like every elected Massachusetts governor who has sought re-election has in the last 34 years. Re-electing governors, regardless of party, is what Massachusetts voters do. However, Baker’s re-election isn’t a sure thing. There is a scenario wherein his chances could plummet. It’s a scenario that came…
In MA, progressive generational change (not ideological insurgency) is underway.
Massachusetts Democratic primary voters signaled on Tuesday that it’s time to start updating their office holders with younger (but not inexperienced) professional politicians. The Democratic establishment isn’t under attack in Massachusetts. It is being fortified for changing times as the next generation of skilled political practitioners begins to take its place in high office. The upset…
In defense of legislatures
The following is a guest post by UMass, Amherst political science professor Ray La Raja. Jeff Jacoby’s commentary, “Short Live the Legislature”, in The Boston Globe is a mix of flawed assumptions and hazardous conclusions about state legislatures. He perpetuates a harmful myth about the superiority of citizen legislators. Does anyone want a part-time surgeon repairing…
Primary Election Day 2018: Sorry, the Commonwealth Is Hungover
Summer is in the home-stretch. Winter in these parts is cruel and none of us get enough sunlight. Every New Englander who has the luxury is thus basking in the last ten days of summer before its unofficial end the Tuesday after Labor Day. Sharks be damned! Beach, cookouts, festivals, porches, lakes, and libations –…
Ranked Choice Voting: If Maine can do it, why can’t Massachusetts?
Interest in election reform seems to have spiked recently around here in the wake of two significant developments, Maine’s first election cycle with ranked choice voting and the enactment of automatic voter registration in Massachusetts. The ability of our northern neighbors to enact ranked choice voting, (a more ambitious electoral reform than automatic voter registration…
Hey There Little Red Riding Hood! Or, Should the Democrats Take Advice from Democrats for Education Reform?
The conventional wisdom is that Governor Charlie Baker will glide to re-election but amidst this Democratic Party gloom comes the director of Democrats for Education Reform Massachusetts with the secret to thrashing Baker: just attack unions and all will be well! This is not surprising since DFER MA is more an anti-union front than an…
Margaret Heckler: she didn’t wait her turn
Margaret Heckler didn’t wait her turn. Had she done so, she may well have never scaled the heights of American politics from Congress to the Cabinet to an Ambassadorship.
The Gifford Giveback. Or When Does a Pol Have to Return the Money?
The Boston Globe is reporting that Rufus Gifford, a Democratic candidate for the open Third Congressional District seat, is repurposing a campaign contribution from accused #MeToo miscreant CBS chief executive officer Leslie Moonves to Planned Parenthood. Good for him. But this raises the question, when does a pol have to give back dirty money? I…
#MaPoli Endorsements: the definitive list
Forget silly season or the dog days of August. With just over a month before our primary election and a few months before the general election, campaigns and candidates are in the midst of Endorsement Season. Every election year in Massachusetts, I re-up my piece on political endorsements in the Commonwealth. Note that the categories…