(disclosure: posted by Stein campaign staff)
Jill Stein’s campaign has been picking up editorial endorsements around the state. See our posts here and here to read more about the endorsements.
Secretary Galvin, perhaps feeling some pressure to respond in the wake of the endorsements, has finally agreed to debate Jill Stein.
Here’s the catch – he wants (and will get) a five minute debate. It’s hard to decide what’s worse: Galvin’s refusal to debate altogether, or insisting on a five minute gloss over the issues at the eleventh hour. Anyway, that’s what we got, and we’re going to take our best shot. Thanks to Jon Keller for working to set it up. Here’s our campaign’s release:
PRESS RELEASE – FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Nov. 2, 2006
Contact: Jill Stein, 617-852-4727
BILL GALVIN TO DEBATE JILL STEIN IN SEC. OF STATE RACE
Secretary of State Bill Galvin has agreed to a mini-debate with challenger Jill Stein. Secretary Galvin insisted on a five-minute debate, moderated by CBS4 political analyst Jon Keller. The mini-debate will take place on Friday, November 3rd, at 1:30 p.m. in an undisclosed location in the State House. An edited version of the exchange will be broadcast later in the day on CBS4, and the full five minutes will appear online.
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Okay, I’m a town committee chair, and I’m thinking this is ridiculous–and insulting to the voters of Massachusetts. I supported Bonifaz at the convention and voted for him in the primary. I may have to leave that box blank, though, in the general. Maybe I’ll write in myself. Holy shit.
Rudderless Bill Galvin has put his toe in the water in the last two Governor’s races and timidly retreated to his safe space. John Bonifaz would have sounded the battle cry for ballot acountability. This year we focused on and replace the governor. Next year we we focus on and replace the secretary
Rudderless Bill Galvin has put his toe in the water in the last two Governor’s races and timidly retreated to his safe space. John Bonifaz would have sounded the battle cry for ballot acountability. This election we focused on and replace the governor. Next election we we focus on and replace the secretary.
Just curious: Why won’t you vote for Jill Stein? We all know Galvin will win this, but why not send him a direct message with a vote for Stein?
just vote for jill stein! make a point!
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I’m voting for Jill. She’s got good ideas, and I know she won’t win. I want to send a message to Galvin that he needs to address some issues in his job. And I’ll vote for anyone that thinks Diebold machines are a bad idea. That rules Galvin out.
Come on. Five minutes? That’s appalling. He wouldn’t debate, or even acknowledge, his perfectly legitimate (at the very least, in the sense of having followed the rules with respect to getting on the ballot) challenger in the primary, and now a mere five days before the election he deigns, finally, to offer his opponent in the general a five-minute “debate” on a Friday afternoon?
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That’s so calculatedly insulting that I’m at a loss for words to express how disgusted I am. I have to assume that Galvin only made the offer because he assumed it was so insulting that Stein would turn it down.
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I don’t know, I’d lay even money he won’t show up. Any takers? (Hey, where’d that chicken graphic go? It looks like it didn’t outlive its usefulness with the primary…)
That’s the last straw. I’m voting for Jill Stein.
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I don’t think Galvin has been a bad Secretary of State, but he needs to realize that it’s necessary to actually run for re-election rather than just assuming it.
If people have an once of human decency, they’ll vote for anyone BUT Bill Galvin. I don’t care if you vote for Stein, write in your grand mother or pull the lever for Donald Duck.
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Bill Galvin is an insult to all of Massachusetts. His very name on the ballot is anathema to the entire system of Democracy. He should be ashamed.
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I have never seen such an outrageous Blue Mass Group diary in all of my lifetime… a 5 minute debate?!?!
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To hell with that. Jill Stein should say no on principal.
This is disgusting. A five-minute debate is an insult to voters, and I agree that it’s appalling that our democracy is being treated with such condescension by the man most singularly responsible for its functioning in Massachusetts.
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Then I read foolish over-the-top things like “If people have an once of human decency, they’ll vote for anyone BUT Bill Galvin” and I’m right back where he started.
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Maybe I’ll write in Mihos’s name for SoS.
In many ways, the way people run campaigns seem to become more important than what they’d do in office. I loved Deval from the moment I saw him, but I never really had a problem with Gabrieli, except for how he ran his campaign. Similarly, I never really had a problem with Galvin – yes, there are many real voting issues in MA, but on the whole I think he’s done an ok job. But as somebody who is in charge of stewarding our democracy here in Massachusetts, his campaign has done everything it can to spit in the face of democracy.
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Now, I definitely won’t go saying things like that decency line, but only because how we present ourselves is important. C’mon, it’s a secretary of state race that is a foregone conclusion — these kind of statements are over the top. By that same token, sabutai, I think it’s worth it to vote Green at this point to send a message that dissent is good and healthy in a democracy. Galvin shouldn’t be given a free ride by anybody. Just as you would want bloggers to show a little respect by not writing those over-the-top lines, Galvin should show a little respect by actually debating the issues or at the very least acknowledging that there are issues to debate!
when our tax payer dollars are paying his salary and the Secretary of State’s office is so important. Massachusetts deserves so much better. The SoS office also includes the Public Records Division as well as the Election Division. The Public Records Division, which is supposed to ensure that the Massachusetts Public Records Law is followed by local government officials, has a very important role to play in ensuring that our democracy works. It also does an ok job, but not a good or great job. For example, it does not keep any records of how many problems people have had in obtaining public records from their local officials. Mediocrity should not be considered ok when it comes to our state government.
This is pretty awful behavior on Galvin’s part, but he’s a long-serving Democratic elected official who, until recent years, seemed to be doing a pretty OK job as Secretary of State, not Hitler. He’s gotten complacent and arrogant in office from too many easy or uncontested races, and that’s a good reason to vote him out; he doesn’t respect legitimate challengers, and that’s a good reason to vote him out; he’s bringing Diebold machines to Massachusetts, and that’s a very good reason to vote him out. But a vote for Galvin is not a vote for evil, and there’s no need to cast aspersions on the human decency of people who vote for the veteran Democrat.
down a 5 minute debate?
I wouldn’t be surprised if that’s Galvin’s idea (and hey, that gets it down to 2.5mins!)
And it’s Jon Keller, so that’s at LEAST 3 of the 5 total minutes… ;P
Galvin will get the votes, but he doesn’t make it easy on us. The question is why? Ted K debated Chase, no so much for the need as we know Ted will crush him in the election, but more to get his voice out to the voters. Why is Galvin missing this?
I hope Jill uses the 5 minutes to hammer him on touchscreen voting and see if he’ll get rid of those Diebold TSx’s.
Please direct us to the thread you mention here, where you explain your “long, detailed” rationale for voting for Galvin instead of Stein.
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I don’t know what “Gotcha” means in this context, but I’m serious. I have e-mailed Cos offline at the address he lists in his BMG profile asking the same thing – no response. I’m not saying he’s ducking, but this is a fair and honest question. As someone who was on Bonifaz’s staff at the same time Cos was, I can’t fathom how anyone in their right mind could transition from supporting John to supporting Galvin. If there’s a logical explanation, I’m very eager to hear it. We have a lot of work ahead of us to move Massachusetts in a progressive direction, and if anyone thinks they can vote for Deval and have that be the end of it, they’ve got another thing coming. Green-Rainbows, Progressive Dems, and Working Families Party people need to sit down – and soon – and figure out what we can work together on and where we’re going to agree to disagree. Otherwise, we’ll get the same old same old.
Despite my reversal on Galvin (based on his refusal to debate, and bringing touchscreen voting machines to MA), I still vehemently oppose the third party organizing strategy on the grounds that it is a proven abject failure, and that working within the Democratic party is showing a lot of success, and that we desperately need more progressives to do that, instead of working on third parties.
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I don’t feel a need to “sit down and figure out.” There was plenty of time for that in 2000-2003. What we need now is for people in the Green and similar parties to give up the delusion, look at reality, and come into the Democratic party to help us run better candidates and win more primaries.
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Tim Schofield lost by 64 votes. You think there might be 64 registered Greens in Allston-Brighton & Brookline precinct 1? How exactly do they help the progressive movement by shutting themselves out of a primary like that?
If you need US to win you your primaries for you within any district, then what you have is an organizational problem that we just can’t help you with. If it is at all true that the progressives within your party have an actual chance of finally reversing your party’s deplorable state-wide direction (and, admit it, slashing Medicaid benefits, Clean Elections, Chapter 70 monies, and RAFT is indeed deplorable and morally wrong) – then you certainly should have been able to demonstrate that to us. We didn’t cost you that election.
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Let us suppose, for just one moment, that you were living in Pittsfield and the Green-Rainbow Party had a primary this year – would you have switched your party registration to help us prevent Dion Robbins-Zust from hijacking our party label for his state senate race if you thought the Green-Rainbow Party primary victor could win? I frankly don’t think you would.
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I don’t vote in your party’s primaries. I won’t vote in your party’s primaries. I have my own party, my friend, and we want our very own primaries. We also had our very own candidate in that race. If you didn’t like the results of that primary, then you could have supported the nice insurance policy that my very good friend in those parts provided for you.
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You could have done far worse than Moran, who happens to be pro-choice and supports equal marriage rights – and whose stance on issues almost exactly matches that pleasant sounding platform your party has yet never implements.
Cos’s inability to admit that Tim Schofield and Mike Moran have the exact positions on every single progressive issue is one of the reasons he will never be able to preach to anyone outside the choir.
His credibility as a progressive is truly hurt by this.
Get over it Cos.
Your guy lost and you still have a super progressive legislator in that seat.
The end result was a win for progressives, a win for Massachusetts and a win for the neighborhoods of Allston and Brighton.
What in the name progress prevents you from admitting this?
Do you have something against white heterosexual males?
Perhaps something against people who spend their entire adult lives serving the community they grew up in local government?
Or maybe it’s Catholics?
Or maybe it’s just progressive candidates who can win without your support….
Get over it.
Put your support behind all true progressives.
Not just your pet projects.
Schofield did.
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I think “Gotcha” may refer to the fact that you didn’t read my comment on the Diebold post.
I don’t think so. I just linked to your response and this is what I read:
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“I still hold all the opinions I’ve stated before about needing to support the Democratic nominee…”
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Again, I ask – what opinions are those? I’m looking for the “long, detailed” explanation, if it exists. But it seems clear you’re not interested in working collaboratively with Green-Rainbow Party members, so don’t knock yourself out trying to find it. I think I get where you’re coming from.
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For the record, I wasn’t invited to formulate strategy for Tim Schofield’s campaign, but I went door-knocking with him in my grandmother’s Oak Square neighborhood and did GOTV calls on Election Day. Had I been asked to help with strategy, I would have made sure that all registered J and G voters got a letter from Tim explaining why they should unenroll and vote for him in the primary. I would have been happy to do the follow-up calls.
This is a letter to editor I wrote to the Globe. A similar letter was sent to The Herald and the MetroWest Daily News
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Letter to the Editor
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By Seth J. Itzkan
70 Marshall Street
Medford, MA 02155
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Five minutes for democracy
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Secretary of State William Galvin’s avoidance of debate during this campaign season (“Secretary of state, rival duke it out briefly”, Boston Globe, November 4, 2006) is the equivalent to his dropping a gavel on exactly the type of election-related dialogue his office should be promoting.
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His challenger, Green-Rainbow Party candidate Jill Stein, M.D., has suggested ideas for the office that seem warranted and timely, such as a website similar to the one operated by the state of Wisconsin that tracks lobbyist contributions to legislatures (http://ethics.state….). Were it not for the “five minute” debate he agreed to last Thursday, in which Ms. Stein referred to this innovation from Wisconsin, the Massachusetts public may never have known about it.
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If Galvin’s role as chief information officer for the state is to be taken seriously, his own campaign behavior should be a model of engagement. One five minute debate over the course of an entire campaign is both insulting to voters, and disparaging to the spirit of his office.
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