In the heat of the election season, I'm making some appearances to discuss issues around the state and figured I'd let readers know ahead of time. It's always fun to write blogs, but it's more fun to actually get to meet people and participate in different venues and settings. Best of all, I love being forced to defend positions and listen to people with other perspectives.
On this coming Wednesday I'm popping on Channel 95's "the Rational Individualist," which airs in Fairhaven, Acushnet, and New Bedford, but will be broadcast later. The show will be about politics, but much more so on broad ideas as opposed to really detailed issues - which is radically different than my site. It'll be an opportunity for me to discuss political concepts that are always on my mind, but don't necessarily fit in the context of this blog (which has become, almost exclusively, about state politics). I'm especially excited to talk about the greater progressive movement and why, after decades of failures, it's finally becoming the political force it could have always been.
The following Wednesday, on the 25th, I've agreed to do a forum at the UMASS Dartmouth Library, on the behalf of the College Dems. Joining me will be several other groups to discuss electoral politics in Massachusetts for this upcoming race. There's going to be all sorts of people on the panel, so it could be explosive. I'm looking forward to it. I'll give more information as I have it (I just agreed to do this tonight!).
Lastly (so far, anyway), on Friday the 27th, I'll be doing a panel discussion that will be podcasted and put on TV in the Worcester area. Several Massachusetts bloggers and campaign representatives will be there, including folks from BlueMassGroup and maybe others like Sco and Mike from MassMarrier. With the friendly folks at Saint Kermit hosting the event, it should be a great time and an even better (and more informative) discussion. The last election podcast I did with them went very well, technical glitches aside, and I expect this coming one to be even better, especially since we'll be doing this in person! Plus, I almost never make it out to the Worcester area and I've been hearing so much about how the city is progressing nicely - and I'm excited to see it!
So hopefully I'll get a chance to meet some readers - say hello! If anyone is interested in coming to these events, or wants to watch them when they're available, let me know and I'm sure I can get you any information and directions needed.
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8 comments:
I was wondering if you could give some good reasons to vote for Patrick. Dont give a reason like he is insperational, I want the reasons to be about issues and his ideas. I dont think he has had one good idea yet, or one plan that explains how his ideas will work other then he will have candor and grassroots, so I just cant vote for him. This is a real question and not a dig at Patrick.
Yeah we can all give you a ton of reasons but it's going to be based on issues we care about, which is different for everyone. What issues do you care about? Everyone's reasons for voting for someone are different, so what matters to you?
I have to agree, it's hard to give you reasons to vote for him without knowing about what you think is important. A lot of people supported him early on because of his stance on Cape Wind. Deval Patrick supported very early on - before polls indicated it was popular. He weighed all the evidence and found it to be a great project - it won't hurt birds (the Audobon society endorsed it), won't do significant damage to views (the few areas that *will* be effected - and it's only a few areas on the Cape - will see no more than a thumbprint on a really, really clear day).
He also has been a very strong and early proponent of equal rights and gay marraige, which is a very important issue to me. Any two consenting adults who love each other should have the same rights and privileges as others, lest they be second class citizens.
The biggest reason to vote for Deval is he's not beholden to the Democratic Party. As a frequent critic of Beacon Hill, I don't want a machine politician to get in power and let the Democrats do what they want. However, Republicans have proven very inneffective because a) they haven't cared about Massachusetts (witness all of them, including Mitt Romney, leave for greener pastures) and b) they just aren't powerful enough to counter the legislature. Deval Patrick will be powerful and has won in large part without the support of House and Senate leaders, who actually actively worked against him during the primary. Now he'll win on his own terms and can actually lead like a Governor should. He'll work together with them, but won't be afraid to stand up to them - and that's exactly what we need in a governor - someone who will work with them when possible, but not be afraid to stand up to them when necessary.
You failed to mention that Patrick once wrote a letter to corrections officals in Syracuse NY complaining that prisoners were being forced to use basketballs that weren't properly inflated.
Everyone should thank anon for pointing out another reason to vote Deval: Healey supports are pretty much complete and utter dicks. They would rather smear Deval than argue the merits of their candidate.
Even (or especially) HubPolitics and Scott Allen Miller are all about why not to vote for Deval rather than why to vote for Healey.
Does anyone outside of 3rd graders and Rush Limbaugh find comments like Scott Allen Miller's "Rumor has it that Scondras' barbecue sauce was a little on the salty side." clever, let alone funny? Is there any other point to this other than fag bashing Deval by implication?
Or does anyone else find Margolis brothers' claim that Deval's support is largely due to white guilt, a little, you know, racist?
I don't think it's fair to say that Healey's supporters are complete and utter dicks. I'd prefer to think of them as "weak minded imbeciles easily distracted by shiny objects and utter bs."
I don't find it a little racist, I find it a lot racist. The problem with weak minded imbeciles is that they assume everyone is just like them, close minded, juvenile, etc and just fighting it or something instead of recognizing that they don't actually represent the default mind set of the human race.
Okay anon, I'll tell you why I'm voting for Deval. I'm voting for him because my town is falling apart. The streets are crumbling, we don't have streetlights, crime is up, we don't have enough cops, property taxes are way too high to even consider buying. Romney doesn't care about actual policy or actual substance, all he cares about are politics and gimmicks and Healey is even more of a lightweight than he is. He's using our state as a springboard to higher office, she cares about her own vanity, not fixing all the problem we have. Unless we restore the local aid that they've slashed I don't know what's going to happen to my neighborhood. I don't want us to end up like Indiana, a red stae with lousy governance where parents have to pay $300 "rental fees" for each kids' textbooks every year. I don't have kids and maybe I won't, but it's still not fair that parents can't afford to allow their kids to participate in activies and they could hurt them when it's time to apply for college.
I've spent literally thousands of dollars on car repair as a direct result of damage caused by the crumbling roads. Deval wants to invest in public transportation and expand the Green Line. My parents are only children, so most of my relatives are older, they're my grandparents and their siblings. Kerry Healey thinks older people are "overhoused" and wants then to get out of their houses so yuppies can take them over. Nice, and what's going to happen to them, they should move into an assisted living facility they can't afford? Deval supports stem cell research, which will be an economic benefit to the state as well as a humanitarian issue, Kerry wants whatever the fundies want, and if people suffer, what the hell does she care? She'll be okay.
Deval supports the Constitution. He doesn't take cheap, easy stands that appeal to popular prejudices by go against everything this country stands for. He won't use our basic rights as a political football. He's against the death penalty, he believes in the justice system, not in random locking up whoever and evidence be damned like Kerry. He's against the death penalty, he's pro chice, he believe in equality for everybody even if it's unpopular. That's called leadership.
I've voting for Deval, too, because Kerry Healey doesn't have anything to offer except the same empty, useless rhetoric of Bush and Romney. Big talk, big photo ops, big corruption and incompetence. We've tried it their way and now we're in tough shape. We can't recover from years of useless governance overnight, so maybe we should get started. It's never made sense to me why we should put people who make no bones about hating government and public service in charge of administering the state and then act amazed when they don't care and sit around getting manicures while everything crumbles. Deval says vote for me and we'll address how the public machinery can address some the problems we face as a state. Kerry says, vote for me or you'll be raped by an illegal immigrant.
Oh, and I'm also voting for Deval because Healey's Willie Horton campaign has been a national embarssment. Racism shouldn't be rewarded. That's obviously all she's got to offer, but that doesn't justify it. Despite what Kerry thinks, the people of Mass are not stupid and racist and she can take her Karl Rove tactics, her increased crime rate, skyrocketing property taxes, her lost jobs and empty slogans, her lies and distortions and go on home.
Wow, lot's of great comments! Thanks. Keep it up!
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