I didn’t follow the news much this weekend, and what I caught was wall-to-wall Mel Gibson, so I missed the whole Romney “tar baby” comment and reaction. Dan Kennedy catches me up, fortunately. He’s measured in his judgment, giving Romney benefit of the doubt, but adding, “I don’t know whether Romney was speaking off the […]
Sometimes the conventional wisdom from pundits is right on the nose. Here’s one thing I disagree with, though: that Romney is a fully formidable candidate for the national stage, only aversion to his Mormonism is holding him back among fundie voters. See Jon Keller for the latest iteration of this idea. Keller’s onto something though […]
Charlie has a great post on the Big Dig fiasco. He’s right: it’s the biggest issue in this 2006 governor’s race and subtends so many other debates about taxation and government service. I can’t imagine any candidates will be stupid enough to ignore it, but they could easily approach it the wrong way.
There seems to […]
Whether or not Matt Amorello has legal precedent to stay as Turnpike head or not, after Monday night’s tragedy and yesteday’s performance I don’t see him staying on much longer. I have some sympathy: clearly the shoddy construction is not Amorello’s fault and he’s trying to do what he thinks is his job, coming out […]
Responding to a heated discussion at Blue Mass Group, Charley has a great post about the Free Lunch mentality among many of the gubernatorial candidates:
Let’s just remember that when you pay taxes, you’re buying something. Maybe you’re getting well-built roads and honest cops and judges and good schools and a safe country; and maybe you’re […]
If I were Jarred Barrios, I’d be worried… Steve Grossman hasn’t backed a winner in a while.
In all seriousness, the Globe has an overview of the Middlesex DA race, and Andy, Lynne and sco have their rundowns (from when Mike Festa was still in the running). I’ve refrained til now from saying much about […]
Joan Venocchi criticizes the business community’s skirting of its responsibility on health care, with all the moral critique that Charley and others have been bringing to the health care legislation debate.
In her op-ed, though, this seemingly innocent line stuck out: "As business walks away, so, too, does the federal government." She’s talking specifically about the […]
How quickly the Globe taps into Citizen Kane-like narratives of man dwarfed by his failed ambitions.
Source: Boston Globe
At first it was even difficult to make out what exactly the larger-than-life shadows were, or whether they were in the foreground or the background.
I’ve been silent on Tom Reilly’s missteps so far, partly because they’ve been coming too fast to fully digest, in part because I didn’t have anything to say over what Adam Reilly, the writers and commenters at Blue Mass Group, sco, and others were already pointing out: that Reilly’s political judgment has been shown to […]
sco of .08 Acres has another post up on Massachusetts independent voters. Those who aren’t already reading his blog should go read his thoughts on the topic. In short, his argument goes like this:
A new Gallup poll on voters’ party identification gives a good indication of how Bay Staters are identifying, including independent voters, who […]
In response to a Globe article on Massachusetts independent voters and the chances of Christy Mihos, .08 Acres has an excellent analysis on indepedent affiliation and voter behavior:
Now, I pointed out last year that Massachusetts was purple in gubernatorial elections, but I’m not sure if the results of those contests prove much about the temperament […]
If I may continue with the media criticism vein, a recent Jon Keller feature on Romney’s State of the Commonwealth address was both a valorous attempt to dig deeper to explore the main policy issues facing the Legislature and a sign of what’s lacking in local news’ political beat. In his interview with Craig Sandler […]
I don’t live in Middlesex County, so I don’t have a horse in this race, so I can enjoy the battle for Middlesex District Attorney as sheer spectator sport. It’s only January and already knives are out. Go read Blue Mass Group for a whiff of the vox populi. There’s a larger issue of what […]
Bill Redding, an "admitted political hack," has started a promising new blog on Beacon Hill inside-politics stuff called Under the Golden Dome.
I don’t know of a blog that covers the "insider" buzz among the young Democrats actually working at the State House on campaigns and for the various interest groups around the Commonwealth.
My hope, […]
Judging from Charley’s reaction to my post the other day, I may not have been clear in my hypothesis on why the local business community was mobilized politically against any reasonable solution to the crisis in health care provision and its costs. In trying to answer his questions (why don’t they support health care reform? […]