Blue Mass Group

As are a lot of states, actually. Kevin Drum links to a ranking of the progressivity of states’ tax systems. We’re not very good.

Soaking the Poor, State by State | Mother Jones.

This is dumb. And wrong. As we know, in Massachusetts a progressive income tax is in fact prohibited by our constitution, although there may be some loopholes/workarounds to that.

A progressive income tax has been on the BMG agenda for years now. It would minimize the pain caused by revenue increases needed to stabilize the MBTA, for instance. In other words, a gas tax hike causes more actual quality-of-life-changing deprivation than would a slight progressive income tax tweak.

Conservatives frame progressive taxation as “punishing success” or “class warfare”. That’s silly, and a red herring, in that it proposes an “evil” intent behind the idea of progressive taxation — without actually demonstrating how it would be bad. Progressive taxation makes necessary public investments possible, while minimizing the actual human cost of raising the money. I strongly suspect that much anti-tax feeling among the non-rich is precisely the result of regressive taxation.

These public investments — infrastructure, education, health, justice — make broad-based prosperity possible, just as they also enable and make possible enormous private prosperity. If you’re going to get rich selling stuff, you need someone with the means to buy it.

We tax in a dumb way which causes more pain than it should. We should stop doing that.

What a disaster. The Komen Foundation backed down today from its decision earlier this week to join God’s Army, rename itself Pray for the Cure, and defund Planned Parenthood. NYT: “The reversal comes in the face of an enormous furor over the decision and widespread complaints that the Komen foundation was tying breast cancer to the abortion issue.”

But the damage to its reputation may be irreparable. First, attention has focused on its religious right Board members who remade the organization into a right-wing political campaigner. Nation:

Because while you were shaking your head over pink Bibles and stem-cell futurology, Komen was hiring Karen Handel as senior vice president for public policy. Handel is not your typical philanthropy administrator. She is a Republican pol, a former Georgia secretary of state, who ran in the 2010 gubernatorial primary, with endorsements from Sarah Palin, Mitt Romney and anti-immigrant finger-pointing Arizona Governor Jan Brewer. At that time she described herself as “staunchly and unequivocally pro-life,” opposed to stem cell research and a fan of crisis pregnancy centers—places that have repeatedly been shown to use scare tactics and misinformation to dissuade women from seeking abortions. She vowed to eliminate from the state budget pass-through grants to Planned Parenthood for breast and cervical cancer screenings.

More here from Democracy Now!

Second, with impeccable timing comes Pink Ribbons, Inc., which argues that money, not health, may be even more fundamental to the group’s agenda than GOP talking points:

Komen should have stuck to fighting breast cancer rather than fighting against the right of women to control their own bodies.

Onion:

MIAMI—At a hastily assembled press conference Tuesday, presidential candidate Mitt Romney reached out to the nation’s Hispanics, asking if they would please return the watch he had left on his dresser earlier. “As I stand before you today, I wish to issue an appeal to my Hispanic friends all across this great land of ours: Please do the right thing and give me back my property,” said Romney, adding that while he didn’t want to accuse the nation’s 21.7 million registered Hispanic voters of stealing the watch, he was certain that no one in his family stole it, and that watches don’t just walk off by themselves. “I pledge to every single Hispanic-American—whether you came here from Mexico to start a new life for your family or fled the brutality of Castro’s Cuba—that if my watch is put back in its rightful place in the next two hours, I will consider the matter closed and no one will be the wiser.” With the watch still not returned at press time, Romney begged the nation’s Hispanics, “Please don’t make me call the—how do you say it? El policío? La policía? The appropriate authorities.”

Daniel Kurtzman:

“Mitt Romney is getting some heat today for something he said on CNN. He said he’s not concerned about the very poor. I’m pretty sure you’re not supposed to say that out loud. Romney said the quote was taken out of context. And that he absolutely cares about the poor. In fact, his campaign bus runs on the tears of the poor.” –Jimmy Kimmel

“To be fair, to Mitt Romney the ‘very poor’ means anyone who doesn’t use a solid gold toilet.” –Craig Ferguson

‎”Mitt didn’t just beat Newt Gingrich, he stomped him by a devastating 14 percent margin. Fourteen percent! That is higher than Mitt’s tax rate.” –Stephen Colbert

“Newt Gingrich is not conceding Florida. He said that Florida has made it clear that this is a two-person race. Yeah, Mitt Romney and Barack Obama.” –Jay Leno

“Mitt Romney’s campaign will start getting Secret Service protection this week. That’s just to protect him from Newt Gingrich.” –Jay Leno

“After he wowed the crowd at the Apollo Theater with his singing voice, producers at ‘American Idol’ have invited President Obama to sing on their show this season. Not to be outdone, Ron Paul’s book will be appraised on the next edition of ‘Antiques Roadshow.’” –Jay Leno

“Studies are showing that Republican candidates are buying a lot of their ad time on the Weather Channel. You can tell because last night, the weatherman blamed the cold front on immigration and gay marriage.” –Conan O’Brien

“I don’t know whether Mitt Romney or Newt Gingrich won but we do know one thing for certain: tomorrow both of them can go back to ignoring Latinos.” –Stephen Colbert

“Ron Paul was not in Florida, he was campaigning up in Maine. They think he was afraid that if he went to Florida, they’d grab him and put him in an old folks home.” –Jay Leno

“Look at that (image of Arizona Gov. Jan Brewer’s finger in Obama’s face). Right to the President of the United States. Now, Jan Brewer says she regrets the confrontation, but these are the kind of problems that arise when we permit negroes to read.” –Bill Maher

“Yes, Mitt finally released his tax returns for one year. It turns out he keeps a lot of his money in the Cayman Islands, in Bermuda, Luxemburg, a Swiss bank account. And he said he’s not trying to evade paying taxes by keeping his money in these places. That’s like saying I got caught with meth and crack, but it wasn’t because I was trying to get high.” –Bill Maher

The indictment rumors have gone crazy. I heard a new name the other day that really blew me out of the water.

I’d bet they come down Tuesday or Wednesday. Tuesday if the Pats lose. Wednesday if they win.

When that happens I hope the good journalists break down the case against each defendant so we the people can see if there are any bullshit cases against certain individuals. The indictments should show some real graft but I also expect some over-reaching charges based on the honest services law. Odds are good we will see a good fact pattern to test the law on appeal. (Unlike Sal’s)

The particulars of each case should be interesting. I can’t wait to read them.

I also can’t wait to see how the roster of defendants and lawyers shapes up. Who will be representing whom? Who will be tried together? How will the feds witnesses hold up under multiple cross-examninations by experienced criminal trial lawyers. Of course theres should be some pleas, but we should see a trial or two before all is done.

Many of the witnesses will be people who just wanted jobs they were qualified for testifying against the politician who made the phone call. Along the way there may have been a campaign contribution. How is this different from the Governor appointing judges or getting appointees to quasi-public agencies to do his bidding with the implicit understanding that to not do so jeopardizes agency funding (or worse, extinction) and re-appointment to the board?

As this thing goes along a number of back room scenarios will be showcased. When it does lets be fair and give each case a fair look and not lump the stupid or the soon to be extinct “old-school” in with the thieves.

Because I do expect there to be some real indictments involving real pay-offs?

——

Maybe this was just a staff-level typo … still, it’s bizarre.  This just showed up on Twitter:

Now, I’m no sports professional, but it sure seems to me that if the Giants lose, Rudy Giuliani should have to wear a Red Sox hat to a Yankees-Red Sox game.  So this “wager” seems exactly backward. #FAIL

This gaffe might not be quite in the Coakley/Schilling league, but it’s yet another sloppy mistake in a race where Brown is going to have to bring his “A” game to have a chance.

UPDATE: Sure enough, it was a boo-boo.  Here’s the latest:

Meant that Rudy will wear Sox hat to Fenway when Giants lose! Even better!

Great!  Glad we’ve clarified that!  Why are we ending all our sentences with exclamation points!

Stop me if you’ve already heard this ad, but really? Really? Listen for yourself here: http://www.youtube.com/user/scottbrownma#p/u/1/l2Zxa-107Q4

Sen Brown’s campaign spends thousands, if not more, on a full minute spot where he talks about great moments in New England sports history and gives a shout out to the Patriots for their Super Bowl appearance. You have got to be kidding me! If I was one of his financial supporters, I’d be asking for my money back right now.

This ad highlights several things. First, Senator Brown has plenty of money to spend. Second, he has nothing to say on the issues important to residents of Massachusetts. If he did, he wouldn’t waste money on ads like this and he’d commit to participating in town halls. Whoever is responsible for generating this ad should be sent packing. Finally, for me, it indicates some key differences between Sen. Brown and his likely opponent Elizabeth Warren. In November you can vote for a man who will talk with you about his passion for sports or a woman who will talk with you about her passion for fighting to save the middle class. You can vote for a man who’s raised millions from Wall Street while gutting financial reforms in the Senate or a woman who worked and fought hard developing the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau. My vote is for Elizabeth Warren, the candidate fighting for all of us.

Scott Brown’s reelection campaign reads a lot like Macbeth:

“Life’s but a walking shadow, a poor player
That struts and frets his hour upon the stage,
And then is heard no more. It is a tale
Told by an idiot, full of sound and fury,
Signifying nothing.”

The case of Arthur Winn is the latest example of everything that’s wrong with money in politics.

I’m sure most readers of this learned blog have heard of Arthur Winn — but to recap — Winn spent the better part of the last decade soliciting public and private funds and working to gain approval of a sprawling complex that was to be built upon “the air rights” above a section of the Mass Pike in between the Back Bay and the South End.

Everything was going according to plan, but when the real estate and credit markets tanked in 2007, the project fell through…

After the dust settled, Winn was charged with using “strawmen” to bribe all of our local political leaders — according to court records, he “reimbursed relatives he convinced to donate to his favored candidates, thus hiding the true source of the money.”

The list of local politicians that accepted Winn’s bribes is long and illustrious: Rep. Mike Capuano, Rep. Steven Lynch, former Governor Mitt Romney, Governor Deval Patrick, Senator John Kerry, Mayor Thomas Menino, Rep. Edward Markey, and state senator Dianne Wilkerson, just to name a few.

For his criminal efforts, Winn managed to secure over $60,000,000.00 in state and federal aid, and he was asking for lots more when the bubble finally burst!

Yesterday, at his “sentencing” hearing — the Prosecution asked that Winn be sent to jail for six months, for crimes that were “an affront to our democratic system” — but the federal judge ruled that Winn should not go to jail.

I would have been satisfied if he went to jail for six weeks.  Heck, I would have been satisfied with six days.  Anything to demonstrate that we take our democratic process somewhat seriously!

But, no.  Instead, Winn will pay $100,000 in fines and walk free.  Tonight we posted this item on the Occupy Boston facebook page — and one keen observer noted: “that’s just the cost of doing business.”  I found that comment to be particularly ironic in light of the fact that yesterday, the Boston Globe broke this story not on the front page, not in the news section, not in the politics section, not even in the crime blotter, but rather, they broke it in the “Business Journal” section.

For Winn, that fine is no problem.  “You can be sure it will be paid promptly,” Winn’s attorney told the judge.

Why does our media focus so much on the G.O.P. dog-and-pony show down in the state of Florida, when democracy itself is being bought and sold right here in our back yard?

Yesterday’s reporting offered no clue as to where Attorney General Martha Coakley’s investigation stands.  Back in October, the Globe reported that Coakley was “looking into it.”  Is the plan to wait until the statue of limitations expires completely?  Or is there a conflict of interest when a politically-charged official such as the Attorney General is responsible for investigating wholesale corruption of the entire Massachusetts political establishment?

Yesterday’s case was in federal court and only pertained to Winn’s bribery of United States Reps. Mike Capuano and Steven Lynch; Winn has yet to be prosecuted for bribing state-level officials (although he’s admitted to doing that…)

Moreover, I am interested in the fact that the lead law firm on the Winn development — Goulston & Storrs — is also a major contributor to local politicians such as Rep. Mike Capuano and Sen. John Kerry.  I haven’t seen that connection noted anywhere else, but a Coffee-Party friend recently provided this link with more background into Winn’s overall lobbying effort.

For me, the most troubling part of all of this is how Winn’s defense attorney explained why Winn should not be blamed: “Arthur did not know…the fact that what he was doing could have just as easily been accomplished legally had he known someone who knew how to navigate the system.”

In other words, Winn’s position is: there’s nothing fundamentally wrong with purchasing support from every politician in town and securing tens of millions of dollars in public money for your crazy project, as long as you hire someone to walk you through the legal technicalities of corrupting our democratic system.

The Susan G. Komen Foundation Race for the Cure announced yesterday that is was pulling $680,000 in annual funding to Planned Parenthood because of a new policy that prohibits support for organizations under investigation by government agencies. CBS:

Komen says the key reason is that Planned Parenthood is under investigation in Congress – a probe launched by a conservative Republican who was urged to act by anti-abortion groups. Komen spokeswoman Leslie Aun said the charity recently adopted criteria barring grants to organizations that are under investigation by local, state or federal authorities.

So much for innocent until proven guilty. In its rush to judgment, Komen has aligned itself with the religious right. Unfortunately, as Patrick Hurd, CEO of Planned Parenthood of Southeastern Virginia, noted in the context of his wife Betsi’s struggles with breast cancer:

“It sounds almost trite, going through this with Betsi, but cancer doesn’t care if you’re pro-choice, anti-choice, progressive, conservative,” Hurd said. “Victims of cancer could care less about people’s politics.”

No more Race for the Cure events for me. I want my effort and my money to go to science and fighting cancer, not political grandstanding and religious extremism.

Interestingly, the Massachusetts affiliate of the national Foundation has posted a sort of pathetic attempt to backpedal and distance itself from its new commitment to religious fundamentalism national parent:

This decision on granting strategy and performance criteria was made on a national level and we at the Massachusetts Affiliate are not part of these overarching decisions. … We pride ourselves on evidence and outcomes-based programming … Currently, Planned Parenthood is not a grantee of the Affiliate and no funding for vital services in Massachusetts has been halted. … We hope that you will continue to work with our organization.

Not me. If the worthy members of the Massachusetts chapter of the Komen Foundation mean what they say about “evidence and outcomes-based programming,” they should withdraw from the national group (or get them to reverse their decision). I’d urge participants in the upcoming Chefs for a Cure event to withdraw from the politicized event, and use their time and energy to fight cancer, not endorse the religious right. Next time you visit One Bistro, Finale, Myers & Chang, Taranta, Union Bar and Grill or Gaslight ask them why they are supporting this politicized group. There are lots of other ways to work to end cancer. For example, here is a list of Relay for Life events by the American Cancer Society in Massachusetts, and here is a link to the local Ellie Fund.

Frank Rich has a new article about Mitt Romney in the January 29th issue of New York Magazine. It’s entitled, “Who in God’s Name is Mitt Romney?” The theme of the article, that Romney is missing a “human core,” is reinforced in the artwork:

To our overflowing store of examples of Romney’s disengagement — calling Lieutenant Governor Kerry Healey “Sherry Healey,” for example — Rich adds more: that a business colleague once nicknamed Romney “Tin Man” because of his inability to connect, that many people who have worked with him regard him as “a man who sometimes seems to be looking not into your eyes but past them” and that, among members of the Massachusetts legislature, he was notorious for having no idea what their names were.

Apparently, one of those lawmakers whose name Mitt had no clue about was State Representative Scott Brown. The Herald Column from May 25, 2003 ($), excerpted below, recounts a time during Mitt’s tenure as Governor when he failed to recognize Scott, then one of 24 Republicans in the House, at a Boston fundraiser. Scott says that Mitt apologized for the slight, both immediately and afterwards. Mitt says he knew all along that it was Scott and was just teasing him for not showing up for regular meetings.

POLS & POLITICS

Word around the hallowed State House halls last week was that Romney had really ticked off one in his small band of Republican friends: GOP state Rep. Scott Brown of Wrentham.

As the story goes, Brown approached Romney at a May 8 fund-raiser at Bakey’s, a restaurant downtown. Romney apparently caught that Brown is a rep and made a near-fatal assumption.

“We’ll have to get you over to our side one of these days,” Romney reportedly said.

When a friend reminded Romney that Brown is, indeed, a Republican, the governor blanched – and quickly apologized.

“It was one of those brain fart-type things; we both laughed after it,” Brown said last week.

“Hey, we had met each other many times – the state convention, in his office. At his swearing-in, my daughter sang ‘God Bless America’ for him and was first to meet him at the door to the State House. For whatever reason, it just didn’t click.”

Brown said the two have joked about it since and that Romney sent a “nice note” apologizing for the gaffe.

Interestingly, Romney’s peeps tell another story.

“Of course the governor knows who Scott Brown is,” said Romney spokeswoman Shawn Feddeman. “The comment was a humorous dig at the rep, who hasn’t been showing up to the regular meetings the governor holds with Republican legislators.”

Feddeman said Brown apparently “took it the wrong way.”

Now, nine years later, when they’re both national celebrities, things almost certainly have been patched up. Still, it’s a little hard not to wonder who was right. I’m betting on Scott, but if Eric Fehrnstrom has anything to say about it, we’ll never know.

The truth may remain a mystery, but at least now we know that Mitt Romney farts. With his brain.

Romney      775,015      46%
Gingrich      533,118      32%
Santorum    222,799      13%
Paul             117,105      7%

What wrong with these people below? Do they even read the paper to find out their candidates aren’t even running anymore?

Perry           6,768
Huntsman   6,198
Bachmann  3,959
Cain            3,492

One of the biggest problems with Washington is that it’s rigged for those who’ve already made it, like successful corporations and billionaires, instead of small businesses and the middle class. I’m all for people succeeding and becoming millionaires, but everybody willing to work hard ought to have a fair shot at it. And once they make it, they ought to pay their fair share to help the folks behind them get ahead.

This is one of the places where Scott Brown and I see things differently.

Just last week, Scott Brown said in an interview that he thinks Mitt Romney and Warren Buffett should get special tax breaks that are not available to most Americans. I don’t think that’s fair.

Senator Brown opposes what’s called the Buffett Rule, which would get rid of the special tax breaks that allow a billionaire like Warren Buffett to pay taxes at a lower rate than his secretary. President Obama, in his State of the Union speech, called on Congress to enact the Buffett rule to require people making more than $1 million a year to pay at least 30 percent in taxes. Senator Brown told a newspaper that higher taxes would hurt millionaires.

People in Massachusetts tell me all the time that it’s pretty obvious what’s wrong with Washington. “We work harder than ever, but it’s harder than ever to get ahead. Instead of helping us, Washington helps the big guys.” They are right.