Blue Mass Group

1. Leone a proven record bringing offenders to justice 2. He is a professional, not just another politician that knows how to get things done 3. The DA’s office needs someone to follow in DA Martha Coakley’s footsteps, someone with experience in the field and Leone is that person 4. He is being endorsed by the aforementioned Coakley and Attorney General Tom Riley 5. Leone is a progressive who will bring a new way of doing things to the table 6. His opponent Jarret Barrios is just running for another office 7. Unlike Leone Barrios has NEVER tried a case 8. Unlike Barrios Leone knows how to accomplish things. He was helping to prosecute the shoe bomber Richard Reid while Barrios was filing bills that he would never try to pass 9. One of Leone’s opponents Mike Festa dropped out and then endorsed him 10. Leone knows how to communicate to the people who will be working for…Barrios, just doesn’t know how to communicate period.

Deval Patrick has gone from “also running is…” to “strong candidate closing the gap”. So now some of my liberal friends have noticed something unusual.  He’s black.  That’s right, African-American, non-white, not-Irish, whatever you want to call it. And the folks who seem most troubled by it are some of the most progressive folks I know.  They start out saying: “Sure, he did well in the caucuses — but can he win?”  I ask, what do you mean, of course he can win — any Democrat who gets the nomination and is not easily labelled “Beacon Hill insider” can win! And he’s doesn’t have thousands of folks with grudges from his days as AG. So they whisper — “Yeah, but he’s black, and this state isn’t ready for a Black man.”  Or — forget Ed Brooke, voters thought he was a white guy with a tan. Is that what you see out there?  Are the folks in Needham ready to vote for a businessman who has good fiscal ideas yet reasonable on social issues — except they can’t deal with his pigment?  Is Wellesely appalled? Love to hear from you all.

The NYT notes today that, “This month, former Justice Sandra Day O’Connor told an audience at Georgetown University that a judiciary afraid to stand up to elected officials can lead to dictatorship. Last month, speaking in South Africa, Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg said that the courts were a safeguard “against oppressive government and stirred-up majorities.” I agree in large measure with O’Connor, but I think Ginsburg has it badly wrong. There is nothing inherent in the judicial system that makes it a safeguard against oppression, as African-Americans discovered, if they did not already know, when the Supreme Court announced they were not people, and citizens of Japanese descent found out when the Court agreed they could be put in concentration camps, to cite just two examples of many. A lesson of history is that the farther government gets from the people, the more it tends to repression. The judiciary is the unelected political branch of our government — nothing less … but nothing more.

Many of us can rattle off the US casualty figures in Iraq: more than 2300 killed and 16,000 injured.  But these numbers do not reflect the Hidden Wounds of Post Traumatic Stress Disorder.  Tonight and this week, New England Cable News (NECN) will air a documentary they produced on the challenges many of our returning troops face readjusting from combat. 

Thousands of men and women will be coming back to our communities who will need our help and support.  The first step is awareness and this documentary sets the stage for the challenges our returning troops will face for generations.

I saw the documentary when it premiered tens day ago and highly recommend it.

Markos Moulitsas Zuniga, otherwise known as “kos,” is of course responsible for the most heavily-trafficked liberal blog on the internet.  He was interviewed by the NY Times Magazine as part of the publicity blitz for his recently-published book Crashing the Gate (co-authored with MyDD’s Jerome Armstrong).  It’s quite an interesting little interview, and it’s very short – you should read the whole thing. Here is the part of the exchange that I found most interesting: Do you read your fellow liberal bloggers, like those who write for Huffington Post? To me, Huffington Post gives voice to the voice. They’re celebrities who don’t need a platform. That’s not fair. You can’t discredit bloggers like Jane Smiley or Nora Ephron just because they have a reputation outside politics. These people don’t have trouble being heard if they want to be heard. Sometimes Huffington Post has noncelebrities — I am more interested in them, people who don’t have the chance to get their message out. In its little way, that exchange tells us a lot about “The Media”‘s understanding of who bloggers are, and what the blogosphere is.  For a Times reporter to say to kos, a guy who created his blog out [...]

The annual South Boston St. Patrick’s Day extravaganza is still going on Channel 56, if you’re looking for a taste of old-time Boston politics.  Jon Keller is posting periodic updates on his blog. My favorite comment so far comes from House Speaker Sal DiMasi, referring to Tom Reilly’s apparently less than hilarious presentation earlier in the morning (which I did not see): “he’s got more starch in him than a Chinese laundry.”  Oof – this from the guy at the center of our hopes for progressive health care legislation.

Having recently separated from active military service, I’m pretty happy to see that there is significant public interest in the military’s homosexual policies.  See the story published in the Globe this morning: http://www.boston.com/news/nation/articles/2006/03/19/military_retaining_more_gays/ The figures and policy issues only prove yet again that “don’t ask, don’t tell” is an antiquated policy that is completely disconnected with the reality facing the armed forces.  What the public does not realize is that in every command there are several homosexuals that are smart about concealing their private sexual preference (i.e. don’t go on internet dating sites, don’t talk about their private life at the workplace etc).  The majority of the people at their command realize they are homosexual, but that does not qualify to have them discharged.  As the article mentions, many commanders and officers try to turn a blind eye at homosexuals in their command, as long as their performance is of a decent quality.  Unfortunately, lawmakers and high level military leaders are so disconnected with reality, that it will probably take another ten to twenty years to scrap this ridiculous policy.  Kudos to Congressman Meehan for crafting legislation trying to make this policy a thing of the past.  When the military [...]

Is this a first? Marge Ware, former Williamstown selectwoman, Democratic state committeewoman, and author of MargeBLOG, has announced that she will seek to succeed State Senator Andrea Nuciforo Jr. Here’s Marge’s blog post on her announcement. Well, Marge certainly has strong and well-documented opinions about a wide variety of issues — a “paper trail”, as it were. There can be no question of anyone being able to pin her down on issues, or getting a sense of her temperament. She has made herself a “knowable quantity”, if not a known quantity, through her blog. Should be interesting.

Sam Kelley at the end of his remarks allotted to him at the annual St Patrick’s Day Dinner put on by the Plymouth County Democrat League endorsed Deval Patrick for Governorlast evening at Halifax Country Club.

I was there and along with other Democrats from nearly every town in Plymouth County we gave both men a great ovation.

Tom Reilly did not show nor did he send a representative to speak for him.