But the best move by Andrea may have been the one she didn’t take: instead of contesting the second ballot (which she surely would have lost), she agreed to put the second ballot to a voice vote to let everyone go home. She must have made an agreement with Murray because when Phil Johnston called for “ayes” between Andrea and Murray, I dare say Andrea got as loud, or louder, shout than Murray. Yet Phil still sad Tim won. That’s fine, it let us all go home, which probably won Andrea even more support!
The biggest losers? Patrick and Goldberg. Deval, because he was thisclose to having his biggest problem out of the race. Now he has to either spend millions of his own or try to ramp up field even more. He’s in BIG trouble. The other loser: Goldberg. After her offensive video (sweeping the floors? stocking shelves? Could you make any more fun of the people who work these jobs? Unbelievable.), she came in last in the balloting. I don’t think they saw that coming at all, given how much they have been touting endorsements and such. Amazing how poorly she did.
All of us that attend conventions, which I think of fondly as being in the bar scene from “Star Wars” have stories that sustain us between fixes. There was a lot of drama today, and some terrific speeches, and all in all a great show for our party. With the Murray campaign, we found ourselves just shy of a first ballot endorsement, although we had gone into the convention with a hard count of between 25 and 30 percent.
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The staging area for candidates, which is made up of a large concrete hanger with blue pipe and drape rectangles housing an RV park of candidate homes, allows the candidate’s and staff to stage their efforts. It takes on the feel of a trailer park. Gabrieli has the biggest RV and after two days we begin to covet it.
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So we’re outside our rectangle, and Silbert’s folks are outside theirs, and we talk about the negative effect of a second ballot on the convention, knowing it is not a good idea to keep people in the hall longer than necessary.
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Murray is less than one percentange point away from endorsement, but we are faced with keeping delegates in their seats for a second ballot at 5PM on Saturday.
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With no promting by the party, both camps reach an agreement that I think speaks well for our party, and bodes well for the fall campaign. The results were clear, the enemy is not internal, and the opportunity to join together, and work together, felt pretty good. Coleman Nee and I made a joint announcement to the press that this would happen, and a joint motion was presented to the convention by both Tim and Andrea. Good for our party.
Classy move on both their parts. Everyone there knew Tim was the winner and we were all glad we did not have to stay for another vote. Tim’s camp may have had a firm count of 25-30, but I know Andrea’s campaign far exceeded their expectations as well. At least in my district a lot of folks made up their minds either on Friday night or during the speeches. I happen to support Andrea, but look forward to a very good LG race. Congrats on your win.
The clear winners were Gabrieli who was able to get in and Tim Murray who won. Going into the convention it was hard to believe Murray could get almost half of the vote. His grass roots effort obviously paid off.Andrea Silbert is a clear loser because she didn’t distinguish herself from Goldberg as the alternative candidate to Murray. Gabrieli can shift into the next gear and take his campaign to the next level where it deserves to be. I’m happy all democratic LG and Governors candidates were able to get their 15% and hopefully it will lead to a more spirited debate.
Smitty, I welcome your passion for Murray and certainly want to encourage your interest in politics. But take a que from Scott in Belmont and try not to act like the high school senior that you are.
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Silbert a clear loser–you are showing just how much you need to learn about politics.
Full of condescension and ad hominem — doesn’t address the content of the comment at all. Your worst work yet, Frank.
…someone that says that a candidate who comes from no where, with no support from the powerbrokers, to capture nearly a third of the convention votes and calls them a “clear loser” deserves a crappy comment. Smitty’s comments fall into the same “ad hominem” charge you’re throwing at me.
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I just think it’s important to put into context a person’s comments. For example, I’ll give more weight to “Scott from Belmont” who in the past identified himself as a paid consultant to the Murray campaign or “John from Abington” who we all know, than other people’s opinion.
… is to give them a low rating and ignore, not to respond in kind. You don’t have to take the bait.
I agree with you that Murray was the clear winner in the Lt. Governor’s race. The CW was that all candidates would be fairly bunched and a real second ballot would be required. Instead, the second ballot was “in name only” since he hit 49% on the first.
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But I have to disagree with your assertion that Silbert was the clear loser. The fact is that Goldberg came into this convention with more endorsements, delegate mailings, name recognition, and self-financed money. For instance, Silbert was the only candidate (Gov or Lt. Gov) not to have a Friday night or Saturday morning party.
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Unlike the Governor’s race, in which most delegates were pledged to a particular candidate, many that I talked to in my district came in undecided about the Lt. Governor’s race. After Silbert’s energetic speech and Goldberg’s cringe-worthy Stop and Shop video, virtually everyone in our delegation who was undecided voted for Silbert. Goldberg was the candidate who should have established herself as the clear second.
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In all honesty, I think the Stop and Shop routine from Goldberg is getting a bit tired. The fact is that she has not been involved with the company since 1988. Since then, health care costs have skyrocketed even when considering inflation. I am fairly certain that her company could not afford to offer health insurance to all of their employees if they still owned the company today. It’s a hypothetical for sure, but that’s my take.
Several folks were committed to Murray and Goldberg going in. We had a hand full of committed Silbert delegates, but not a ton. In fact she was having trouble finding a whip as late as last week (I was going to volutneer, but I already had responsibilites to the Patrick campaign). She did get a whip in the end. After the speeches the dynamic changed drastically. Most of the undeclareds went for Silbert. Final tally 44 Goldberg (her husband was working our area and we were expected to be a home run for her), 37 Murray, 37 Silbert. I think that is pretty darn impressive.
Hoss Predction: 65% Deval, 18% Gabs, 17% Reilly.
GGW Prediction: 63% Deval, 22% Reilly, 14.9% Gabs – big “rounding” debate
Actual: Deval Patrick 57.98%, Tom Reilly 26.66%, Chris Gabrieli 15.36%
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Today in Gabs’ Beacon Hill dining room for the 17 voters who put him over the top: lox and bagels with capers and vidalia onion; freshly squeezed OJ; Peets coffee; Shannon O’Brien bumper stickers.
I agree that Gabrieli is the big winner given that he made the ballot. What an accomplishment by he and his team given their late start!! Given his poll position with the broader electorate, watch out!!!
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I think Reilly’s speech and result exceeded expectations as of Saturday morning, so he’s a winner although if you told me that would be his result a year ago, he’d be in the losers column. He will need to raise his game to beat both Gabrieli & Patrick.
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I disagree with earlier talk that Patrick is only a big loser. He’s actually both a big winner and big loser if that’s possible. He’s a winner given the result and where his campaign has come from a year ago. He is a loser from the standpoint noted earlier that Gabrieli is a big problem for him and Patrick’s team clearly wanted him off of the ballot given yesterday’s late activity.
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Gabrieli’s team and grass roots will only grow from here as I think some people were waiting to see if he made the ballot. He not only has a lot of money, but he also has great ideas. It will come down to Gabrieli’s ideas, results oriented background, smart/savvy/professional/growing team, and $ versus Patrick’s charisma, growing war-chest, and grassroots strength versus Reilly’s “old school institutional” support (read Menino, Glodis, etc.) and $. It’s way too early to do this, but I will predict a Gabrieli primary victory with 38% to 33% for Reilly, and 29% for Patrick. I also predict that whoever emerges from the primary will win in November. It was a great day for small d democracy and the party!
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Silbert and Murray are the LG winners. Goldberg the loser. Bonifaz is a winner for SOS. Galvin is the SOS loser as he hoped to avoid a primary race altogether.
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Sorry for the length!
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Best,
southshoreguy
Much like Rosie Ruiz.
Look at what he was able to accomplish in just 8 weeks!
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BTW, the “Rosie Ruiz comment” was a cheap shot, typical of the talk and arm twisting I’ve seen out of the Deval’s supports.
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Unfortuantely for you, most people won’t get the Rosie Ruiz cheapshot. Please tell us what “rules Gabrieli broke” to get on the ballot… You can’t because if he broke any he wouldn’t be on the ballot.
Gabrieli lost ANY chance he ever had of casting himself an an outsider in this race – and according to you all – the voters want BALANCE in the corner office.
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They’ll not find that balance in Gabrieli with the Speaker and others in the same smoke filled corner office.
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He would have been better to have gone for it all on his own than to sell his soul to get those 50 extra votes.
You really should think through the “talking points” you’re given before just repeating them. OF the three candidates for Governor Gabrieli is the only one that as far as I know has never held elective or appointed government job.
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Some people might consider Deval a insider from the Clinton administration. Tom holds a constitional office and has also served as elected Middlesex County DA. Nothing wrong with any of that for either Deval or Tom. But don’t try to turn Chris into an insider because he had to go into the convention and do what everyone else was doing in that hall.
Everone in the hall was doing the same thing?
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Everyone except Deval who got it done in February maybe.
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What deal did Gabrieli make with DiMasi for those votes?
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What jobs/assignments were promised Spellane and Pedone and the others?
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Not saying Reilly didn’t do the same.
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Just saying from what I saw – Deval got it done on 2/4 – not 6/3
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And I’m saying the way I see it and I think it WILL be seen by the public – Gabrieli’s soul belongs to the machine on Beacon Hill now. NOT so Deval.
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These are not talking points handed to me. ALL my own humble opinions. I wasn’t given talking points by anyone.
What I meant by “everyone was doing it” was that people were being asked “what can we do to change your vote”. Which I was asked many times by DEVAL operatives, since I was a Gabrieli vote. So please leave the “Deval is a political virgin” arguments behind, you’re insulting everyone’s intelligence…
I had one waivering Deval supporter that did vote for Gab (due to presure from two ward councilors… as a simple democratic city committee member, I could not out weigh that) that I worked pretty exentisively. Of course she is helping plan a Deval event right now, but simply felt the argument to get Chris on the ballot was persuasive and he deserved it. I understand that point even if I do not agree with it and we left the convention happy with each other’s decisions.
I appreciate your honesty AND I have no problem with what you were doing, as I said everyone was doing it. What I object to is the “holier than thou” attitude of certain people… then using that to put down the underdog.
That’s how Chris is going to play this out.
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I’m the The Underdog. Here to save you – Sweet Polly Purebread.
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The man who came from “no-where” to get on the ballot in 4 months.
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People just love an underdog.
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You could see it all over the news Saturday night and Sunday.
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The comeback kid?
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Watch for this ad on a TV near you soon.
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Being an insider isn’t necessarily defined by the office you have or haven’t held. It’s also about concepts like “controlled” delegates, a term that makes me wince every time I hear it.
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Chris was our Lt. Governor nominee four years ago. He has used his millions to shower donations on Democratic officials. These connections helped him get on the ballot.
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Don’t get me wrong – I think he played by the rules, and he seems like a nice guy with some good ideas. But he’s as much a party insider as any elected official.
doesn’t mean I am. 🙂
Any proof Hoss that Silbert was the magnamimous one? I think you actually dectract from Silbert when you try to pin all the credit on her. I think it is fairest to say that the agreement to suspend the rules was a two way street and both deserve high praise for thinking of the delegates first. Please quit taking the campaign hack route by trumping it up for only Silbert.
…it appeared to me that the “ayes” for Silbert on the voice vote were as loud, if not louder, than those for Murray, yet Phil still said Murray won. If Silbert hadn’t agreed ahead of time that Murray would win that voice vote, then how could Phil have legitimately and assertively claimed Murray won? And why wasn’t there someone from Andrea’s campaign jumping up and down at the sergeant at arms table complaining? That’s why I said that Silbert must have agreed to both the voice vote and to letting Tim win that voice vote. I think Tim’s people may have been surprised at the “ayes” for Silbert, but who knows.
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Regardless, I got home earlier than I would have had Andrea or Tim sought a roll call vote, and that makes me happy.
That must have been how it went down. If I remember correctly, Phil looked over to his right after the votes were cast and smiled before saying that Murray had won. Even though we supported Silbert, I think we all knew that Murray was the winner. If you get 49% it’s hard to believe that you’re not the winner on the second ballot. (The fact that many delegates had left at that point probably accounted for the possible discrepancy in the voice vote.)
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I was actually thinking about this afterwards. In any voice vote that I’ve ever been in, there’s one side going into it that is the default winner. Only if the ayes are far louder for the other side will that default be overcome. It’s all part of the fun.
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In any case, it was great sportsmanship (and politics) by both Murray and Silbert.
Winners:
– Deval Patrick: He gets his name in lights for a few days.
– Chris Gabrielli: He’s on the ballot. ‘Nuf said
– Tim Murray: Clearly a popular guy
– Andrea Silbert: Clearly a popular gal
– John Bonifaz: perhaps more than just a thorn in the side of Galvin.
– The State Party: Ran a relatively smooth campaign.
– Deval Patrick’s supporters: Exhilarating experience to be in a room full of people cheering for your guy.
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Losers:
– Deb Goldberg: Probably wanted a stronger showing. Combined with her self-financing looks rather weak. Oh, and whoever made that video should be fired.
– Reilly Supporters: probably didn’t love being in a room full of cheering Patrick supporters.
– Delegate digestive systems: There couldn’t have been any decent food at the DCU center?
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To Be Determined:
– Deval Patrick: Helped or hurt in a 3-way race? (i’m still not convinced either way.)
– Tom Reilly: Did well under the circumstances or should have done better? What does this mean for the next 3 months?
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Favorite moment:
– The half-grin on Phil Johnston’s face trying to quiet DP supporters so that Reilly could give his speech. Priceless.