Representatives Eugene O’Flaherty, Peter Koutoujian, and James Vallee; Senator Steve Baddour; and Suffolk DA Dan Conley, are all slamming Kerry Healey’s latest negative ad, which they say falsely implies that they back her bid for Governor.
Here’s a letter addressed to the TV stations running the ad, signed by O’Flaherty, Koutoujian, Vallee, and Baddour:
October 1, 2006
Dear Station Manager:
I write to a misleading television advertisement now being aired on your station and others in which lieutenant governor Kerry Healey misuses my likeness and misappropriates my words to suggest that I support her candidacy for governor and her ads blatantly false attacks on Deval Patrick.
I do not support Kerry Healey for governor, nor do I agree with her advertisements message that she is the best candidate for voters concerned about fighting crime. Therefore, in the interests of fairness and accuracy, I respectfully ask that you pull the spot, or require the deletion of my presence.
The signing ceremony featured in the advertisement represented the culmination of months of hard work by many people, the great majority of them Democrats, on the critical issue of eliminating barriers to the prosecution of sex offenses. Deval Patrick has been absolutely clear and consistent in his support for this. That is one reason among many why I support him for governor.
I have notified the Healey campaign of this infraction.
Sincerely,
Steven A. Baddour
Peter Koutoujian
Eugene OFlaherty
James E. Vallee
In a press release from the state party, Baddour, Koutoujian, and O’Flaherty go further, accusing Healey of twisting their support for the bill into supporting her candidacy, when they in fact back Patrick:
“I am disappointed that Kerry Healey would intentionally distort my role in the bill signing. I am deeply troubled that the voters of this state are being lead to believe that I am supporting her for Governor,” said Senator Baddour. “I am 100% behind Deval Patrick for Governor.”
Footage for Healeys ad was taken from a press conference on September 21, 2006, when Healey signed legislation passed by the legislature that toughens penalties for sex offenders and extends the statue of limitations for victims of sexual abuse. Deval Patrick supports the bill.
I showed up at a press conference to support an important bipartisan piece of legislation. It was not an endorsement of Kerry Healey, said Representative OFlaherty (D-Chelsea). I support Deval Patrick for governor and I am working with many others to ensure he wins this election.
Representative Peter Koutoujian said I am supporting Deval Patrick because I know that he will be a strong leader who will be both tough and smart on crime. I am surprised by Kerry Healey and let down that she would use our work on this law to unjustly promote her candidacy.
Way to “work with the legislature,” Kerry.
DA Dan Conley, for his part, released the following statement:
Last week, at a public event where a bill aimed at combating sexual predators was signed into law, I shared credit for its passage with Democrats and Republicans, elected officials and private citizens alike. Giving credit where it is due is only right and I stand by my public statement.
I was not asked, advised or foretold that the statements I made at this public event would be used in a campaign commercial. [Ummm … and it didn’t occur to you that something like that might happen? Come on, Dan. –ed.] As District Attorney I believe that the average voter expects me to do my job professionally and to remain as free of other people’s politics as possible. As a Democrat, throughout the primary campaign for Governor, whenever I was asked, I stated consistently that I liked and respected all of the candidates and would support my partys nominee. Deval Patrick is our nominee and he has my support.
OK, so this is all a bit along the lines of being “shocked! shocked!” that footage from that press conference might somehow find its way into a Healey ad. Still, good for the Dems for speaking up about the misleading use of that press event.
Two final points: (1) the state seal is all over that ad. Clear ethics law violation, though no one’s going to care very much.
(2) Where is Tom Reilly? Does he have any thoughts — any at all — on being used by Healey this way? Hello? Bueller?
If you actually read their comments, it seems to me that they are tacitly backing Healey but have to send out this letter and hold a press conference in order to maintain favor with the party leadership. No one forced them to credit the Lt. Governor at the press conference during the first week of the general campaign.
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And Tom Reilly is MIA because I think it’s clear he doesn’t want to help Patrick. I mean, Reilly and Healey had a lot of the same positions on a lot of the issues, most importantly the rollback.
… how do you see it that they are backing Muffy? They all clarify , each one of them, who they support in those statements and letters ….
Where in the English-speaking world does this statement:
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mean that the speaker supports–tacitly or otherwise–Kerry Healey for governor?
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Where in the English-speaking world does
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actually mean–tacitly or otherwise–I do not support Deval Patrick for governor?
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Really, now, c’mon.
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And as for Reilly, well, he’s stunned. Stunned like a Norwegian parrot nailed to his perch pining for the fjords.
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This is just too cynical by half and half past that by a great deal… Politics does not mean you are required to be deceitful, manipulitive and sleazy…
$50,000 worth of free advertising tonight (Sunday). These clowns are Deval’s worst nightmare. They stand up there supporting him because Sal and Trav pointed a gun at their empty, little heads. Baddour’s outrage at being featured in an ad that he conspired to co-produce?!? Geno trying to convince himself and anyone who doesn’t know him that he actually had something to do with passage of a good law?!? Valle looking like he’s the middle duck in a shooting gallery (thankfully whatever he had to mumble didn’t make the video).
And Conley? Someone get me to a shower.
Now they line up like their part of a perp-walk and ingratiate themselves to voters. What’s most distressing is there’s a four foot Deval sign behind them.
Let’s remember what exactly they said that fine day last week. They didn’t just join Healey on stage for this momentous event and make smarmy comments about her loving relationship. They then held a press conference to kick the hell out of Deval for being too liberal.
So now their big Deval supporters and tomorrow they’ll be stunned, absolutely stunned, that Healey’s ad ran repeatedly on the news from 6pm to 11pm with their righteous indignation as a backdrop.
When Deval wins, let’s just hope that Sal and Trav have the good sense to make them go away.
Maybe these three clowns took a look at the latest polls. If Patrick wins, they’ll have a lot of ‘splainin to do.
I’m not that worried about the free advertising — I don’t know how she’s going to spin the fact that even the people who respect her most won’t vote for her. (Well, they might in the privacy of the booth, but they won’t endorse her.) The fact that she is going to leave the ad running makes her look desperate. “Kerry Healey. See? There is someone who likes her.”
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O.K. — let’s give Dan Conley the benefit of the doubt here. He DID get the word out within 48 hours of the commercial first being run that he was not pleased with how his image was used. As a DA, he is NOT supposed to use his office in a partisan manner.
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That being said — if Reilly doesn’t make a statement very, very shortly to similarly denounce the use of his image, he will go down in local history for his self-admitted poor political skills, but being a sore loser.
… but it looks like that ethics law violation PDF you posted is written narrowly to refer ONLY to using the seal on “stationary.”
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Having said that, I don’t think Lt. Governor Healey has any shot of erasing a 20-30 point lead by Deval if she keeps having hiccups like this and the Mihos slaying once a week.
it addresses only the specific question asked. But the general principle holds.
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I was referring to these comments, and the fact that they made them at a televised press conference 2 days into the general campaign…just a coincidence?
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CONLEY: “As [has become] the norm, whenever a good idea for public safety and victims arises, everyone in law enforcement and the victim rights community knew that we could count on Lt. Gov. Kerry Healey to do what she does best and for which she gets so little recognition, and that’s work behind the scenes, reaching out across the lines of both party and government to move things forward.”
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BADDOUR: “But for her leadership, but for her standing up and continuing to push and to aggressively pursue this bill, today would not be happening. She deserves a great deal of admiration and respect and gratitude for making this bill a reality today.”
It’ll be a while before any self respecting Dem does a press conference w/Healey again!
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Her campaign so far befits a twice defeated Republican candidiate for state representative. From the anti-Gabrieli ad to this one — no class.
This letter seems to indicate a dramatic shift in how the center-right wing of the party sees this race taking shape. After the primary these guys aniticipated a much tougher general and were going to take advantage of the uncertainty of the outcome by leaning on Deval to moderate some of his positions, or at least make very nice with them and theirs. After the debate and the recent polls, it has become clear that the momentum is overwhelmingly in Deval’s favor, and that they had best be on his good side come January. I don’t mean to imply that they didn’t intend on supporting Deval the whole time, but they did think they could do a bit more arm-twisting before embracing him on-camera…oops.
I agree that they are backtracking, and your analysis is probably right. The whole “the party is strong-arming them” accusation doesn’t make much sense, considering the usual disorganization of the party, and the fact that these guys have a track record of not falling within the party lines. They have no real need to start now: I think they just don’t want to be on the losing side come November. It’s possible that they’re being strong-armed by their constituents, but I really doubt it’s from the state party.
I have seen comments in other threads on BMG about working to elect legislators who will work with Deval, and about targeting those legislators who obstruct the changes needed in the state’s political culture. In addition to seeing the poll numbers for ’06, these guys may have heard that there is something big and progressive building in the netroots. They don’t want a Lieberman-style bull’s-eye on their electoral backsides when the nominating papers for their districts are available in a couple of years.