Blue Mass. Group has MOVED!!

Arch-conservative Manchester Union-Leader doesn't like the $@%@ guitar, either.

Link:

A better leader would have flown straight to the disaster zone and announced the immediate mobilization of every available resource to rescue the stranded, find and bury the dead, and keep the survivors fed, clothed, sheltered and free of disease.

Amen to that. (Hat tip to diarist quaoar @ Kos.)

Patrick cuts back

This is a little strange...

BOSTON -- Deval Patrick is spending more money than he's raising in his campaign for next year's Democratic gubernatorial nomination and has stopped paying or cut the salaries of some of his top staffers.

Now, Patrick told us that the summer was going to be the time to muscle up on policy prescriptions -- maybe that was at the expense of running the 24/7 money machine. Still, it's odd that they're scraping for cash.

Everything that we've heard and seen of him tells us that he's a real and credible candidate. But realistically, he's going to need a truckload of cash to compete against the financially-cruisin' Reilly and the Healy Money-Printing Machine. I suspect that as long as he keeps his head above water through the fall, he'll be in the fight.

It's time to ACT

I'm just gonna steal this post wholesale from Health Care for All:
---

Bookmark this Site: The MassACT Ballot Initiative    

The Massachusetts Affordable Care Today campaign to put real health reform on the 2006 state ballot has a new website that will be the central organizing site for the effort to collect 100,000 signatures over 12 days starting on September 23rd. The address is: www.massact.org

The Coalition includes HCFA, Families USA, Greater Boston Interfaith Organization, Neighbor to Neighbor, Coalition for Social Justice, Service Employees International Union, Mass. Building Trades Council, and the United Food and Commercial Workers.

Together, we're mobilizing a volunteer army of 2,000 volunteers who will commit to collecting 100 signatures apiece over a 12 day period, something never done in the 85 year history of initiative and referendum in Massachusetts. If you would like to volunteer to be a part of this historic campaign, now's your chance and www.massact.org is your site.

---
I've signed up to get signatures -- if there's anyone out there who just couldn't get enough community-action goodness during the 2nd Middlesex campaign, or who would just like to accomplish something significant for the Commonwealth, let me know. Many hands make light work -- but it won't happen by accident.

Numbers of uninsured grows in MA

Bad news, and what one would have expected:

The federal Census Bureau reported yesterday that the number of uninsured residents in Massachusetts grew to 748,000 last year, up by 66,000 people from 2003. Massachusetts healthcare organizations and the state have estimated a smaller number of uninsured -- between 460,000 and 532,000 residents last year.

It was brought up in WBUR's report today that the growth in the uninsured may make it more expensive, and therefore more politically difficult, to enact major health care reform. Well, let's be clear: It's extremely expensive not to cover people. They incur more expenses down the road, when untreated symptoms turn into major maladies. Doing nothing costs money.

Good report on 'BUR this morning as well.

No one deserves this.

Hat tip to Kos:

 

President Bush plays a guitar presented to him by Country Singer Mark Wills, right, backstage following his visit to Naval Base Coronado, Tuesday, Aug. 30, 2005. Bush visited the base to deliver remarks on V-J Commemoration Day. (AP Photo/ABC News, Martha Raddatz)

New Orleans and a good chunk of Mississippi are underwater.

What can one possibly say?

Romney talks up science education - does he mean it?

Romney's speech at Raytheon, which apparently had all the trappings of a presidential campaign event, noted the importance of science education in America if we are to remain competitive.

Well, on that, I agree with him.  But the devil is of course in the details.  So here's a detail I've been thinking about lately: school boards around the country are trying to force the pseudo-theory of "intelligent design" down the throats of science students who should instead be learning about actual science, namely, evolutionary biology.

I wonder what Mitt Romney thinks about that, and whether he would speak out against "intelligent design" as part of his campaign to boost science education.  Let's ask him.

... and Curt Schilling's (and Trot Nixon's, and Tim Wakefield's, and ...)

Turns out the Red Sox have the highest concentration of evangelical Christians of any team in the majors.

Romney's religion

There's a long article, well worth reading, in the Globe about the possible impact Mitt Romney's Mormon faith may have on his bid for the presidency.  That he seems to be casting his lot with the rightmost wing of his party (which is heavily populated with Christian evangelicals) makes the issue particularly acute.

When (oh, all right, "if") he decides to run for President, look for a lot more to be said on this interesting topic.

Help out New Orleans and Mississippi

While we've been having fun with a relatively normal primary up here, New Orleans is essentially underwater. It's getting worse.

Donate to the Red Cross here. I heard a story on NPR about some Massachusetts folks who saved 42 people today ... let's get more of us out there.

Somerville News calls it: Jehlen wins

Link. Mackey gave concession at Orleans restaurant.

I'm looking around for confirmation -- anyone hear anything?

UPDATE: Somerville News also says high voter turnout. Maybe it was the progressive elves working for Jehlen... or just good solid work all around, on a lousy weather day.

Dan Cence, Communications Director for Joseph K. Mackey's campaign, said that as of 2 p.m. there had been 9,440 votes cast in the race for the 2nd Middlesex state Senate seat.

Earlier this week, the estimable sco wrote:

Last year the late Senator Shannon ran unopposed in the primary and 11,840 people in his district turned out. If that many show up on Tuesday, it would be heavier turnout than I'd expect.

Looks like that's what happened. Although I find it strange that a four-way race wouldn't get a lot more than an unopposed primary, even under peculiar circumstances and not-so-great weather.

Will post final numbers when I see them.

So... What Does It All Mean?

UPDATE II: All right, here's my null hypothesis: After Sciortino's victory and Schofield's near-miss, this shows that a nouveau-"progressive" movement, awakened by Howard Dean (who was, after all, awakened by the horror of the Bush era) and matured during the '04 national elections, now has tipping-point electoral-organizational critical-mass in the greater Boston area. In other words, Pat got her "progressive" ducks in a row early, who quacked merrily on to victory. Is that nuts?</McLaughlin>

UPDATE III: esteemed commenter Ron Newman posts thusly:

---
The following are unofficial totals now being displayed on Somerville City Cable channel 16:

District-wide:
Jehlen - 7117
Mackey - 4984
Callahan - 4122
Casey - 2457

Somerville only:
Jehlen - 4190
Mackey - 3109
Callahan - 570
Casey - 278

Money talks, Part III: Now it's time for the breakdown

Well, it's all over but the voting, but just for kicks, here are some finance calculations from Dave from the medfordmass Yahoo group:

---

Here's some totals from the data I gathered, without comment, without
judgement, just to think about...

Contributions this year for Michael J Callahan (98 filed, including 2 contributions totalling $5000 in loans to self))

Woburn: 3 contributions totalling $400
Winchester: 3 contributions totalling $250
Somerville: 1 contribution totalling $50
Medford: 15 contributions totalling $2750
22/96 from in-district

Contributions to Jehlen (Jehlen has filed 651 contributions, including 2 contributions totalling $20,000 in loans to self):
Medford: 55 contributions totalling $5975
Winchester: 27 contributions totalling $4010
Woburn: 2 totalling $250
Somerville: 307 totalling $61,664
391/649 in-district

Mackey (Filed a total of 453 contributions, including 7 contributions totalling $21,300 in loans to self and a donation of $500 to himself):
Somerville: 174 contributions totalling $17,010
Medford: 37 totalling $2819
Winchester:26 totalling $3,755.00
Woburn: None

TODAY'S THE DAY!

If you live in Somerville, Medford, Winchester, or Woburn, get out to your polling place and vote!

This is an open thread.  Tell us what you're seeing and hearing.

Where do I vote?

Find out here. Then just do it, baby.

Baker doesn't

As sco has scooped, Harvard Pilgrim CEO Charlie Baker has decided not to go up against the Kerry Healey money-printing machine for the Republican gov. nomination.

From what I've heard from a couple of different quarters (including esteemed co-blogger David), this is good news and bad news. Baker is said to be a member of the "reality-based community", not a wide-eyed radical, and a guy who really knows the health care business and has led Harvard Pilgrim to a lofty status as the top health plan in the country. He would have been a worthy opponent.

So assuming -- I don't think it's a stretch -- that the Dems will be facing a well-funded but, er, lightweight opponent, with deep pockets but shallow support ... whom do you want doing battle out there? Do you bet on bucks and institution, or passion and organization? What's the trump card?

(We were skeptical of Kerry Healey magic back in June -- but she's a heckuva lot richer now. Who needs a fairy godmother when you can buy your own pumpkin?)

A superb debunking

In case you missed it, this column by Daniel C. Dennett in Sunday's NY Times is the best takedown I've yet seen on the so-called "theory" of intelligent design ("ID") as an alternative to evolution.

You should read the whole thing, because it is extremely well done and, I think, unanswerable.  This ought to be the final word on this stupid "debate" (it won't, of course, but it should).  A couple of the truly excellent points in the article:

• The "design" touted by ID promoters as so "intelligent" is actually not all that great in some ways.  The example the author gives is the blind spot that everyone has in their vision, which results from the awkward path that nerves must traverse to get from the retina to the brain.  Surely an omnipotent and merciful "designer" could have, and would have, done a better job.  So ID can't explain the blind spot.  But such a defect is perfectly understandable if you accept that these structures evolved over billions of years, and that non-critical design flaws may never be weeded out in that process.  As the author says, "this is just one of hundreds of accidents frozen in evolutionary history that confirm the mindlessness of the historical process."
  • I can't help adding my own example to this line of thinking that is probably not suitable for publication in a family paper like the NY Times.  If you think about it, really, what's up with the organs used for reproduction and for excretion being the same (for men) or very, very close (for women)?  The two functions have nothing to do with each other, and there's no reason they couldn't be separated.  And, really, they should be - if I were designing an animal, they'd be pretty darn far apart.  But in fact they're not, presumably because although the system we have ain't perfect, it works well enough to keep the species self-perpetuating - the sign of a system that evolved, not that was "designed" by an omnipotent being.
• The author does an excellent job of summarizing the trick ID promoters have used in advancing their phony cause.  He first describes the right way to create controversy in science:
  • "The legitimate way to stir up such a storm is to come up with an alternative theory that makes a prediction that is crisply denied by the reigning theory - but that turns out to be true, or that explains something that has been baffling defenders of the status quo, or that unifies two distant theories at the cost of some element of the currently accepted view."  He notes, however, that "to date, the proponents of intelligent design have not produced anything like that. No experiments with results that challenge any mainstream biological understanding. No observations from the fossil record or genomics or biogeography or comparative anatomy that undermine standard evolutionary thinking."
  • Then he explains how the ID promoters have cheated - they have done an end-run around this process: "the proponents of intelligent design use a ploy that works something like this. First you misuse or misdescribe some scientist's work. Then you get an angry rebuttal. Then, instead of dealing forthrightly with the charges leveled, you cite the rebuttal as evidence that there is a "controversy" to teach."
  • In short, the ID gang has created "controversy" where none should exist.  And that is, so far, their greatest victory.  I made a similar point here.

Like I said, it's a great article and you should read the whole thing.  And then you should visit this site, which has a less high-minded, but much funnier, take on the "intelligent design" issue.  About the site, I will only say this: it is the home page of the Church of the Flying Spaghetti Monster.

Money talks part II

... but does it knock-'n'-drag?

A fellow named Dave posted these links to the Medfordmass Yahoo group -- they may have shown up in the bazillion comments here, sorry if I missed them:

• An article about campaign spending by the various candidates in the Winchester Star. Here's a tidbit from that:

"Casey spent $260.96 on cakes for the elderly and Mackey spent $152.65 on helium in hopes of lifting his campaign with balloons. Jehlen hoped to make a splash by dropping $75.72 into a soup party for her campaign."

There's a few one-liners in there somewhere...

• Good old-fashioned spying on your neighbors from the Office of Campaign and Political Finance, with contributions and amounts for any candidate you want.

Video of yesterday's debate

In case you weren't awake yesterday morning @ 8:35 ... there's a link to yesterday's Senate debate, moderated by Jon Keller of WBZ4, at the bottom of this page. (Thanks to Jonathan of the medfordmass Yahoo group.)

As I've noted, the candidates all seemed to be coffee-achieved and awake for the event.

Bay Windows backs Jehlen

The endorsements in the 2nd Middlesex Senate race are still trickling in - Boston's major gay and lesbian newspaper, Bay Windows, has endorsed Pat Jehlen.  They also had kind words for Joe Mackey ("just the sort of person we want in politics"), but concluded that, among other things, Jehlen's vocal support for gay marriage since the Goodridge decision and her appreciation for the special issues facing the GLBT community made her their pick.

I thought Bay Windows' editorial supporting Jehlen was quite good.  I will confess to being a tad put off by the pro-Jehlen stuff coming out of MassEquality and others - after reading it, you could be forgiven for thinking that Pat Jehlen was running against a bunch of James Dobson clones.  The fact is, of course, that Mackey has come out strongly in favor of gay rights, including marriage, and even Michael Callahan has said that he doesn't favor amending the state Constitution to ban gay marriage - Paul Casey is the only anti-marriage candidate in this race.  For that matter, the Globe's endorsement of Mackey suffered from a bit of the same problem by saying nothing about any of the other candidates.  Good for Bay Windows to acknowledge the race as it actually exists, lay out their reasons, and make their choice.

Just like that old time HMO

Tufts Health Plan says forward -- into the paaasssst ...

Link:

Tufts Health Plan is trying to revive the company by returning to old-fashioned managed care: The insurer has put its own nurses into hospitals to monitor patient stays and is requiring doctors to get permission to perform hysterectomies, back surgeries, and certain other procedures.

Ugh... yeah, we've seen this movie before. The moral-hazard cops  manage to piss off patients, doctors, politicians, you name it. Tufts wants to cut costs and offer lower rates, but I can't imagine many more people are going to want to sign up for it unless they've learned something from the mid-90's HMO horror stories. If so, I hope they share it with the rest of us.

Traffic on Blue Mass. Group

A regular reader posted a comment asking how many visitors Blue Mass. Group receives, and I thought other readers might be interested as well.  These numbers are of course approximate because they're based entirely on the cookies that our tracking software is able to place and read, but with that caveat, here is some basic information.

On a typical weekday, we receive between 300 and 500 unique visitors (you are a "unique visitor" if you are either here for the first time, or are returning more than one hour after your last visit).  Weekends tend to be slower - between 100 and 300 unique visitors.  And on some days our traffic shoots up substantially - on Friday, for example, our post on ex-US Marshal Anthony Dichio was picked up by buzzflash, resulting in almost 2,000 visitors, and yesterday our post on Mitt Romney and the National Guard was picked up here and here, giving us our biggest weekend ever at 750 visitors yesterday and 500 (so far) today.  Since we went live nine months ago, nearly 75,000 unique visitors have stopped by.

That's the traffic report.  This also seems like a good opportunity to extend, on behalf of all of us here, a HUGE "thank you" to all of our readers, without whom this blog would serve no useful purpose whatsoever.  I very much hope that you find this an interesting, informative, thought-provoking, and entertaining place to visit, and that you'll keep coming back.

Well, that was quick!

Two days after the Globe published the results of the Justice Department's investigation into the questionable work habits of US Marshal Anthony Dichio, he has been fired.  No surprise about the final result, really; the Globe's report was pretty damning, and the DOJ investigation didn't cut Dichio any slack.  Dichio never should have been in this job, so better late than never.

Speaking of "late," though, the really interesting nugget in today's Globe article is this: the DOJ report on Dichio "was completed in March, but was not released until Wednesday, in response to a request by the Globe under the Freedom of Information Act." 

So let's see.  The DOJ Inspector General completed his report five months ago, whereupon it was undoubtedly relegated to dust-gathering.  Amazingly, though, the final decision on what to do about Dichio comes a mere two days after the results are publicized under a Freedom of Information Act request!  I'm sure the Globe article had nothing to do with that, though - it must be just a remarkable coincidence that DOJ's and the White House's "internal review process" terminated just when this week's Globe article came out.  Amazing how that happens!  [UPDATE (8/30): Barney Frank agrees that this coincidence is just a bit much.]

Well, whatever.  At least this slacker is gone.  It's probably up to Mitt Romney, as MA's highest-ranking elected Republican, to recommend the next marshal.  Suggestion to Mitt: try to get at least Kennedy and Kerry on board with your choice - and don't recommend your driver.

DiMasi: "Barriage" unlikely

The game's not over, but we may be heading into the late innings: Sal DiMasi has deemed "unlikely" the passage of the "barriage" constitutional amendment (i.e. Travaglini-Lees). The anti-marriage groups and Governor Landslide are pushing for the outright ban, to be on the 2008 ballot if AG Reilly approves it.

It's encouraging that the pro-marriage groups seemed to have made peace with the laissez-faire and nose-holding contingents, if three of the four candidates in this morning's debate are to be believed. The movement still seems to be towards allowing marriage and "moving on". Nothing I'd like better.

2nd Middlesex: Candidates on fast-forward

So, Channel 4 gave the four candidates 25 minutes to debate, and they all raced through four or five issues, all speaking very fast, except Jehlen. There were really no surprises. These are my initial and superficial impressions, which you can supplement.

• Casey is hyper, reminds one of Denis Leary. Claims the fiscal conservative mantle.
• Callahan really loves the lottery. Move on from gay marriage.
• Jehlen speaks slowly and gently, claims progressive mantle. Straightforward on marriage, relatively so on mandates for health care. Mentioned Health Care for All's plan.
• Mackey speaks fast, jumped in immediately in "open rebuttals" (bad idea on station's part); touted Shannon's widow's endorsement; talked a lot about going door-to-door; measured tones about gay marriage (supports it, acknowledges resistance but says people have other priorities); doesn't support mandates on small business. Property tax tough on older people.

If you watched it, fill in your own impressions.

Health hazard

Health Care for All points to an important and typically terse article in the New Yorker by Malcolm Gladwell, the author of The Tipping Point and Blink. Gladwell essentially studies how people make decisions, as a group and as individuals.

"Moral Hazard" is the idea that if something is freely available, people will use too much of it. Essentially, you can break down liberalism vs. conservativism as concern about Injustice (liberals) vs. concern about Getting Something You Don't Deserve (conservatives).

Gladwell tears down the idea that the problem with health care is that our demand needs to be externally controlled: In fact, limiting consumption of health care is what causes it to cost so damn much in the long run. When you "disincent" someone from going to the doctor via co-pays or deductibles, they are less likely to get care they actually need, and get sicker because of it. That's expensive.

“Moral hazard is overblown,” the Princeton economist Uwe Reinhardt says. “You always hear that the demand for health care is unlimited. This is just not true. People who are very well insured, who are very rich, do you see them check into the hospital because it’s free? Do people really like to go to the doctor? Do they check into the hospital instead of playing golf?”

The frame that we need to work on, though, is something that Governor Landslide has declared: Every man and woman is an island in health care:

''It's the ultimate conservative idea, which is that people have responsibility for their own care, and they don't look to government to take of them if they can afford to take care of themselves."

Well, maybe health care isn't the place for playing around with "Ultimate Conservative Ideas".

Basically, it comes down to this: If you think that health is:

• the individual's responsibility
• that people get what they deserve and deserve what they get
• that if you were just smarter you wouldn't have gotten diabetes, that broken arm, or if you'd just brushed harder you wouldn't have lost your teeth to decay;
• etc.

... then yeah, health care is the individual's responsibility, like car insurance.

On the other hand, if :

• you think health has a huge component of luck;
• if you hope to get old and therefore likely incur some big expenses someday;
• if you're young and hope to have children soon;
• if you brush and floss and get exercise and yet still get sick sometimes;
• etc

Then we need another model of health care. It's called social insurance, where people take care of each other. Look, if this were happening through the free markets, that would be great. But it's not. We need to government to step in.

Public policy, like all management, is largely about what kind of problems you're willing to put up with.  The kinds of problems we have now are unspeakably cruel to many people. I'll gladly exchange a bureaucratic problem for making sure people can keep their teeth and don't die young, unnecessarily.

"I have not urged my own children to enlist"

Thus spake Governor Romney, when asked by a Herald reporter whether, as part of his campaign to encourage Massachusetts residents to sign up for the National Guard, he has brought the campaign to his 24- to 35-year old (i.e., eligible) sons.  The article is entitled "Mitt backs war, but his boys are safe at home."  Romney is a stalwart supporter of President Bush's Iraq policy and has not, as far as I know, voiced any of the concerns mentioned by fellow Republicans John McCain, Chuck Hagel, and others.

Is this cheap "gotcha" journalism?  I really don't think so.  If an elected official like Romney is willing to go public with his support of Bush's Iraq policy and urge other people to send their wives, husbands, mothers, fathers, daughters, and sons into the National Guard - where, of course, they stand a reasonably good chance of being called to serve in Iraq - it seems perfectly reasonable to ask whether Romney himself is willing to do the same.  And if he is not willing to do so, he had better have a really, really good reason why the Guard is the right choice for other people's flesh and blood, but not his.

UPDATE: Turns out the Herald put a blurb for this story on today's front page, in a can't-miss bright red box that says "The Herald asks Mitt: 'If you support the war, why aren't your boys over there?'"  You gotta love the Herald - they get a lot of things wrong, but every now and then they really nail it.  Also, FWIW, I cross-posted this over at Kos and it made the "recommended diary" list, so lots of non-MA folks are hearing about this.  How's that landslide looking now, Governor?

Second Middlesex candidates debate on Channel 4 tomorrow morning

Channel 4 will carry a debate among the four Democratic candidates for the Second Middlesex Senate seat tomorrow (Sunday) morning, bright and early, at 8:35 a.m.  This according to today's Globe, which also has a brief rundown of the candidates' positions on taxes, health care, and allowing slot machines.  Good to see that the Globe is covering the race in the City/Region section instead of the regional weeklies.

Governor Landslide

Mitt on Hardball last night:

Well, I win by a landslide in Massachusetts if I run for reelection.  And that's very possibly what I'm going to do.

Landslide. Welcome to immortality, Mitt.

Also, evidence why the real Chris Matthews is stranger than any Saturday Night Live parody:

MATTHEWS:  You mean if we called it marriage II or barriage or come up with some other word, and yet the law was exactly the same, that would be significant?

Cue up the Bud Light "Real Men of Genius" song...

The sad tale of a lazy hack

Nancy McGillivray had been US Marshal for the District of Massachusetts in charge of security for the Mass. federal courts since 1994, and had been with the Marshals Service for 24 years.  Seems like reappointment would have been in order when her term was set to expire in 2002.

But George W. Bush would have none of it.  Bush's friend Paul Cellucci, upon whom he had recently conferred the Ambassadorship to Canada, had recommended replacing McGillivray with his loyal head of security, State Trooper Anthony Dichio (and what do we have as a parting gift, Vanna?).  Senators Kerry and Kennedy, and most of the congressional delegation, objected, but to no avail (they're Democrats, after all).  Then 9/11 happened, and Kerry and Kennedy, joined by A.G. Tom Reilly, ratcheted up the pressure on then-Acting Governor Jane Swift, urging that Dichio was not the right man for the job (among other things, he had no experience dealing with terrorism-related threats), and that in light of the increased need to focus on security around federal courts, installing a patronage appointment like Dichio was a particularly bad idea, so Swift should withdraw her support.

No luck.  Swift stood by Dichio, Bush nominated him, and he was ultimately confirmed.

After assuming his new office, Dichio gave an interview in which he said all the right things: "There are a lot of security issues that need to be addressed, especially in the wake of September 11.... I am saying that safety and security are my top priorities.... It's a huge responsibility, and I look forward to the challenge this job will bring."

Part of the "challenge," apparently, was finding the time to take care of those pesky errands like grocery shopping - you know how much less crowded the aisles are if you go during the middle of the day?  Two Boston Globe reporters tailed Dichio for 10 days back in September and October and found that he rarely if ever put in a full 8 hour workday - his average was 4 hours and 22 minutes, and he scored a goose-egg on a couple of them - even though his time sheets showed 8 hours each day.  The article, featuring a photo of Dichio loading the back of his government-issued SUV with groceries in the middle of a weekday afternoon, was devastating, and an investigation commenced.

Well, as the Globe reports today, the results are in.  The Inspector General of the Justice Department has concluded that Dichio broke the law by not working full days and using his official car for personal business, and that he should be disciplined, "including consideration of whether he should remain as US Marshal."  Particularly amusing are Dichio's lame-ass excuses for his chronic inability to show up for work.  They're in the article, and there's really no clever comment I can add that will make them seem more pathetic than they are.

Apparently, the Inspector General's report is "under review" at the Justice Department.  President Bush will have to sign off on any discipline, since Dichio is a presidential appointee.

What an appalling saga of hackery run amok.  Kudos to the Globe for exposing it.  Obviously, this guy was never the right person for this important job, and we're very fortunate that, so far, his lackadaisical approach to his post hasn't resulted in a major incident in Massachusetts (maybe it's been a blessing in disguise - I love the comment in today's Globe article that "one manager was quoted as saying that the operation ran more smoothly with Dichio out of the office").  Patronage, unpleasant as it is, will never be eliminated, but this ought to be a cautionary tale to those politicians who would place personal loyalty above national security.  (*cough* George Bush *cough* Karl Rove *cough*)

Open thread redux

Five days until election day.  Time for another open thread on the Second Middlesex Senate race.

First, a couple of updates: according to several comments in this thread, the Somerville Journal's print edition today endorsed Joe Mackey, yet for some reason the endorsement doesn't appear in the paper's online version, so I can't link to it.  The Somerville Journal has endorsed Joe Mackey (hat tip to alert reader Ron Newman).  No endorsement appears in either the print or online edition of the Medford Transcript, and the Boston Phoenix mentions the race but doesn't take a position.

Have candidates been beating down your door or causing your phone to ring off the hook?  What do you see out in the neighborhoods?  What's the buzz in your neck of the woods?  Go to it.

Yet another endorsement for Jehlen

Herewith the latest from Cos.  Just for the record, Cos doesn't speak for the rest of Blue Mass. Group on this - as you know, we haven't taken a position as between Jehlen and Mackey, and I know less about Jesse Gordon than I do about quantum mechanics.  -- David

MassForDean co-founder Jesse Gordon, now a candidate for Cambridge City Council, formally endorsed Pat Jehlen in a press release in the Cambridge Chronicle this week. I'm on Jesse Gordon's city council campaign staff, and we've been plugging Pat Jehlen for a while now. Why does this endorsement matter?

It matters because we're an active campaign located right next to the Second Middlesex district. We have an office, a staff, and volunteers, and have been sending groups out canvassing every weekend for a while. Now, we're asking all of our people to join Pat Jehlen's GOTV. All of our staff, and Jesse, will participate on the 30th.

It also matters because Jesse has made himself well known among Massachusetts progressive activists over the past few years, through such things as being IT director for the Robert Reich for Governor campaign, co-founding MassForDean, the Mass Scorecard, and coordinating progressive action at state conventions. Many of these people are on Jesse's email lists, are active, and this will reinforce the message that progressive Democrat ought to volunteer for Pat Jehlen.

Here's our press release that appeared in the Cambridge Chronicle today:

This week, the Jesse Gordon Campaign wishes to remind Cantabrigians that Pat Jehlen's election for State Senate in the 2nd Middlesex District is this coming Tuesday, August 30. This Senate district includes Somerville and several neighboring counties, but not Cambridge. However, the winner of the 2nd Middlesex election matters in to this city as well. Often, our best means of addressing vital issues such as our tax policies, health care system, and school funding is to work with our State Senators and Representatives. Our campaign has made this point frequently in regard to the property assessment issue. Pat Jehlen is a strong pillar of the progressive community, and she will be a valuable leader in the Statehouse.

Jesse Gordon and his campaign staff are taking next Tuesday, August 30, off from our campaign to help Pat Jehlen. We encourage other Cambridge progressives to do the same.

Reality from Iraq

A bit of reality from Iraq should BMG readers want to take a break from MA politics:

"Under US noses, brutal insurgents rule Sunni citadel. Guardian gains rare access to Iraqi town and finds it fully in control of 'mujahideen'. By Omer Mahdi in Haditha and Rory Carroll in Baghdad. Monday August 22, 2005. The Guardian:

"The executions are carried out at dawn on Haqlania bridge, the entrance to Haditha. A small crowd usually turns up to watch even though the killings are filmed and made available on DVD in the market the same afternoon.

"One of last week's victims was a young man in a black tracksuit. Like the others he was left on his belly by the blue iron railings at the bridge's southern end. His severed head rested on his back, facing Baghdad.

Children cheered when they heard that the next day's spectacle would be a double bill: two decapitations. A man named Watban and his brother had been found guilty of spying.

"With so many alleged American agents dying here Haqlania bridge was renamed Agents' bridge. Then a local wag dubbed it Agents' fridge, evoking a mortuary, and that name has stuck.

"A three-day visit by a reporter working for the Guardian last week established what neither the Iraqi government nor the US military has admitted: Haditha, a farming town of 90,000 people by the Euphrates river, is an insurgent citadel.

That Islamist guerrillas were active in the area was no secret but only now has the extent of their control been revealed. They are the sole authority, running the town's security, administration and communications.

A three-hour drive north from Baghdad, under the nose of an American base, it is a miniature Taliban-like state. Insurgents decide who lives and dies, which salaries get paid, what people wear, what they watch and listen to.

Haditha exposes the limitations of the Iraqi state and US power on the day when the political process is supposed to make a great leap - a draft constitution finalised and approved by midnight tonight.

For politicians and diplomats in Baghdad's fortified green zone the constitution is a means to stabilise Iraq and woo Sunni Arabs away from the rebellion. For Haditha, 140 miles north-west of the capital, whether a draft is agreed is irrelevant. Residents already have a set of laws and rules promulgated by insurgents.

Within minutes of driving into town the Guardian was stopped by a group of men and informed about rule number one: announce yourself. The mujahideen, as they are known locally, must know who comes and goes.

The Guardian reporter did not say he worked for a British newspaper. For their own protection interviewees cannot be named.

There is no fighting here because there is no one to challenge the Islamists. The police station and municipal offices were destroyed last year and US marines make only fleeting visits every few months.

Two groups share power. Ansar al-Sunna is a largely homegrown organisation, though its leader in Haditha is said to be foreign. Al-Qaida in Iraq, known locally by its old name Tawhid al-Jihad, is led by the Jordanian-born Abu Musab al-Zarqawi. There was a rumour that Zarqawi, Washington's most wanted militant after Osama bin Laden, visited early last week. True or not, residents wanted to believe they had hosted such a celebrity.

A year ago Haditha was just another sleepy town in western Anbar province, deep in the Sunni triangle and suspicious of the Shia-led government in Baghdad but no insurgent hotbed.

Then, say residents, arrived mostly Shia police with heavyhanded behaviour. "That's how it began," said one man. Attacks against the police escalated until they fled, creating a vacuum filled by insurgents.

Alcohol and music deemed unIslamic were banned, women were told to wear headscarves and relations between the sexes were closely monitored. The mobile phone network was shut down but insurgents retained their walkie-talkies and satellite phones. Right-hand lanes are reserved for their vehicles.

From attacks on US and Iraqi forces it is clear that other Anbar towns, such as Qaim, Rawa, Anna and Ramadi, are to varying degrees under the sway of rebels.

In Haditha hospital staff and teachers are allowed to collect government salaries in Ramadi, the capital of Anbar, but other civil servants have had to quit.

Last year the US trumpeted its rehabilitation of a nearby power plant: "The incredible progress at Haditha is just one example of the huge strides made by the US army corps of engineers."

Now insurgents earn praise from residents for allegedly pressuring managers to supply electricity almost 24 hours a day, a luxury denied the rest of Iraq.

The court caters solely for divorces and marriages. Alleged criminals are punished in the market. The Guardian witnessed a headmaster accused of adultery whipped 190 times with cables. Children laughed as he sobbed and his robe turned crimson.

Two men who robbed a foreign exchange shop were splayed on the ground. Masked men stood on their hands while others broke their arms with rocks. The shopkeeper offered the insurgents a reward but they declined.

DVDs of beheadings on the bridge are distributed free in the souk. Children prefer them to cartoons. "They should not watch such things," said one grandfather, but parents appeared not to object.

One DVD features a young, blond muscular man who had been disembowelled. He was said to have been a member of a six-strong US sniper team ambushed and killed on August 1. Residents said he had been paraded in town before being executed.

The US military denied that, saying six bodies were recovered and that all appeared to have died in combat. Shortly after the ambush three landmines killed 14 marines in a convoy which ventured from their base outside the town.

Twice in recent months marines backed by aircraft and armour swept into Haditha to flush out the rebels. In a pattern repeated across Anbar there were skirmishes, a few suspects killed or detained, and success was declared.

In reality, said residents, the insurgents withdrew for a few days and returned when the Americans left. They have learned from last November's battle in Falluja, when hundreds died fighting the marines and still lost the city.

Now their strategy appears to be to wait out the Americans, calculating they will leave within a few years, and then escalate what some consider the real war against a government led by Shias, a rival sect which Sunni extremists consider apostasy.

The US military declined to respond to questions detailing the extent of insurgent control in the town.

There was evidence of growing cooperation between rebels. A group in Falluja, where the resistance is said to be regrouping, wrote to Haditha requesting background checks on two volunteers from the town.

One local man in his 40s told the Guardian he wanted to be a suicide bomber to atone for sins and secure a place in heaven. "But the mujahideen will not let me. They said I had eight children and it was my duty to look after them."

Tribal elders said they feared but respected insurgents for keeping order and not turning the town into a battleground.

They appear to have been radicalised, and condemned Sunni groups, such as the Iraqi Islamic party and the Muslim Scholars' Association, for engaging in the political process.

The constitution talks, the referendum due in October, the election due in December: all are deemed collaboration punishable by death. The task now is to bleed the Americans and destabilise the government. Some call that nihilism. Haditha calls it the future.

Grabauskas vs. Dukakis

Just now on Fox 25 news, Dan Grabauskas was given the opportunity to strike back at Mike Dukakis for the former governor's lambasting of a couple of weeks ago. It was interesting to hear how much Grabauskas spoke in the future tense: We're spending $2 billion dollars on improvements, replacing the "joke" of a PA system (some nice calculated outrage on that one), elevators and escalators will be fixed any day now, folks, really... And then Grabauskas compared the Dukakis administration unfavorably to Romney's vis-a-vis the MBTA: the Savin Hill stop was a mess back then, now it's pretty, etc.

Waa-a-a-ll, it's August 2005. Mitt has been in office, if not in charge, for more than two and a half years. The Guv's book on public transportation is not yet complete, perhaps, but can we agree it hasn't exactly been stellar so far? Was he pro-active? Was the PA system first and foremost in his mind before the London bombings? Is garbage like this Orange Line SNAFU -- which is after all partly just a matter of lousy communication on a *really* basic level, as Pelican points out -- really unavoidable? The near-riots this winter, which (I guess) were due to maintenance problems?

I mean, it's nice for Grabauskas to acknowledge the problems that we're all aware of, right? But spare us the defensive, invidious comparisons with twenty years ago. The only meaningful question is: Is the MBTA better off than it was two and a half years ago?

Mackey picks up another media endorsement

The Somerville News, in a rather oddly written post that makes very creative (and possibly unintentional) use of fonts, has endorsed Joe Mackey for the 2nd Middlesex Senate seat.

Who is the Somerville News, anyway?  Do they have a print edition, or are they only a Typepad blog?  They seem to have inside sources who like to whisper to them about the goings-on in Somerville - at least, they claim to - but are they a real paper?  Just askin'...

Too smart for their own good

The Volokh Conspiracy is a group blawg (i.e., law-related blog) composed mainly of right-leaning law professors.  Its founder (Eugene Volokh, a 1st Amendment, intellectual property, and cyberlaw specialist) is an acquaintance of mine.  It is one of the most widely-read blawgs of any political leaning, and is more or less required daily reading for those interested in the blawgosphere.  And despite its generally conservative bent, the posts are well written and at least thought provoking, if not always ultimately convincing (at least to me).

However, this series of posts strikes me as an excellent example of how intelligent conservatives are sometimes, frankly, the unwitting dupes of the foulest elements of the Republican party.  The subject is whether gay people attempt to "convert" others to become homosexuals.  The whole thing is quite long and riddled with more statistics than any sane person would want to read through.  But here's how I see it playing out in the greater scheme of things:

• Nasty right-winger: "Gay people try to convert 'normal' people into becoming gay, and therefore we should ban them from being schoolteachers."
• Normal human: "That's the stupidest thing I've ever heard - gay people don't try to 'convert' straight people into anything.  Gay people just want all people to be accepted and not discriminated against regardless of their sexual orientation."
• Way-too-smart right-leaning law professor: "I have data to support the proposition that some people who have only had heterosexual relationships nonetheless harbor some homosexual tendencies, and it stands to reason that gay people might want to encourage such people to act on those tendencies, if only because logically it seems to follow that gay people would want people who are in fact either gay or at least bisexual to be more comfortable with their homosexual tendencies.  And, applying the normal meaning of the word 'convert,' it follows that gay people generally want to 'convert' (that is, to change the belief or practice of) people who previously only behaved heterosexually into a behavior pattern that includes some homosexual activity."
• Normal person: "Huh?"
• Nasty right-winger: "Aha, you see?  Mr. Smarty-Pants Law Professor agrees that gays are trying to convert decent 'normal' folk into homos, and he has the studies that prove it.  Therefore, the motion to ban gays from the school is hereby approved."
• Way-too-smart right-leaning law professor: "No, no, that's not what I meant at all.  I was just trying to explain that ..."
• Nasty right-winger: "Next item on the agenda, please."

Eugene Volokh is not by any stretch of the imagination anti-gay.  To the contrary, he favors gay marriage, and he is generally libertarian when it comes to issues of intimate behavior.  The problem is that these clever law profs seem to be somewhat naive about how the real world - and in particular the rabid wing of the party for which they presumably vote most of the time - works.  So let me spell it out for them.  It is not about truth.  It is not about accuracy.  It is not about fairness.  It is, rather, about deceptive marketing, and arguments like this are simply fodder for the deceptive marketing machine.  No one cares whether what Eugene says is accurate (maybe it is - I didn't have the patience to read through all the stats).  Simply by giving cover to the "conversion" nonsense, he has handed the wingnuts a gigantic gift.  It's like the so-called "debate" over intelligent design - the whole right-wing game is to create doubt through deceptive marketing, not to actually prove the unprovable (which is of course impossible).  By creating a debate over evolution vs. "intelligent design," the wingnuts have already won.  Same thing with gays trying to "convert" straights - by giving the silly "conversion" notion any credibility, the clever law profs unwittingly aid and abet the goal of deceptive marketing, of creating doubt where none should exist.

Mass. Dems gettin' local

This interesting post on the state party's blog announces a "Victory '06" campaign, the goal of which is to have active precinct and block captains in each of Massachusetts' 2156 election precincts.  Good for the Mass. Dems to announce and start recruiting for this campaign now, rather than next August.  As one of the commenters on the post said, the Republicans figured this kind of thing out some time ago and consequently have won more elections of late.  If the Democrats can match the Republicans in organization - and that's a mighty big "if" - we can surely beat them on the issues.

2nd Middlesex Senate race: Blue Mass. Group endorses ...

Joe Jehlen!  No, wait - it's ... Pat Mackey!  No, wait ...

That's right, folks.  We can't make up our minds.  So we're endorsing both Jehlen and Mackey as clearly preferable to Michael Callahan (a charter member of the hackocracy who seems to have few convictions other than "more bucks for my district," which is fine as far as it goes, but one does yearn for just a tad more) and Paul Casey (too conservative for our taste).  But we're not going to take a position on Jehlen vs. Mackey. 

Instead, as those of you who live in the district and haven't yet made up your minds march toward election day (a week from today), we'll float a couple of questions you might keep in mind:

• Which candidate will work for you, your family, and your community by
  • voting the way you want on issues you care about?
  • making sure that roads, bridges, parks, schools, libraries, and other public facilities in the district are kept in shape?
  • answering the phone when you call and working with you and the community when you bring a constituent issue to his or her attention?
  • working effectively with other legislators to advance all of the above?
• Are you worried about "splitting" the "progressive vote"? 
  • If so, which way does that cut?  Jehlen has the interest group endorsements and the edge in cash, but Mackey has the Globe and arguably the momentum.
• Are you worried about who might take Jehlen's place in the House if she were to win?
• Do you feel that you can "send a message" with your vote beyond voting for the person whose interests most closely match yours?
  • If so, what is the message, and why do you think your vote can send it?

I'm sure there are other good questions voters should ask themselves.  Those are just off the top of my head.  If you've got some, or if you've got answers to ours, drop them in the comments.

Here comes the Sun

The Lowell Sun sheds some, uh, light on the two forward-thinking health care proposals. It's fairly clear and concise, and eyeball-glazing is minimal. It addresses the proposed constitutional amendment for universal health care:

The Legislature would be required to “enact and implement such laws as will ensure that no Massachusetts resident lacks comprehensive, affordable, and equitably financed health insurance” for all “medically necessary” services, according to the question.

They also discuss the ballot initiative for the Health Access and Affordability Act ("HA3") (which the Sun strangely re-named the "Massachusetts Quality Affordable Health Care Act"... am I missing something?). UPDATE: Cape Ann Dem's Patrick Abegg points out that the new title is for the ballot initiative, not the bill before the legislature, which is still "HA3". Thanks for the clarification.

Now we're really getting somewhere!

In a must-read post, Lynne at Left in Lowell absolutely knocks this one out of the park. She crushes arguments that a single-payer system would be more expensive, and makes this critical point:

... The “Yugo” plans that Romney and Travaglini have put forward [are] hardly better than being uninsured, because many people will still have to forgo crucial care when it is not covered. That you save money for the government in the long run by preventative care and other non-Yugo benefits seems not to penetrate these people’s skulls. You can’t say “certainly that would include preventative, basic, safety-net care” but support Romney’s plan. [my emphasis]

Lynne also lays out the economic competitiveness argument:

And hey, we’re already driving businesses out of the state in droves, partly because of our high cost of living. If we move to a lower cost-per-person state-run single payer government plan (and trust me, it will be lower cost and way more efficient), suddenly Massachusetts is a competitive place to do business again. For a lot less than private coverage costs in other states, businesses will be able to insure their workers.

In other words, we'll be more attractive to those businesses that already insure their employees. This is good.

Read both the Sun article and Lynne's post and be a BMG Ranger™ for the day! (I don't know what being a BMG Ranger™ means... I'll think of something.)

 

Bubble bubble toil and trouble: Been there, done that...

... bought the T-shirt.

In other bubble news, this diary at Kos points to slowing price increases in some west suburban communities. But with increasing inventories, maybe there's sanity at the end of the tunnel:

Gelineau predicts that asking prices will remain fairly stable but in the long run, sale prices will be 5 to 10 percent less than sellers asked. "Buyers are going to scrutinize everything and not pay crazy prices because they don't have to."

Wow, what a world that would be ... not paying crazy prices because you don't have to. I remember the market economy...
 

Money talks ...

... but what is it saying?

A press release from the Pat Jehlen campaign reports that she has raised more money, and has more money in the bank, than any of the other three candidates for the Second Middlesex Senate seat.  According to the release, which says it's based on OCPF filings, Jehlen has raised about $113,000 to Mackey's $75,000 and Casey's $50,000.  Callahan, apparently, did not bother to file.  The release also notes that as of the August 12 filing date, Jehlen had about $59,000 in the bank, compared to Mackey's $22,000 and Casey's $18,000.

This is, of course, good news for Jehlen - other things being equal, more money is better than less money.  At the same time, though, it's not very surprising - after all, Jehlen has amassed a list of endorsements from interest groups far longer than any other candidate, and endorsements like those are probably most useful for raising money (I can't tell you how many emails I've gotten from MassEquality and others urging me to donate to or volunteer for Jehlen).  What I actually find somewhat surprising - and not such good news for Jehlen - is that Mackey, presumably competing for a lot of the same voters as Jehlen, was able to raise as much money as he did without anywhere near the special interest group assistance that Jehlen had.  Remember, the maximum donation in Massachusetts campaigns is $500, and of course lots of people only send in $25 if they send anything at all, so raising $75,000 for a special election without a slew of special interest groups behind you is no mean feat.

All of which is to say: take this stuff for what it's worth, i.e., not a whole lot.  As everyone recognizes (but as it's worth reiterating), it's not ultimately about how much money you raised, or how many endorsements you have, or which newspapers are behind you.  It's about how many people you can get to show up on August 30 and vote for you.

This post sucks

... 'cause this is what a political vacuum looks like:

ARG poll: Bush 36% approval rating.

Limbaugh's and Hannity's radio ratings cratering in Minneapolis, major metropolitan area in a swing state; guys (mostly) turning to sports talk instead.
Romney rates a cool 30% re-elect number.

Yeah, these are all over the place, and unrelated... but I think it's clear that pe