The other shoe has dropped. In a front-page, above-the-fold piece in today’s Boston Globe, we see the desired candidate of the cabal who performed the political assassination of Tim Murray — Martha Coakley.
The piece, by Frank Phillips and Jim O’Sullivan, opens with the narrative that the cabal hopes will carry the day (emphasis mine):
Attorney General Martha Coakley, whose political standing has rebounded after her embarrassing defeat in the 2010 US Senate race against Scott Brown, is giving serious consideration to running for governor, Democratic Party operatives said on Thursday.
Right. Notice that the emphasized phrase is worded as an objective statement of fact: “…has rebounded”. This is just one of the lies the media machine would like us to believe.
Then we get to the next item in the narrative:
Perhaps most significantly, she would be the only woman in a developing field that could include a half-dozen male candidates.
“Perhaps most significantly”? So apparently the “most significant” reason to support her is that she is a woman? Excuse me, but she’s already tried that strategy, and lost. We just saw Gabriel Gomez explode into the ground in a power dive shouting “I’m a SEAL” all the way in — biography is NOT a primary reason to elect a Governor, and gender is even less important. Surely we should choose our Governor based on which man or woman is the best qualified and best able to do the job. Surely we should reject the lie that such special consideration is needed — is there any doubt that Elizabeth Warren is a superior senator than Ms. Coakley would have been? We are better off with Senator Warren (a woman) than we would have been with “Senator Coakley”. I suggest the same dynamic is true in the upcoming gubernatorial race.
The media machine takes care to position the immediate rival (emphasis mine):
Coakley’s candidacy would overshadow that of state Treasurer Steven Grossman, the only other statewide officeholder in the race. Grossman, a former state and national party chairman, has strong ties to Massachusetts Democratic Party activists who dominate primary races. He has thus far been considered the most formidable figure in a nascent field.
Again, we see an editorial opinion expressed as objective fact (“would overshadow that of …”).
Finally, in what strikes me as a veiled shout-out to BMG, the piece sketches the remainder of the field — and essentially paraphrases the recent discussions here. I particularly enjoyed this bit:
Another Massachusetts congressman, Michael E. Capuano of Somerville, is also giving serious consideration to running and will make a decision later in the summer, according to an adviser. If Capuano does not run, Somerville Mayor Joseph A. Curtatone is set to join the race, Democratic Party sources have confirmed.
Sounds to me like we have achieved the exalted status of “Democratic Party sources”.
The despicable destruction of Tim Murray’s political career is, in my view, a typical Martha Coakley move. I find it particularly interesting that, after her extensive investigation, Ms. Coakley found no reason to indict Mr. McLaughlin, no reason to indict any of the other Democratic Party candidates that he raised money for, but nevertheless insured that she tied Mr. Murray to the scandal. I remind us of, for example, this gem from last summer (emphasis mine):
Prosecutors from Attorney General Martha Coakley’s office questioned two Chelsea Housing Authority employees under oath this week about their political connections to Lieutenant Governor Timothy P. Murray, part of an intensifying criminal investigation into whether the housing agency’s former director illegally turned the workplace into a political machine aimed at helping Murray win election.
Later, in February of this year, we see a similar piece from the Globe (emphasis mine):
Former Chelsea public housing chief Michael E. McLaughlin could face little, if any, prison time under Tuesday’s plea agreement with federal prosecutors, but he still faces possible criminal prosecution from state Attorney General Martha Coakley, who is conducting an energetic investigation into McLaughlin’s allegedly illegal political fund-raising.
McLaughlin pleaded guilty to four felony counts of concealing his inflated salary from federal officials. He has not yet negotiated a plea deal with state investigators that, like the federal deal, would require him to provide evidence against others. However, a person briefed on Coakley’s investigation said McLaughlin is already providing information about his relationship with his onetime ally, Lieutenant Governor Timothy P. Murray.
Mission accomplished. Nearly a year later, Mr. Murray’s political career is destroyed, and no charges are filed against him. I’d love to know who the “person briefed on Coakley’s investigation” is.
The story appears to conclude in May, with the victim of the assassination taking a private-sector role (emphasis mine):
Yesterday Lt. Governor Tim Murray announced he would resign to take a $200,000 per year job with the Worcester Chamber of Commerce. This would suggest that Murray and the Chamber believe he is at little risk of being indicted by US Attorney Carmen Ortiz or Attorney General Martha Coakley for campaign finance violations he may have committed along with felon Michael McLaughlin, former head of the Chelsea Housing Authority.
Yup, you got it. “This would suggest that Murray and the Chamber believe he is at little risk of being indicted by … Attorney General Martha Coakley.”
Sadly, Maurice Cunningham (the writer of this last piece) seems to have missed the final dot (or is perhaps reluctant to say so in writing):
So are we talking Salem witch trials in these highly publicized political investigations that lead to little? Or are we talking “extremely well-connected guy[s]”? Or something else?
We are talking “something else”, Mr. Cunningham. Martha Coakley and the Globe have eliminated her chief rival. Once that deed is done, nothing else matters. There never was a scandal with Mr. Murray. The blowback from actually prosecuting Mr. McLaughlin is far too dangerous for Ms. Coakley to pursue it.
All in all, a disgraceful episode for the Globe and an excellent reason to campaign hard for Mike Capuano or Joe Curtatone. It is time for the rest of us to help Ms. Coakley follow Mr. Murray’s example — it’s her time to find and execute an exit strategy. Perhaps the Globe will assist her.
Mclaughlin did plead guilty, didn’t he? Are you saying that the things he was accused of never happened, or should have been ignored, or were overblown?
Or are you saying that Murray’s connection to all this was invented, or just overemphasized? Or what?
Mr. McLaughlin was guilty of serious crimes, and got a handslap.
I’m suggesting that Ms. Coakley had a strong interest in taking out Tim Murray. I’m suggesting the Ms. Coakley showed no appetite in pursuing the other Democratic Party individuals that Mr. McLaughlin was involved with — it appears that the only person Ms. Coakley wished to see Mr. McLaughlin implicate was Tim Murray, and it appears to me that her primary interest in that implication was the advancement of her own political career. After that plea deal with Mr. McLaughlin, there have been no subsequent indictments. As the last link I posted observes, his appointment to the Worcester Chamber of Commerce strongly suggests that none will be forthcoming.
Mr. Murray read the writing on the wall and stepped aside. As I wrote in the thread-starter — mission accomplished.
I’m suggesting that a serious and neutral Attorney General would have been far less receptive to the plea deal Ms. Coakley accepted given the apparent lack of evidence actually provided by Mr. McLaughlin. I’m suggesting that Ms. Coakley was just as happy to go easy on Mr. McLaughlin as she was eager to drive Mr. Murray from the race.
The Globe was meanwhile eager to smear Mr. Murray as much as possible. As I’ve written elsewhere here, the Globe’s handling of Mr. Murray’s car crash was distorted, dishonest, and irresponsible. The Globe repeated its false claims about the speed of Mr. Murray’s vehicle long after those claims were shown to be false (no Crown Victoria could have accomplished the acceleration claimed in the Globe’s reporting).
The Globe then used those false claims to build a tower of damaging and utterly false innuendo about Mr. Murray’s “strange” behavior regarding the crash.
I’m saying that the Globe and its connections within the Democratic Party appear to have intentionally removed the leading contender from Ms. Coakley’s aspirations to be Governor.
Have you seen any polls taken over the last year or so? Coakley regularly has the highest net favorables among state office holders…hence the use of the word “rebound”.
Are you suggesting that being the only woman in a crowded field does not create a political advantage for her? The Globe reporters would be committing journalistic malpractice if they did not state the obvious.
But what is most delusional is the suggestion that Tim Murray is a victim and did not show very poor judgement in getting so deep in with McLaughlin. The very fact that McLaughlin was indicted and pled guilty to federal charges indicates that Coakley was simply doing her job by investigating McLaughlin at the state level. When Murray knowingly had McLaughlin host fundraisers for him, when both knew this action was against state law, in-and-of-itself warranted an investigation and illustrated the many questionable decisions Murray made with regards to his relationship with McLaughlin.
My take on the “story behind the story” is the Barbara Lee / Swanee Hunt cabal who are seeking to recruit a woman to run for Governor. Terry Murray apparently has said no, Bump is apparently a no. Martha is thinking about whether she can deal with the art of campaigning, which she obviously loathes (who wouldn’t).
Grand conspiracies based on speculation, inferences and conspiracies are so unbecoming.
You forgot “suggesting”.
Really I am so disappointed that Tom posted this unsubstantiated negative personal attack on a good woman and a very effective AG.
Please God he doesn’t favor us with more of his suggestions, speculation, inferences, conspiracies.
Ms. Coakley joins Mr. DeLeo in the pantheon of highly regarded figures in the Massachusetts Democratic Party for which I have little or no use.
Reread the reports about how Mr. Murray’s Crown Victoria accelerated from 70 to “over 100” on an icy road in 3 seconds (as reported in the Globe), then get back to me about “inferences”, “delusional”, and so on.
Astonishing acceleration fit the narrative — wheels spinning on ice (and recorded by the block box) did not.
With respect, many do not share your rosy opinion of the AG’s body of work. She may be a good woman who loves her husband and dogs, but effective AG is a stretch and candidate for Governor is remarkable hubris on her part.
I do not share somervilletom’s “suggestion” or opinion for that matter, that Martha Coakley was instrumental in the former LG’s political downfall. Her body of work reveals that she calculates every move (and her blind-eye to others) for her political aims, but I do not see her having the malevolence to target nor successfully destroy the former LG’s political career. He made some foolish missteps. Maybe he lost touch with his roots/foundation as a boy from working middle class Worcester and got sloppy with shaking the wrong hands, but it was his own mistakes that burnt the ground.
It could well be that Ms. Coakley did not need to explicitly, herself, target Mr. Murray. I can well imagine that her staff saw the opportunities in the housing authority scandal, that her staff enjoyed the salacious innuendo published by the Globe about the car crash, and that she and her staff were willing to let things play out in a way that benefited Ms. Coakley.
I am also not suggesting that Mr. Murray was a golden boy untouched by political sin.
I am suggesting that an AG dedicated to aggressively rooting out political corruption would have either done all in her power to ensure that the press reported her prosecutors pursuing other figures beyond her chief rival, or aggressive worked to not offer any specifics.
Similarly, I wonder if the US Attorney’s office would have gotten involved if the AG’s office had been more aggressive earlier.
Given the long decline in the Globe’s investigative resources, do we really believe that the housing authority scandal (like the probation department scandal and the Dookhan mess) was a total shock and surprise to the AGs office when published by the Globe?
Whatever mistakes Mr. Murray made, I doubt that they were more egregious than mistakes made by any of the other candidates or prospective candidates.
I think a far more important factor is that he was the most important obstacle in the path of Martha Coakley’s political ambition, and that Martha Coakley is, for whatever reason, the favorite candidate of the Globe editorial and reporting staff.
This is not far from the view out here an hour west, though I have not seen it spelled out as you have here. She has a long career that shows a certain economy when it comes to the exercise of prosecutorial ethics, particularly when it comes to the political ambition of the present AG. She should not be elected to anything, anywhere, ever.
I would be surprised if she could actually win a primary, but I do know that if she did, that would convert me from cranky independent who gripes but tends to vote D, to donating, volunteering Republican, regardless of whom the Republicans see fit to nominate.
I think I pointed out in 2010, that I will never, as in not ever, vote for Ms. Coakley. She has grossly abused the prosecutorial authority of the state, which in my view is entirely unforgivable.
I’ll add that the most Masha Coakley has done for the Commonwealth is enforce the auto lemon law. I can’t think of anything else she’s done.
I like that line … “she has a certain economy when it comes to the exercise of prosecutorial ethics”.
I’m reminded of a line Louis Armstrong sings in “My Sweet Hunk O’trash”:
It seems unlikely that Coakley backers had anything to do with Murray running away from adversity and going to work for a parochial business lobby.
But something is rotten in this Coakley article and its over-the-top placement–it suggests the Globe is going to work for her. Coakley is an electoral disaster for anything other than AG. It doesn’t take much of a shift in conditions to elect an insubstantial Republican in a statewide election–see Paul Cellucci (RIP) and Scott Brown. Coakley winning the Democratic nomination would be one such condition.
I see there is a full-blown Coakley debate already underway.
For her spirited attack on federal environmental regulation on behalf of Massachusetts voters. I am sure that this lawsuit is supported by existing law and valid evidence, and is not just a political ploy.