Have you heard anyone say “No comment” when debating? Well, if you saw the mayoral debate tonight you will.
I recommend watching the first 7 minutes of Part 3 from WBZ’s page
Marty Walsh dancing in circles when talking about the repeated bills he filed for binding arbitration awards. Walsh never really answers the question, never explaining his position. Walsh’s detailed rebuttal?
“Actually, that’s not what the bill did”
And that’s it.
Walsh painfully tries to counter that Connolly was not at the negotiation for the Boston Housing Authority contract, not sure how that was supposed to be a counter, but Connolly tactfully explains that he’s not allowed at the bargaining table by law. I guess you learn something new every day.
After multiple failed attempts to have Walsh discuss his binding arbitration bill Connolly says:
“I’m just concerned that when your campaign is taking over a million dollars in outside money and when you also work in two roles for these unions — that will influence what you do when you’re mayor,” Connolly said. “And we’ve seen that it certainly influences the legislation that you file.”
Walsh responds: “No Comment”.
It was a complete train wreck for Walsh.
Within that exchange I thought there was an embarrassing moment for Connolly too, when he said he had been “at the table” for 37 labor contracts, but then had to backtrack and say that as City Councilor he could not be involved in the negotiation. Walsh pointed out that Cllrs. Arroyo and Ross had nevertheless managed to play constructive roles, which highlighted the fact that Connolly has been divisive and headline-grabbing on these issues. I thought Walsh’s no comment at the end was his refusal to bring the debate down any further–he could easily have brought up the outside groups now coming in on Connolly’s behalf, but chose to let it lie and move on.
I thought both were strong in their response and details.
But I don’t see Walsh open the door to outside group discussion, not sure why he was so unprepared for the topic. They will need to come up with something in the next debate.
What the hell was John Connolly thinking? I get that he’s serious about reforming education, but that was deeply callous to name drop a failed student like that. Absolutely grotesque.
during debates. So not a first. But if you are saying that he could have made his point better then I agree,
But when it’s all said an done, Walsh still lost the debate.
that you of all people think the debate was a train wreck for Walsh. I thought Connolly was his usual smug, smarmy self. He reminds me more than anybody of Kevin McCluskey from The Last Hurrah.
“What would be different under you than under Mayor Menino?”
“Oh, the schools. I’ve got bold ideas for the schools. I’m all about the schools.”
26 6s for you my friend
If you read above.
But yes, that entire exchange was a train wreck, you need to acknowledge it and learn from it. Reality-based.
OpEd.
You’re citing Scot Lehigh as evidence Walsh was a “train-wreck”? I’d be very, very wary of any candidate Scot Lehigh supported.
it’s just that he has eyes and ears and can see/hear the obvious.
Um … seriously?
op-ed columnists are generally not allowed to expressly endorse candidates. But for heaven’s sake, it could not be more obvious who Lehigh wants to win (or, more accurately, who he wants to lose).
okay, okay, but in no way could anyone argue that Leigh wants either person. With that in mind, please how could anyone see that exchange and not see what I did. You’d need some serious rose colored glasses.
and thought it shameful that Connolly was trying to score points by being anti-union. You see things through your lens. That’s normal. But your lens is not universal by any means.
and somebody said, “Scot Lehigh,” I’d say, “Charter schools! Education ‘reform!,’ Anti-teachers’-union!” and the little bell would go off. And which candidate has wrapped himself in that flag?
He’s been on the Connolly bandwagon since before Menino declined to run. Every couple weeks comes a piece like this and this.
this is about the debate, sorry but it was obvious.
I don’t know why you Walsh guys keep trying to use charter schools as a club against Connolly. Walsh also supports charter schools. He proudly states he is a “founding board member of the Neighborhood House Public Charter School”. Walsh is clearly pro-Charter.
Walsh for it as well. This has been discussed in detail on BMG.
But there’s a huge difference between his education plan and Connolly’s (or rather, Connolly’s rhetoric, since he’s been a little short on actual plan). Walsh is for taking the aspects of charters that have worked (e.g. smaller size) and importing them into BPS, as seen by his recent high schools proposal. His overall approach is far more nuanced than Connolly’s. There’s a reason Stand for Children wasn’t interested in backing Marty Walsh.
The whole post. Yes, you say:
but I defy you to find anyone (other than hrs-kevin – sorry, but it’s true) who’d consider this post anything but anti-Walsh, like everything else you’ve had to say since September 24.
Cannoneo says it was an “embarrassing moment” for Connolly as he said he participated in 37 city negotiations when he did no such thing. From you I learn that Walsh’s pointing that out was “painful” and Connolly’s acknowledgement “tactful.”
Jim O’Sullivan says on the Globe website that Walsh “feels he has momentum” and “mostly stayed above the fray” in a “mostly collegeial” affair. Here I learn that Walsh “danced in circles.”
Good thing I have you and Scot Lehigh to tell me what happened and to tell me how “fair and balanced” you are. In the meantime, I still will run from any so-called Democrat who makes his political hay running against labor.
instead of attack, acknowledge.
there was one thing that Leigh brought up that I didn’t realize. In 2011, Walsh tried to undermine the popular Patrick health insurance reform which included municipalities joining the GIC. Amendment 749. When I have time this seems like a good post, but what are your thoughts. While I need to go through it, it does seem that Walsh was trying to go the binding arbitration route instead of municipalities deciding to go with the GIC.
In this state we have cut inflation-adjusted tax revenues by 26% since 1978. Aid to towns and cities is down nearly half since 2000. Starving municipal governments of revenue and then saying your hands are forced because they’re poor does nothing but move the ball even farther to the right.
I can’t be clear enough on this. I don’t support the notion that, having successfully screwed over almost all private-sector employees on benefits and retirement, we now must complete the job by bringing public employees down as well. I let my representatives hear it loud and clear on GIC and “pension reform.”
Greater negotiating power through economies of scale, good. Increasing employee premiums and deductibles without negotiations, not good. And we do all of this because our 80%+ Democratic legislature lives in terror of even modest tax increases. It may be “popular” with others, but a low point of the Patrick Administration in my book.
With local aid dropping through the floor and the economy on the skids, municipalities were get broken by their old self-insurance models. One big claims year was enough to throw them into budgetary turmoil. Jobs were being slashed, no one was getting raises. It was a raw deal for everybody (and still is for self-insured munis).
The GIC provides excellent health coverage. It’s the largest insurance pool in the state, which provides more stability for those in the pool. Most private sector employees would love to have GIC. I happened to work for a municipality at one point that switched to the GIC and it put $2,000 back in my pocket over the course of the year (my weekly premiums before the GIC were outrageous).
As I understand it, the municipalities that have made the switch since the municipal GIC legislation passed have done so via negotiation with their unions. What the legislation did was give those municipalities an option if local unions employed endless stalling tactics. Though I haven’t seen a full report on it, the municipalities that I’m aware of that have made the switch now have a lot more cash on hand. They’re giving raises and hiring for new jobs.
Frankly, my take is a lot of municipal unions blew it and blew it hard when it came to the GIC. This is not screwing over government employees. It’s offering them a high-quality benefit at a more manageable price. It was a problem with a solution and a lot of unions reflexively resisted it.
So did Marty Walsh and I think it’s fair to ask whether his reticence to make any changes that affect labor will prevent him from making sensible changes that can actually benefit labor in the long run (even if labor is being resistant).
You raise fair points. Our mayor here said he’d negotiate with the unions, but the law allows towns to implement unilaterally changes that require higher out of pocket costs for workers. I don’t support that and don’t think it’s necessary to the bill. That is my objection.
A municipality can do the unilateral route, but it takes significant time and a ton of work. That way it’s worked so far is that both sides agree at the table before anything unilateral kicks in.
Your out-of-pocket costs are higher with municipal self-insurance than the GIC (at least if you consider your weekly premium to be something that comes out of your pocket). I think it’s unfortunate that some unions have to be dragged toward more affordable quality coverage, but we hit that point. BTW, I’d making this exact same point if we were talking about single payer and muni unions were kicking up a fuss about switching to that.
Anyway, the legislation does set up a carrot-and-stick situation. I get not liking the stick part of it, but somebody had to start eating those carrots.
You’re talking about employee contribution toward the premium, right? Of course that’s pre-tax. How employees fare overall would depend on the details: Does the municipality use the savings as a justification for raising employee share of the premium, so the employee really doesn’t get the savings? Or does the municipality take a harder line on salary because employees are paying less toward premiums.
I think the savings would also depend to some extent on the size of the municipality. The smaller the town, the higher the costs.
The costs are high for every city and town that goes the self-insured route. Only Boston has a large enough workforce to wield much power in the insurance marketplace.
The premiums go up because the self-insured municipality directly has to cover its estimated claims for the upcoming year. And with Baby Boomers generally requiring more care, there’s more and more expensive claims to pay. Municipalities have to take a harder line on salaries when health costs explode. They’re looking at your total compensation. Your raise is you keep your health insurance as it is.
The thing that precipitated the muni GIC legislation was health costs were eating up the entire annual Prop 2 1/2 jump at the muni level. It was getting ugly.
At the employee level, what I can tell you is my weekly premium in the public sector was double what I had been paying in private sector. Once I got switched to the GIC, my personal premiums dropped by $50 a week. Yes, I had to pay some taxes on that and my co-pays went up a bit, but I came out well ahead. I made an extra $2,000 annual once I figured in all my health costs, which put me ~$1,400 ahead after taxes. My savings were fairly typical.
Obviously there can be devils in the details, but as I recall the unilateral path only allowed the municipality to implement a fairly modest premium/co-pay system. At the end of the day, local government has to offer good benefits to attract and keep talent.
I don’t know why you would suggest that I would not consider the post to be anti-Walsh. It clearly is. But I don’t think it makes a lot of sense to attack John for being anti-Walsh. It’s not like you haven’t been blatantly anti-Connolly in your own posts and comments. It seems hypocritical of you to automatically dismiss opinions from people who are not in you camp and then expect others to give your opinions any attention.
I was watching the Sox and didn’t see the debate so I don’t have any real opinion on it, but it doesn’t sound like there was a clear winner, and even if there was it is not clear that very many people were watching.
You were the first one to recommend the post. You’ve been the first one to agree with johnk on every word he’s had to say on this race. This is not news. It’s also not news that I am anti-Connolly. I make no bones about it. I think he’s a grandstanding empty suit and I vehemently oppose his attempt to win election by running against the BTU.
I’m not being hypocritical at all. John’s entitled to his opinion. I’m entitled to challenge it. But I do think he’s being hypocritical by repeatedly claiming that he’s not for Connolly in this race, and now claiming that this post is neutral. That said, you’re right, I should not have suggested that you’d join John in claiming the post is neutral.
I recommended the post simply because the topic interested me. It was not an endorsement of 100% of his views. I have not been the first one to agree with John on “every word he’s had to say”. That is simply not true. I would suggest that this is just your own tendency to put all people who aren’t in your camp into a single box.
I have no problem with you holding strong opinions in favor of Walsh and against Connolly. I do have a problem with you doing that while holding the same against people who appear to favor Connolly much less strongly than you favor Walsh. Someone is not automatically wrong about everything they say just because they don’t support the same candidate.
For the record, I probably am leaning toward Connolly but still have not decided. I both like and dislike things about both candidates. I think they are both basically good men with good intentions. I have never interacted with either candidate other than a hand shake, but I have heard good things about both candidates from friends and neighbors who have had dealings with each of them.
John’s made three posts about this election since the preliminary. You’re the first person to rec each. If that’s just because you find “the topic” interesting, where were you on cannoneo’s debate thread, or striker57’s post on the Golar Richie endorsement, or cannoneo’s substantive post on housing policy, or David’s post with the photo of Walsh with his recent endorsers, or the Left Ahead post about Walsh’s interview on their show, or…? You get the point.
You’ve also uprated pretty much every comment he’s made about the race, including one for which you were the only plus against five minuses. When John was going after Ryan in an unacceptable manner (calling him an “unbalanced jackass,” while calling me “nutty”) and Ryan pushed back, there was plenty of this:
Surpassed only by:
People want to be for Connolly, go for it. But spare us the disingenuousness of saying johnk’s not for Connolly. He clearly is.
…I think Connolly’s continued dropping of Ayanna Pressley’s name everywhichwhere has gotten embarrassing. John came in 3rd place two years ago, and can’t help himself from attempting to take credit for the person who beat his ass. It is clearer than ever why he helped Ayanna in 2011: So he could beat his chest about it when he ran for Mayor. It was never actually about her.
On the “no comment” I took it as Connolly attempting to goad him into a street fight, and Walsh looked like the adult just taking a pass.
Connolly does drop Aynna Pressley’s name a lot. I don’t think she endorsed has she?
And I find it interesting that while last year Linda Dorcena Forry joined a Connolly education initiative, she’s endorsing Marty.
From what I can tell who’s only barely paying attention, the Connolly folks think Connolly won, and the Walsh folks think Walsh won.
I’m surprised. Perhaps I’ll just use my usual method of supporting the candidate running against dfw’s favorite. It’s been pretty reliable thus far.