My judgment after watching the five minute Stein-Galvin debatelet is that Galvin is not fit to hold the Secretary of State’s office. He doesn’t appear to respect the fundamental premise of our system of government: the people are sovereign.
First, he insults every citizen of the Commonwealth by dragging us off to some undisclosed location — an undisclosed location for a freaking Secretary of State’s debate! — for a “five minute” debate (which actually ran 15 minutes … like we should be on our knees weeping tears of gratitude for the extra 10 minutes). Did Dick Cheney suddenly decide to run for Massachusetts Secretary of State? We’re paying him $124,920 a year and he gives us 2.5 minutes of his time?!
Second, he refused to address virtually every substantive issue Stein raised. Whenever the going got tough he attacked his rival’s party affiliation instead of answering the question. Party politics is not the point — although I have no doubt it is in the tortured minds of the hackocracy, sweating fever dreams about the possibility of another trough of patronage jobs. At one point, I believe, he even had the gall to defend his office’s handling of the Big Dig. The day a Massachusetts politician goes on TV and says with a straight face that anything involved with the Big Dig is a credit to his office is the day you know he has completely lost the plot. Does someone have to die before an incumbent will admit that project was mismanaged. Don’t answer that.
The point is decent government. Answer the questions: why has the existing administration botched things so badly that we getting our asses sued in multiple lawsuits by the Department of Justice for voting rights violations; why aren’t we in compliance with HAVA after years to prepare; and why are we buying second-rate Republican-controlled Diebold voting machines that run secret software and can apparently be hacked by pretty much any election worker who knows how to use Excel. These are not party questions, they are democratic questions.
Take our advice and vote for Stein. Kudos to Keller, indeed, for organizing the exchange and being a decent moderator. I wish he would run for Secretary of State!
Sorry, but the presence of two candidates and a moderator does not constitute a “debate-anything.” You are giving both the event and the people too much credit.
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Fifteen minutes? An undisclosed location? That constitutes a sick, pathetic joke in my book.
“Debacle”
It’s amazing that liberals would cry over a Stein-Galvin debate. How about Martha Coakly openly refusing to debate anyone, especially her GOP opponent.
She is unfit to hold the office of Attorney General because she refuses to make an opening and closing statement and arguments for her case in between them.
Oh yeah! That’s what an attorney does in court! But in the court of public opinion Coakley is too good to do just that.
Even Dems should show her the door for her arrogance.
But her abilities are not in question, as I’m questioning Galvin’s. Most of the people I respect respect her abilities.
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I agree it’s very negative that she’s not debating however. Totally bad form. Though, before totally condemning her, I’d want to know the circumstances of that – with Galvin, we KNOW he’s been evasive, not even showing up when people think he will be. However, I’d like to know for sure that it’s Coakley’s fault there’s no debates first before I pass final judgement. Since this is the first time I heard about it.
I haven’t read anything at all about that race yet — anyone have some solid information they’d like to put in a user post?
Simply cite me where Coakley avoided a debate…I may still vote for her even if she did, she is not the person who is on the front lines of ensuring that democracy works in the Commonwealth, after all, but it would change my opinion of her candidacy. It may even change the opinion of those who read BMG enough to vote for Frisoli, so…Please substantiate your argument.
Stein has a nice precise opening, then Galvin has his…and it’s more than twice as long as far as I can tell. Thank god Keller gave Stein a rebuttal.
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Love her point on having the ability to check exACTly what laws are being influenced or requested by which lobbyists.
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Galvin: “your party doesn’t even have a full slate of candidates” – WTF does that have to do with anything?? Nice rebuttal by Stein on that one…what a dumb point by Galvin.
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“No better example of closed-door politics than what’s going on in the legislature, and I think it’s up to the Secretary to be the advocate for the reforms that we need to get our democracy back on track.” NICE. Mentions open meeting law, which legislature exempted itself from…how this results in lobbyists writing bills the public – AND the legislature – has no time to absorb before it’s passed.
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Galvin goes into how much he backed the Health Care for All version of the health care bill…yes, very nice, but that’s NOT the point Stein was making – she was using the health care bill the legislature passed as an example, pay attention. “If your issue is legislative then you should run for the legislature” – again, Galvin completely missing the point here. She’s saying the SecState could be an advocate for reform SUCH THAT these legislative processes can be clarified. Galvin needs a lesson in listening.
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Nice accusation against Stein “I think your issue is to reinvigorate your party” – real classy, Bill, just keep avoiding the issues and attacking her motives, like a Republican.
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Galvin RE same day registration…if true, good for him. I’m not holding my breath right now though…
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Yes, he was good on getting us better voting equipment in the late 90’s. My big beef is that he’s apparently not paying attention to that level of detail anymore with his decision to test out Diebold. And dude, no one has said anything about there not being a paper trail in these things…specifically, the critics are wondering if it’s the RIGHT paper trail – these have issues. Not to mention the other ones like crashing computers and hackability.
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She got him on the compliance thing and on the 4 investigations by the feds on voter rights violations. His answer didn’t satisfy me.
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RE Latino communities in Lawrence: Galvin apparently has a pattern of being invited places to do his job and neither confirming or denying his attendence and leaving them hanging. My god that’s irresponsible.
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Overall impression: Stein dogged Galvin pretty well, Galvin had some really good answers but Stein was also able to show that he’s been a little absent recently (most of Galvin’s pats to his own back, I noted, were things done years ago). She also made the point well, I think, that to some extent, Galvin is NOT an independent when it comes to dealing with the legislature. I mean, obviously he’s been
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RE Galvin in general, it seems to me whatever fight he used to have for protecting the people of the Commonwealth, he’s lost it long ago. I’d like to see some change. And if he gets back in, PLEASE will someone run against him again.
Damn, is she normally that fragile? I don’t trust Galvin. She should have been far better prepared and far firmer.
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Maybe it’s her speaking style, but she sure did seem timid, unsure and ineloquent. After reading her campaign literature and eating up her site, I expected a strong speaker who would make him ‘fess up to his failings.
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I’m voting for her and against him, but I don’t think her performance in the elevator debate will convince anyone. Pity for that, and I saw no evidence that he’s aware he needs to reform and do his job right.
I don’t know, I guess y’all were watching something different from what I saw. I don’t think Stein won at all, as I said. She came off as unprepared and flustered, and didn’t seem to have effective rebuttals to Galvin. Now, I’m no fan of Galvin’s — some of you may have noted I was less than kind to him earlier today — and this “five-minute debate” thing stinks, just like his behavior in the primary, just like his frequent absence, just like bringing Diebold into Massachusetts. It all stinks. But what’s Stein offering? She didn’t seem very together today, and whether or not it’s actually true, she let Galvin make her look like she didn’t even know what the Secretary of State’s job is.
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I know lots of reasons not to vote for Bill Galvin. I know that I probably agree more with Jill Stein on most issues than I do with him. Today’s performance hasn’t necessarily changed how I’ll vote. But no matter how good your ideas are, no matter how bad your opponent’s ideas are, you can’t expect to get anywhere if you don’t present yourself well, especially running against someone as smooth as Galvin.
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Believe me, I’d rather agree with Bob, but it just ain’t so: Stein lost that one.
Massmarrier and smadin, I’m a disappointed Bonifaz supporter. But, having observed Stein in person many times, I can attest to the fact that she is well informed, well spoken and plenty tough. Frankly, I think what you took for timidity was barely contained rage at the context of the exchange she was engaged in. I don’t know about you, but I think I would have been flapping my hands and babbling if I were whisked off to some damn mysterious safe house, plopped onto a live feed and given five minutes to sum up my rationale for a year and a half long campaign. Moreover, once I was done delivering my breathless summation to Galvin, I probably would have smacked the smug S.O.B. upside his head.
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Whatever you think of Stein’s admittedly (and understandable) below par delivery, you have to admit that she won on points.
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Also, I thought Galvin’s little riff about her arguments not having weight because her party hadn’t fielded a full slate was, well…. kind of wierd and pathetic. It made no sense to me.
The party argument was lame, plain and simple. Obviously, he didn’t have much else he wanted to discuss with Jill Stein, but I’m not bought one way or another just yet…See below:
I’m the “one legislative candidate” Bill Galvin talked about.
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Here’s my website:
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http://www.owenbroad…
As someone who originally intended to vote Galvin, then Bonifaz, then Galvin, and then Stein…I was not particularly impressed by what she made of her time, for the most part. I didn’t think Galvin was great, but I didn’t think he was awful. More importantly, I didn’t think that Jill Stein was particularly impressive. I think that Grace Ross would have KILLED him one-on-one, but Stein really didn’t punch to the gut.
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I understand some of this may have been attributed to the format and length, but I just wanted those of you who care in the GRP that while I will likely vote for Jill on Tuesday, it will not be because of a stellar performance tonight. In fact, I was leaning back towards either a Galvin or no-vote until I was reminded that the debate was taking place just 4 days from the Election, for 15 minutes, and at an undisclosed location. Once again, my lack of faith in Galvin to get the job done well, and his flouting of the voter’s rights (which include debating viable candidates) were re-affirmed, but my faith in Jill Stein did not grow which surprised me honestly.
Was the Galvin has serious lacks of listening comprehension skills. He kept saying “you should be a legislator” instead of realizing that she was USING an EXAMPLE to make a point about the PROCESS, not the bill itself. That said volumes to me.
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I also think he reads the blogs, or someone he knows does, because his “you should be in the legislature” argument was almost word for word what some of us used to say about Bonifaz before the debate (or lack thereof) shifted in the primary.
There was no real winner, although I think Galvin is the loser on general principal. An undisclosed location? Puh-leaze. What’s he afraid of? If he was afraid to do it in front of people, why not do it in Keller’s studio?
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Wierd. Doesn’t really inspire any confidence.
Galvin wanted the undisclosed location because he’d been kidnapped by aliens the night before, and while they were willing to beam Stein and Keller up for the debate, they weren’t willing to let Galvin down. Nor were they willing to let it go for more than 5 minutes (it APPEARED to be fifteen to us because of the speed of their spaceship and relativistic effects of time slowing down).
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But did you people consider this before piling on poor Bill Galvin? Did any of you even mention the chance that he might have beenin extraterrestrial captivity? No, not a single one. Typical liberals.