Just wondering if anyone knows why this was allowed to happen?
1) The Chair of the Party is elected by the members of the DSC and the term of that office is 4 years. Technicaly Phil has 2 more years to serve out his term unless he resigns.
2) Gus Bickford is still a member of the State Committee since he did not resign from his DNC seat. He only resigned from his position as one of the Deputy Treasurers.
3) As usual no one was paying attention when John Walsh pulled this move. Walsh wants to oust Phil and take over as Chair and to do that he needed to be a member of the State Committee. If he is doing this for Deval … so much for openess and transparancy.
The by-laws which can not be suspended requires that for any vacancy there must be at lest 30 days notice given and then an election needs to be held at the next State Committee hearing.
Here they had Gus resign and John Walsh coronated/elected in one felt swoop.
Now all they have to do is get Phil to resign so that they can push thru another quick election for Walsh.
4) Say what you will about Phil but he has raised the money the Party needs, and under his term we have gained seats in both the House and Senate here in Massachuetts as well as got a Democrat in the corner office as well. Why we would want to change that now seems foolish to me. And let us not forget that if it wasn’t for Phil and Sue Thomson raising money thru Victory 06 Deval would have gone dark after the primary since his campaign was broke. The DSC gave Deval $400,000 so that he could go right up on the air and not loose a beat. That was in addition to the monies and resources they gave to some Reps and Senators that also had very tough races.
This tells me nothing about what happened. Now, I am a huge John Walsh fan, so I’m already biased (and I by no means have any preference for incumbant insiders either) but I would like to actually hear the context in which this happened.
The by-laws which can not be suspended requires that for any vacancy there must be at lest 30 days notice given and then an election needs to be held at the next State Committee hearing.
<
p>
John had them ignore the by-laws. When the Deputy Treasurer resigned there needs to be a 30 day notification and an election held at the next meeting. My sense was that John didn’t care about the rules he just wanted in to set himself up to run ad Chairman down the line.
I’m piecing together from the account that Gus Bickford resigned, and John Walsh was elected to replace him, but I might be wrong about that. And now we’re going on “your sense” that Walsh wants to be MSC chair.
<
p>
I say this as a backer of Phil Johnston, and someone who’d like to preserve a place in the Mass Dem Party for the half of us who didn’t vote for Deval in the primary.
Phil doesn’t do anything he doesn’t want to do. I am the first to admit that I’m out of the gossip loop, but I have no idea where you go this info:
<
p>
<
p>
As I recall, when Phil announced a couple of years ago that he was going to resign, he was talked into staying with the promise that there would be an expanded health insurance bill passed at the state level. With that in place and the electoral successes you outline, it wouldn’t surprise me if he was now ready to step away from the DSC.
<
p>
As for Walsh wanting that job, I don’t know. It seems to me like he has a lucrative career ahead in campaign management, if he wants it. The DSC is a tough group to manage, so I can’t imagine anyone really wanting the job. As you point out, one of the most useful roles for the Chair is to schmooze for big money, and I don’t know if that’s Walsh’s preferred form of political activity.
<
p>
If the skids were greased to get Walsh onto the Executive Committee, my guess is that a number of people recognized that he has some useful skills and contacts that would be valuable to have in the inner circle of the party. Nothing underhanded about it – just a recognition that a guy who engineered a very smart campaign could help the party to improve in other ways.
This anonymous post smells of conspiracy theory, and is more than a little silly. It isn’t clear how the author comes by this “information.”
<
p>
To say that John somehow engineered his way onto the DSC w/o Phil’s approval is ludicrous. John can speak for himself, of course, but my understanding is that he’s a big fan of Phil, and would never do anything to shunt him aside. Furthermore, if Phil did decide to resign, John would not be annointed, but would have to stand for election, perhaps against other qualified candidates.
<
p>
Having worked closely with John on a certain campaign over the past two years, I find it laughable to suggest that he would do anything underhanded or disrespectful.
<
p>
And, you’re right to suggest that “finance” may not be his “thing” — I can remember a comment or two he made to that effect.
<
p>
Should the Chair’s slot become vacant, and should John decide to run, we could do much worse than to have someone who had a lot to do with the Party taking back the corner office for the first time in 16 years.
<
p>
So, to John, I say “congratulations on your election” and I, for one, will welcome you in any role you choose to play in the Party going forward.
are you sure there was no notice? i’m not even a DSC member and i heard this.
<
p>
i cannot believe john walsh would do anything underhanded. i’d leave that to the DSC, which did its fair share of underhanding before the primary.
I am actually a member of the State Committee. So I know that no notice was given. And I know on good sources that John pressured this to happen. Not such a nice guy after all. Everyone should abide by the rules.
<
p>
Not sure what you are talking about by the State Committee being underhanded pre-primary. Since most of the State Committee Members backed Deval and that everything was done to ensure him a fair and open process thru the convention. I actually think that the State Committee did above and beyond it usually does for a candidate for Deval. And lets not forget the nearly $500,000 they gave him the day after the primary when Deval’s campaign was broke so that he would not go dark in the press and could compete with Kerry Healy.
That they were going to give whoever won the primary. Don’t make it out like this was a Deval-only donation.
I still don’t really care. If the only way to clean house at the DSC is by favors and arm-twisting, then so be it. The powers-that-be in the DSC have been in power too long and only seem to be interested in staying–and I’m not including most committee members, just the top. They were clueless about grassroots and pooh-poohed the idea, and now they’ll probably claim it was their idea at the convention.
<
p>
Look, there are two words to explain why we’ve suffered for so many years with Republican governors:
<
p>
JOHN SILBER.
<
p>
That was the year I became formally disgusted with the DSC. And the first time I ever voted for a Republican. I was far from the only one to do that.
oh, puhleez . . .
<
p>
Gabrieli sent “that letter”–and I’m sure you know which one I’m talking about. The one to all the delegates that looked like it was from the party. Used a facsimile of the state seal. And claimed ownership in teensy-weensy letters that a lot of people said they didn’t even notice until they were told about it.
<
p>
The letter was at the very least unethical, and more than likely crossed a couple of legal lines.
<
p>
Did the DSC even try to admonish him? Issue a public statement, a gesture, a wrist slap???
<
p>
Yeah, thought so. “Fair and open process.”
<
p>
At the convention I was told exactly what would happen and what the outcome would be, and when I seemed surprised I was told I was naive. I was told that some towns would be “late” in their count, and when the dust settled Gabrieli would have squeaked onto the ballot with a hair over 15%.
<
p>
That’s what happened. Exactly.
<
p>
At the last issues convention a lot of people wanted to discuss some of the proposed amendments. A lot of people thought they were in the majority. But the DSC elite just breezed over the vocal vote and ignored the protests.
<
p>
“Fair and open process.” And I’ve got a bridge for you in Brooklyn.
<
p>
The state DSC is just a microcosm of the timid, almost spineless DLC centrists.
<
p>
I stay with the Democrats because their platform at least pretends to be about the progressive issues I care about. But when it comes to bureaucracy, Dems on every level can rival Republicans in their desire to keep a tight hold on their little corner of paradise.
<
p>
Put the blame where it belongs …you just said yourself …
<
p>
“Gabrieli sent “that letter”–and I’m sure you know which one I’m talking about. The one to all the delegates that looked like it was from the party. Used a facsimile of the state seal. And claimed ownership in teensy-weensy letters that a lot of people said they didn’t even notice until they were told about it.
<
p>
The letter was at the very least unethical, and more than likely crossed a couple of legal lines.”
<
p>
I don’t think you can blame the DSC for something Gabrielli did on his own.
<
p>
As for the convention you obviously don’t know the rules. Challenges were being heard and that is what slowed the count down. You can blame Reilly’s camp for tying up the convention with so many challenges that Gabrielli could strong arm enough votes to squeak by. The DSC was just following the process as they should.
No, I wasn’t blaming the DSC for sending the letter. That’s twisting my words. I blamed the DSC for not responding to it, which was not only well within their purview but something they should have done to show they do not condone dirty tricks like that within their own party. What kind of statement did they make by not condemning it? Hmmm, maybe like Kerry Healey did when she didn’t condemn the yahoos in orange jumpsuits harrassing John Walsh’s family.
<
p>
Yup, I can blame Reilly’s camp for tying up the convention. But whose convention was it? The DSC’s. And they didn’t do anything to stop the irregularities and possibly unethical backroom bargaining (I heard what I heard from someone who is an expert and old hand at Bay State politics).
<
p>
So either the DSC has absolutely no say in their own process and are held hostage by egotistical politicos, or they are complicit–not so much in what they do as in what they don’t do.
<
p>
I don’t know if you were a coordinator for Deval, but we had a very hard time with a lot of the DSC in the time between the convention and the primary. Deval was the endorsed candidate, and that didn’t mean a damn thing–oh wait, I was told that it meant he could use it to raise money. Someone working for the party said that to me.
<
p>
I’ll admit I may be wrong about what I’m going to say, but the DSC gave every appearance of passively hoping Deval would lose, in their actions in dealing with the grassroots campaign, in their public statements, and in their near-total absence. I cannot believe that they would have been so passive had Tom Reilly, the ultimate insider, had won the convention. Or if Chris Gabrieli, the ultimate party donation machine, had won. I say this because I ran into a lot of resistance to Deval from Democrats during this time. It’s not that they didn’t like him–it’s that they, for one reason or another, didn’t believe he could be elected (and the why of that is another long story).
<
p>
Deval ran on a campaign of change, of egalitarianism, of examining how well someone does his/her job not who he/she knows. That’s an anathema to any established power. Just ask that hypocrite Travaglini–he felt so threatened that he started huffing and puffing and blustering and bloviating about the relationship between the legislature and the governor even before the inauguration.
<
p>
So I cannot imagine that there wasn’t some of that uneasiness wafting through Dem HQ.
for Silber. He won the primary–the voters nominated him.
I’m pretty sure you meant to say that Gus Bickford is still part of the DSC rather than DNC. Correct?
<
p>
I was at this meeting. In fact I blogged about it. Now I mentioned on my blog that stuff goes pretty fast at these meetings, but I don’t personally recall John Walsh “pulling” anything. If this thing went down like you say, then why would Uncle Phil sound like he was thrilled with the idea of having Walsh as a more active fundraiser for the state party?
<
p>
The idea that the party gives 30 days notice for vacancies is awesome — if the party actually gave notice somewhere that folks had access to.
<
p>
I ran for an open seat last August. The DSC was supposed to give notice about that opening too, but lemme tell you, if you don’t know (or know someone else who does know) the secret handshake, you’re not going to just “run into” that information. To my knowledge none of these openings are published on the Mass Dems website and I have a HUGE problem with that. If you call the Mass Dems office you’re not likely to get an answer either, although the very polite intern answering the phone is delighted to forward your call to the appropriate person’s voice mail. Good luck ever hearing back from them. Do I sound bitter? Maybe a touch. đŸ™‚ /end rant
<
p>
Just wondering if anyone knows why this was allowed to happen?
<
p>
You say you’re on the State Committee, yes? What did YOU do to stop this? Or is this just a personal beef with John Walsh?
<
p>
One thing I do agree with is that there are transparency problems with the DSC, but blind quotes from anonymous bloggers ain’t going to get us anywhere.
<
p>
Gus remains a State Committee member because the rule is that all DNC members are automatically members of the State Committee. So it was easy to get him to resign since he techinacally kept his seat on the committee in a different role.
<
p>
Things do go very fast at these meetings and if you are not there for the whole meeting or blink you can easily miss something.
<
p>
Don’t always believe what you hear or read. Do you think Phil or any other member of the commitee would discredit or say something bad about the person that is perceived as the new governors hand picked go to person. Especially on the night the governor himself is making an appearance.
<
p>
No personal beef with John but I like others don’t want to give him or anyone else a reason to go after us or our seat on the committee by putting some up against us.
<
p>If this was indeed an illegal action, did you raise a point of order? Debate against it? Vote against it?
<
p>If you are actually a state comittee member, and you were at a meeting and saw something that you found so objectionable going on, why not stand up and call the DSC out on it? If you were there and kept your mouth shut, out of cowardice, or out of some sort Milgram-esque go-along-with-the-crowd mentality, then you have absolutely no business complaining about it here. None. Especially under cover of anonymity.