Blue Mass Group

In Kerry Healey’s world, there is no place for Defense Attorney’s in government or positions of power.

Kerry Healey has managed in attacking “the concept of the defense attorney” to attack John Adams, our Massachusetts Constitution and thereby extension, the United States Constitution.

Yes, the author of the Massachusetts Constitution was “Defense Attorney”  John Adams, a founding father and our second president. The oldest constitution still in existance in the world today. Older than the US Constitution. This is nothing less than an attack on one of the founding fathers. 

For someone (Healey) that has a PhD, I find this attack extraordinary. Imagine if the type of thinking Kerry Healey is promoting was used against John Adams:  “Do we really want one (a defense attorney) as our President?”

Reed Hillman and Tim Murray will be debating on NECN next week apparently on Tuesday. This will apparently exclude John J. Sullivan and Martina Robinson. Another debate for later this month is also planned. So-those in the bloggosphere, any ideas to what they will debate about?

So, we’ve gone back and forth on the validity of different pollsters, different methodologies, and polls in general. Mileage obviously does vary, as does the over-analysis of virtually every aspect of the numbers. As a self-proclaimed ‘poll junkie’, I know how it feels. Here’s my question, appropriately enough with a poll. How many BMGers have have actually been called by a reputable pollster during this or another election cycle? Was it a live person or a robot? Who’s been push polled? Personally, I’ve never gotten the call. This makes sense as I, like a lot of people my age, only have a cell phone. I also don’t list my number on my voter registration.

There are a lot of reasons why Deval lost half his lead in 3 weeks–with 3 weeks to go.  Many reasons are benign, others more worrisome.  One reason buried in today’s Globe story on the ad race is the fact that Deval and the Democrats are getting out-spent 3 to 1 by Healey and the Republicans, since the Primary and, at best, we’re narrowing that down to a 2 to 1 spending gap.

Sorry to be the Chicken Little at BMG, but everyone has to have a role and I think I play mine fairly well.  After the nasty “killer cop” spot, we’ll be seeing the LaGuer attack ad—which I haven’t seen yet, but imagine it is even nastier than the killer cop spot. 

And next week we can expect a spot that says Deval believes it is the Constitutional Right of rapists to masturbate in front of women.  (Sorry, I don’t make this up—I just manipulate the facts a bit—just like you should expect Healey’s operatives will be doing.)

Dismiss these vicious cheap stunts all you want—but dispute the fact that ignoring these ridiculous attacks is what caused Dukakis and Kerry to lose the Presidency.  Maybe this year is different and people are finally sick of these attack ads and they will back fire.  I can agree, up to a point.  But most would concede that some of Deval’s decline in the poll is a result of the killer cop ad and the first wave of the LaGuer issue.

Yes, many know I advocate throwing everything, including the Kitchen Sink, at Healey and expose the hypocritical record she has built up in the last 8 years (including those 2 loses for state rep).

Deval is certainly responding and showing he’s got the fight in him that I knew he always had.

But this is not the reason for my post.

Keller’s got the goods: Attention, Healey campaign: if you’re using push polls, those sleazy phone calls to voters that purport to be legitimate polls but are really aimed at peddling smears about an opponent, you might want to reconsider the practice.  From a viewer: ” … Real polling has a place in the electoral cycle. Pathetic and desperate fearmongering does not. That sunshiney friendly image Healey tries to pull off covers a cynical heart of coal.” Ouch. This is not a new development — we noted anecdotal evidence of Healey push-polling a couple of weeks ago. Seems fairly clear now that those early reports were correct: Healey, or someone working for Healey, is using push-polling in a sustained, systematic way to try to smear Deval Patrick. Nice.  Maybe Keller should ask the Healey campaign if they’re behind this — or if they will condemn it.

Brett Arends has an awesome take-down of anyone who tries to seriously maintain that George W. Bush’s economic “policies” have been successful. he Dow Jones Industrials Average closed last week at 11,867. That’s a gain of 1,279 points since George Bush took office on Jan. 20, 2001.  That’s an annualized gain of 2 percent. Under Bill Clinton, it was 15.9 percent.  Bush’s dad: 9.8 percent.  Ronald Reagan: 11.3 percent.  These figures are public record. The index also did better under Presidents Ford, Johnson, Kennedy, Eisenhower, Truman, Franklin D. Roosevelt and Calvin Coolidge. Much better. Since World War I, the only presidents with a worse Dow Jones Industrials record than the incumbent were Herbert Hoover, Richard Nixon and Jimmy Carter. Hoover, Nixon, Carter, Bush? Hmmmm.  I’m saying nothing. Let’s talk about gasoline prices.  Yes, they’re down 73 cents a gallon from the peak in August. Average today: $2.26. But in January 2001, they were $1.46. So they’re still up 55 percent. Jobs?  Since January 2001, the jobless rate has risen from 4.2 percent to 4.6 percent.  Over that period, non-farm payrolls have added an average of 46,200 jobs a month. That’s good, right? Clinton: 237,000 a month.  Reagan: 168,000. Carter: 215,000. [...]

A small plane crashed into a residential high-rise on New York City’s east side this afternoon.  The impact started a fire which has since been put out.  At least two people are dead. All indications at this point are that terrorism was not involved; the FBI and the Department of Homeland Security are both saying that it appears to have been a terrible accident. The photographs are eerie.

Kerry Healey is sadly following the Republican strategy of instilling fear in the voters, in the grand tradition of Bush I. While the unseemly ad Bush I used of Willie Horton “exiting” prison is widely condemned as being racist and fear-mongering, it seems the playbooks is still warm for Republicans. Her subtext is to make the voter, who finds her/himself in a insecure world filled with war, high gas prices, school shootings , even more fearful. The message is “if you let Deval become governor, he will let dangerous African-American men on the street and they will hurt your family”. Pretty ugly message for the leader of a progressive state. Deval’s best response is not to fight on the facts. Rather he needs to re-frame the issue by acknowledging the intended emotional response, to help people move from fear to anger. Real security in their lives can be achieved by giving towns and cities money to re-hire police, fund schools so they can think about safety not finding pencils, funding social services so people get the help they need, and creating jobs so crime is not the only option. This issue is not about a person (Benjamin LaGuer)nor Deval’s support. [...]

New Survey Shows Healey Gaining Ground On Patrick

(CBS4) BOSTON An exclusive CBS4 Fast Track shows Republican Kerry Healey has closed the gap on Democrat Deval Patrick in the race for governor. With four weeks left until Election Day, Patrick leads Healey by 18-percent.

In the survey of 609 likely voters taken earlier this week, Patrick won 52% support, Healey was second with 34%. Independent candidate Christy Mihos had 9%, Green/Rainbow Party candidate Grace Ross, 1%, with 4% undecided.

Today’s Globe kicked the crap out of Tom Werner’s new show, “Twenty Good Years” on NBC. Here’s some quotes from the review: “The show is just awful.”  “I found myself hoping their 20 good years left on earth could be downsized to 20 seconds.” As readers of BMG may or may not know, Ernie has a hair across his ass when it comes to Tom Werner, Larry Lucchino, and John Henry. And yes Ernie has hinted  that one reason this show was bought by NBC was because of the relationship between Tom Werner and NBC V.P. Dick Ebersol Instead of Teddy Ebersol Park we should call it “Twenty Good Years Park”.