Monday, January 12, 2009

Stopped Reading Here

The very first sentence!
This is a truly marvelous, glorious state, where we can find millions for useless, utterly useless "full-time legislators" and no money for the most vulnerable kids among us.
Is this really coming from a regular columnist at the Boston Globe? An irrational, angry rant? (Is the Boston Globe now fighting for the Howie Carr audience? Good luck with that - and the whole integrity thing.)

Deep thought for Mr. Cullen: New Hampshire and Colorado are two states where State Reps are paid little to nothing, compared to the $61k salary in Massachusetts. The Bay State fairs better in everything from education to divorce rates. Are those states really better off treating their elected officials like members of a student council?

7 comments:

lovable liberal said...

What I posted at the Globe:

First, could the Globe please link to referenced articles? This one is at http://www.boston.com/news/local/massachusetts/articles/2009/01/11/pay_as_they_go/.

If you actually read it instead of foaming at the mouth with all the rage of ignorance, you'll find that Kevin Cullen is blaming the entire current legislature for a law that was passed 58 years ago, when not a single one of them was in office and many weren't even born, a law that is currently being exploited by a grand - and bipartisan - total of 14 ex-legislators, all of whom had to have 20 years of service by law. Further, the amounts of money are small. There's not a gold-plated golden parachute in the bunch.

None of that makes it right. This is definitely something that needs to be fixed. But could we just have proportionate and well-targeted anger instead of calling for pitchforks?

lovable liberal said...

Oops. Sorry about the missing A tag.

Here it is.

Ryan said...

I eventually did read the whole thing... and I have to say that I was amazed that it only got worse as it went along.

Your analysis is spot on, lovable.

Anonymous said...

I thought Cullen's column was 100% accurate and appropriate. What a bunch of thieves..
Signed, Lovable Republican

lovable liberal said...

Rebuttal: 1950!

Anonymous said...

Rebuttal: thieves

lovable liberal said...

Not the fault of the current legislature...

As I have stated from the beginning, despite every conservative's inability to read it, this is bad and needs to be fixed, especially regarding those disgraced legislators who resign one step ahead of indictment. But they already had their stupidity and outrage, and they just can't help expressing here, no matter how wrongly aimed and disproportionate.

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