Thursday, October 05, 2006
'A great, Boston-set crime drama,' Part II
No, not the movie. The Massachusetts gubernatorial race. Deval rightly continues to get pounded for l'affaire Ben LaGuer. This could have and should have been over by now -- if only Deval had come clean earlier. He didn't. Now it's drip-drip time, combined with a lot of fibs and forgets that voters register and never quite forget. But, wait! Healey, now pushing anti-Deval cop-killer ads, suddenly has her own coddling-cop-killer caper to deal with. It blunts her argument. But only to a degree: 'She didn’t file the guy’s appeal or personally plea for clemency.' ... Bottom line: Deval will be hurt by this. It could get worse. Depends on whether he keeps bungling the response and whether more revelations emerge. But the campaign fundamentals remain the same for now: People want change. I talked to a few moderate friends yesterday, both of whom said they were voting for Patrick. The reason cited is they're tired of Mitt -- and they mentioned Paul and Jane as well. All I could do was nod in agreement about the malaise. How can you get excited about voting for more mediocrity? Healey may keep jabbing and chipping away at Deval's lead. But she's really only running another 'against' campaign, not a 'for' campaign. ... For more Mitt, Paul and Jane? Try to get around that one. ...
Update -- Reader No. 1 responds:
Hug Blog's response -- Let's put it this way: This race is starting to distantly remind me of the '76 presidential contest -- with the mediocre Republican Ford, with all the post-Watergate/Vietnam GOP baggage, going up against the fresh unknown Dem Jimmy Carter, who turned out to be even more annoyingly mediocre after people narrowly voted him in largely for 'change.' ...
No, not the movie. The Massachusetts gubernatorial race. Deval rightly continues to get pounded for l'affaire Ben LaGuer. This could have and should have been over by now -- if only Deval had come clean earlier. He didn't. Now it's drip-drip time, combined with a lot of fibs and forgets that voters register and never quite forget. But, wait! Healey, now pushing anti-Deval cop-killer ads, suddenly has her own coddling-cop-killer caper to deal with. It blunts her argument. But only to a degree: 'She didn’t file the guy’s appeal or personally plea for clemency.' ... Bottom line: Deval will be hurt by this. It could get worse. Depends on whether he keeps bungling the response and whether more revelations emerge. But the campaign fundamentals remain the same for now: People want change. I talked to a few moderate friends yesterday, both of whom said they were voting for Patrick. The reason cited is they're tired of Mitt -- and they mentioned Paul and Jane as well. All I could do was nod in agreement about the malaise. How can you get excited about voting for more mediocrity? Healey may keep jabbing and chipping away at Deval's lead. But she's really only running another 'against' campaign, not a 'for' campaign. ... For more Mitt, Paul and Jane? Try to get around that one. ...
Update -- Reader No. 1 responds:
1- If mediocrity were a criteria for voting, we'd all pass on every election.
2- If the criteria is 'change,' that's different than 'mediocrity.' Patrick will surely be more interesting for reporters to cover but that's not a good criteria either.
3- What makes Deval any less mediocre than Healey or Mihos?
Hug Blog's response -- Let's put it this way: This race is starting to distantly remind me of the '76 presidential contest -- with the mediocre Republican Ford, with all the post-Watergate/Vietnam GOP baggage, going up against the fresh unknown Dem Jimmy Carter, who turned out to be even more annoyingly mediocre after people narrowly voted him in largely for 'change.' ...
