Isn’t everyone sick and tired of voting for the next politician who patiently waited his/her turn, or being told by the party brass who will be the nominee. I love new blood, keeps both parties closer to the people, and those in power, more on their toes.
I have some friends in Fitchburg who have great praise for their mayor. Her name is Lisa Wong. She was first elected in 2007 and accomplishments are impressive. According to her bio, she consolidated 22 city departments into 10, and built a stabilization fund from $20 grand to over $4.6 million, thus increasing Fitchburg’s bond rating. Lisa realizes Fitchburg has lost 8,000 manufacturing jobs, so I am sure she is sensitive to the plight of the working class struggles.
Lisa is the type of candidate BMG and its activists should be pushing and promoting, not the next person out of the bullpen. Charlie Baker vs Martha Coakley or Steve Grossman is 50/50 odds. If Lisa Wong was the Democratic Nominee, I believe she would get over 60%.
wouldn’t that be Charlie Baker?
There is a primary on the Democratic side.
and only a handful of elected office holders due to the Democrats gerrymandering all the house and senate districts, beggars can’t be choosers, no?
Even though most Republicans get over 40% of a statewide vote, Beacon Hill is 90% Democrtats. That, in your eyes, seems right, no? It’s no wonder the Dems have a deep bench, but most of your bench is unpalatable.
Dems need to learn how to identify talent, Lisa is one of them, and the activists should not simply take marching orders from the party brass. Rise up Democrats, rise up!
of your argument.
…with the GOP at less than 15%. Gerrymandering may give some advanatage, but it takes voter preferences to get the numbers the Dems have, along with fact that there are Democrats and then there are “Democrats”.
Why does my section of Waltham include Lexington, which is crazy liberals? The other section of Waltham is paired with Newton, another bat-shit liberal city. Oh no, I see nothing, nothing wrong with that. Gimme a break, all corrupt.
Watertown? What the hell are you talking about.
It is so obvious.
That section of Belmont is mostly wealthy Republicans, paired with my section of Waltham, free-thinking unenrolled voters, for the most part, a new district like like, would be a toss-up or possibly Republican.
But look at what we have, Lexington, which is worse than Watertown, whom I believe devours the moderate section of Belmont.
I just don’t get why Dems have to rig the elections like they do. They are not 90% of the voters, but they sure as hell rig these districts to get their desired outcomes. But they don’t believe in the exchange of ideas, just absolute power.
Face it, it’s legal voter supression, but in your eyes, it’s fair. One would think, especially those who claim to know statistics and probability, that it is impossible to have such overwhelming one party domination in the House and Senate, without gerrymandering.
is on the North Side of Belmont, as far away from Waltham as you can get and still be within Belmont. The two sites would connect to each other without Gerrymandering how exactly?
a) Beaver Brook Reservation,
b) Pleasant Street
c) Prospect Hill Park
d) No contiguously?
It connects very nicely. We have nothing in common with the Lincoln residents nor with our former Lexington district partners. Question is, are you interested in competitive elections and diverse thought, or rigged elections as we have today? Unless you think you are really believe havering 90% of the office seats in Democrats hands, are fair elections.
Translation: Not really contiguous, or warped to all hell to put that together.
Having managed multiple campaigns here. Markey got 60% in Waltham against Stephen Lynch, with higher turnout than ever before (thanks to over 50 WALTHAM volunteers who knocked on 10k doors on E-day).
Belmont Hill has nothing in common with South Waltham, one is pretty poor with a lot of immigrants, the other has lots of wealthy gazillionaires. North Waltham (the middle-class half) has a lot of similarity with South Lexington (the middle-class half). Other parts fit better with other towns: Brandeis would be good with Newton/Brookline (the Jewish vote). Warrendale seems like a good fit for Watertown (not great but OK). And South Waltham doesn’t vote proportionally, but if it did it would be far more progressive than the rest of Waltham, so it kind of fits with Newton (although again a very different kind of progressive).
You wouldn’t know it from the Kotouljians and the Stanleys, but that’s the truth.
I too was shocked how Lynch got just 40% or so in Waltham.
It looks like No Waltham is now paired with Lincoln, the Mike Barnicle’s of the world. Would not No Waltham, with the millionaires who live in Pigeon Hill (near Bentley) be better paired with Belmont Hill and the Rt 60 section of Belmont? That’s all I’m saying.
Also realize, Romney carried Waltham in 02 over O’Brien and Scott Brown won Waltham in 2010. I wouldn’t say it’s progressive, appears Stanley will be our next mayor.
There is no such thing as middle-class Lexington. There is upper class and the the rich.
All of Waltham is within the same Congressional, Governors Council, and Senate districts. It shares its CD with Lexington, but not Newton, its GCD with both of those, and its SD with half of Lexington, but not Newton. Only for the state House is Waltham divided, but it looks like only as much as necessary for the population. Most of Waltham shares an HD with Lincoln while the other part is in a district that includes corners of Newton and Cambridge. No part of a Waltham HD is shared with Lexington. As of 2008 Dems outnumbered GOP almost 4:1 in Waltham.
Our district included sections of Lexington for the longest time, now I read we are paired with a section of Lincoln!!! Gee thanks, may I have another. Link us with the business owners who live on Belmont Hill, and we will send a Leah Cole (Dem or Rep, but of her ilk) to the State House.
It should go to Weston and Wellesley, which would create a competitive district. But no, cant have that.
Dan, do me a favor and breakdown Waltham for me. What specifically does the “working class” section of Waltham mean? What are the “other” sections that you believe exist within the town.
Homes tend to be mostly multi-family, small lots, compacted. Cars in the driveways tend to be older, see high concentration of work trucks, vans, industrial area as well. Its called the eyeball test, johnk and to group my Walthamites with Cambridge? Really? Absolute disgrace.
shouldn’t be linked together. Is that the section you are talking about? I was hoping you weren’t going “white” on me. It sounded that way. My mistake.
I never linked Waltham to Cambridge, but have you ever driven through Cambridge? You just described a great majority of the area when you described Moody St.
Dan, you live in Middlesex county, there is nowhere for you to go, you live deep in the Dem wheelhouse. Sorry no gerrymandering going on, your just surrounded, and I’m including Waltham.
…but I would love to see her run for higher office.
And Driscoll, and they tend to take their policy seriously. In many ways Mayor is a better stepping stone to Governor but its hard in Massachusetts. Even Kevin White couldn’t pull it off. It was quite common before though, even a few Cambridge mayors made it to the Corner Office!
I’d have to see where she falls on education, otherwise it’d be great to see her to for an office.
Last summer, they signed a new three year contract with the teacher’s union. Both sides seem happy with the process and result:
http://www.sentinelandenterprise.com/rss/ci_20888833?source=rss
Wong appears to oppose new charter schools at least:
http://www.sentinelandenterprise.com/news/ci_23789533/fitchburg-eyed-charter-school
Plus, she has a cool looking dog:
http://www.commonwealthmagazine.org/News-and-Features/Features/2010/Fall/~/media/Images/Commonwealth%20Magazine/News%20and%20Features/2010/2010%20Fall/_26.ashx?h=233&w=350&as=1
I was going to mention that in my diary but feared the haters would say something negative about me for even mentioning it. It’s a cool looking pup, I concur.
After reading those I am definitely intrigued by her candidate. LG might be an easier step though, and it would be nice to balance the ticket again between Eastern and Western MA. I’m a big Mike Lake fan though so not sure I want her running for that. Finegold is a jerkoff, so she’d have my support for Treasurer. But yeah, Governor is the best equivalent move up, not sure if she can assemble a team in time or if she will be entering a too crowded field. Definitely keeping my eye on her though.
Also, calling Finegold an obscene name is uncalled for.
…If somebody has been doing a job for six years (Wong) they are, somehow, better than a politician who’s been doing a job for 26 (Coakley).
But looking forward 20 years from now… no matter what position is next for her… Lisa Wong, circa 2033, will probably have as many detractors as Martha Coakly does today, circa 2013… Not because she’s not good, she is very good, (and I’m speaking from personal experience), but because that’s the nature of the job. People get all misty eyed and weepy hoping for somebody who’ll make ‘tough decisions’ and then get all steely eyed and actually vengeful when those decisions get made and fall, or fail, in the other direction.
I think being the Chief Executive in a strong mayor system of a gateway city with a host of post-industrial challenges makes her far more qualified to oversee the entire state and its economic challenges than someone who has been a lawyer for 26 years, albeit one with big case experience.
Never understood why we elect AGs or DAs in the first place, all they do is politicize the office and abuse its power and then run for offices they are totally unqualified for. Who was the last AG to move over to the Corner Office? I hear crickets. We used to have a strong tradition of Mayors jumping into the Corner Office*, not just Boston’s either, even smaller cities like Cambridge and Newton had their share, and it’s time that is revived.
*Weld was a USAG, Brooke went to Senate from AG, still can’t think of a Gov
… however tangential to my point: the lure of the new and the naive, as I alluded to prior, is a false lure; in 6 years the accumulation of divisive calls is far far less than that which is found in 26. The general thrust of the original post was that new is always better and old is always a problem. But the new has a long and storied history of becoming the old… Lisa Wong might never be AG but I still maintain that after another 20 years in politics, she will have as many detractors as the current AG. That”s the job. That’s what’s happened to every politician, be they mayor or AG, to start: Elizabeth Warren, should she serve another 20 years, will be in the same position. Somebody once thought John Kerry would be the ideal, end-all-and-be-all Senator. Barack Obama, once thought a savior, turns out to be a human… who’d a thought?
In politics, as in life, there are two things to remember: nobody’s perfect and the perfect is never the enemy of the good…
I’m sympathetic to the argument against electing AGs: I think it ought to be an appointed position, as it is in the federal level. But appointing them won’t stop the politicization of the office *cough* John Ashcroft *cough* and it won’t make them any less likely to want to run for office *cough* RFK *cough*.
It was less an age/experience thing and more of a which kind of experience is better. I’d take Menino over Coakley and he’s been in politics longer than her. I’d take Curtatone over Dan Wolf, since he has been Mayor for almost 10 years while Wolf has been a State Senator for six. Basically I am saying Mayor>AG. Depending on the size of the city, the powers the mayor has, etc. So Murray as a figurehead Mayor in a Council-Manager system is not nearly as qualified as Wong, even though his city is bigger. Why more City Managers don’t run is beyond me, but they actually enjoy one of the best jobs in public service (lately looking at that for an end goal instead of elected office).
and it seems to me that DanFromWaltham always supports the absolutely weekest Democrat in order to give various Republicans a shot in this bluest of blue states. This post alone is enough to guarantee that I will always vote against whomever DanFromWaltham supports. After the killings in the Navy Yard yesterday, I have no doubt that the NRA and DanFromWaltham are celebrating another victory for their side.
is correct once in a while. Lisa Wong is great and has a future as a leader who has the ability to think long term.
A broken watch or clock is right twice a day. I will bet you that if DFW is speaking in support of Lisa, it is because there is some pathetic looser of a republican who has expressed an interest in being Mayor of Fitchburg who is probably a rabid gun lunatic, there is more to this than appears here.
The future is now, after she wins (unapposed), encourage her to look at the race. I know she fought resistance to her reforms and took on the union brass a few years ago (so I’m told), she can take on Martha and Steve.
Is she definitely out? I fail to see how she would do anything other than crush the primary and crush the general. Ortiz vs Coakley? No question who would win that one. And aside from Charlie Baker needing to walk back the image he created for himself last election, he really on has two notes: 1) lower taxes and 2) culture of corruption. Ortiz destroys the corruption angle.
After Aaron Schwartz’s death, many people on the Internet pledged to prevent Carmen Ortiz from winning seeking higher office. She’ll be marked by Anonymous for the rest of her days, and is done in politics. Too bad, too. I thought she had a lot of potential.