Kirsten Hughes, the chair of the Massachusetts Republican party, doesn’t often say things that gain much traction around here. But on Would-Be-Speaker-For-Life Bob DeLeo, who is seeking to abolish the House’s 8-year term limit on being Speaker, she’s right.
state Republican Party chairwoman Kirsten Hughes said, “Speaker DeLeo’s sudden reversal on term limits he once championed smells of hypocrisy. Speaker DeLeo’s about-face is yet another example of Democrats on Beacon Hill changing the rules for their own self-interest and demonstrates a lack of commitment to changing the culture of corruption that led to the indictment of three consecutive speakers.”
Yeah … I’m afraid I can’t find much in there to disagree with. DeLeo, as the Globe correctly points out, used to see a term limit on the Speaker’s chair as not only a way to restore badly-needed confidence in government, but also as a way to ensure that “fresh ideas” had a chance to emerge from the House. As he put it in 2009,
“Is it a symbolic move? Maybe it is,” DeLeo said. “But sometimes symbolic moves can do a great deal in instilling public trust.”
DeLeo has called ethics reform his top priority and said he considers term limits to be a part of his overall reform package because it would mandate that the powerful position change hands regularly.
“It’s important in a position such as speaker for there to be an opportunity for fresh ideas, and the only way you can ensure that is to put term limits on the speaker,” DeLeo said. “Sometimes folks feel they’re concerned about political figures getting stale. This shows that there’s opportunity for change.
“Whether it’s president of the United States or speaker of the House, there’s an opportunity to bring fresh ideas.”
But so much for all of that. What DeLeo is doing, essentially, is saying that ethics reform and fresh ideas were needed in 2009 because other people had been Speaker, but they’re unnecessary now because it’s me, and you can trust me. Is that not the very definition of hubris, especially coming from a guy who came awfully close to being indicted last year?
Getting rid of term limits for the Speaker is a terrible idea. Apparently, it’s nonetheless expected to pass easily. If it does, what a sorry commentary on the House that will be.
Blame the 19th Suffolk.
I have my doubts. It’s a defining issue.
Everything is open to being gamed and thwarted, but the option to fire a problematic legislator without involving courts may well be more useful as it shifts focus to actual merit in office rather than longevity.
…and if we did, I suspect one’s one constituents generally like the idea that their own member is so powerful.
“one’s OWN constituents”
When they say they had no choice. That there is no alternative, that it’s a symbolic vote at that point, and one that freezes them out from advancing other legislation? A rep who voted against leadership and with the Governor on revenue who can’t afford to take another vote like that? They need allies.
It’s easy for a bunch of bloggers like us to Monday morning quarterback and type that they aren’t pure enough or that they are sellouts. Lord knows I’ve good at that. Yet this shows that this vote was planned months ago, the leak was done to time with the blizzard to dampen coverage, and all the fence sitters had their talking points to tell angry activists emailing them ahead of time. We can’t primary all 160 members and defeat them with progressives. We can’t even do that for the members of the Progressive Caucus in all likelihood.
I think we need to identify the next Speaker today, figure out which progressive can mount a serious campaign and become the leader. Stan Rosenberg supposedly had the Senate presidency sealed up as soon as Murray’s last term was to start. No reason a similar thing can’t be done here with a similar figure on the House side.
DeLeo won this round. How can we win the next one?
It would be interesting to look at numbers voting in his district. I was there a number of times last winter doing winter photo walk stuff.
I saw Arabic families on Constitution Beach. I saw Southeast Asians working at beach side restaurants. Who is engaging the Brazilian immigrants moving there? There were African Americans who once avoided the place like a plague out of racial antagonism fears.
Many are on some path to citizenship if they haven’t already arrived.
It’s a different Revere and Eastie from the one I remember as a young adult petty criminal in the 70s just as it was different again in the 1940s when Miles Davis played in the ballrooms and DeLeo’s family were the new kids.
Are these people becoming voters and citizens? Is DeLeo or anyone engaging them? This is a long game that partly involves generational turn over and demographic attrition.
My generation is a horrid lump of cheese in a body politic that is increasingly lactose intolerant.
It might take us a while to die off, so it may be worth the effort to get in at the ground floor with those who will replace us.
in Eastie but because there will be a very low turnout, it will be decided by the insiders, with Walsh’s guy probably winning. Once elected the winner will hold the seat as long as he wants. Once the progressives and immigrants rouse themselves from their slumber, the game will be over.
It is similar to our national elections, where young people and people of color show up for Presidential elections but let the GOP run the table in off year elections.
I date back to the days of the Cardinals Nest there when there was a lot of mob and bike gang fratricide that spilled over into Blackfriars in Boston.
It is a very different scene now. I was there last year making video of the greenway made from an old rail spur and trolley yard. I did several trips walking from Belle Isle to Maverick.
Immigrants have to be engaged and convinced. It’s not enough to just expect them to play a game they haven much of a stake in.
What was more interesting is just how engaged people are there in general.
rarely vote in the elections that matter most. The weight of your vote and how it affects your life is highest in the local and low turnout elections, just the kind that vaguely progressive voters too often ignore.
Some of my peeps came in from the old country via Eastie, mob ties and everything, so I still pay a little attention there. I wish the Columbians, Central Americans and North Africans who fled tyranny in their home countries would help keep out state a little more honest.
. . .housing.
If there were a campaign to stop rents from going up and bring back rent control, maybe to prevent people from being displaced by the effects of the 2024 Olympics, or of the casino, you would see new people getting involved.
…there is a party just for that issue:)
Mass is a fairly compartmentalized place. The various classes from poor to yuppies are in their respective boxes.
I’m a fluke in that my choice to be poor had me working lots of crap temp jobs with a virtual who’s who of immigrants and people who aren’t yuppies.
And I have a curiosity about the world and people that gives me a way out of these boxes.
Progressives tend to be upper middle class white people with an occasional blue collar warrior in the mix. Do they hang out with the Dunkies employees who hand them their coffees?
Here’s your chance progressives.
http://www.ebecc.org/english/volunteer.htm
They have a specific request:
Now don’t everyone fall over yourselves in that rush to help that I’m sure will be forthcoming… (Snark off)
And for those who are serious and sincere, here’s a regular directory.
http://www.massresources.org/immigrant-agencies.html#community
It was a pretty easy search query.
…there are plenty of liberal/progressive activists who do yeoman’s work doing exactly the kind of work you describe.
They just don’t post and opine here because they are too busy elsewhere.
When I see assertions about the poor and immigrants that lack any actual sense of what’s out there, and shallow, shoot from the hip analysis, I always take it as an opportunity to just go find out.
I actually don’t enjoy playing gotcha all that much and readily accept discoveries that refute my assumptions.
Last week I went off looking into the origins of Korean democratization due to an assertion that the Olympics was a fulcrum. I figured that would be impressive, if true, except that it wasn’t.
We live in a time where it is pretty easy to look nearly anything up and I am a very intensive user of the search engine system.
I also feel it is a kind of obligation for participation here to offset hollow assertion. Discourse would suck a lot more than it does if it were all hollow speculations all the time.
It is the principle of ‘enhanced utility’. It was pretty cool to discover that Somali’s have social service advocacy entities here, for example, but I never would have known if I didn’t look it up.
If you go over my jabber patterns of late you’ll see I’ve done what I can to lead progressives to potable water, but the drinking is up to them.
An aspiring politician could get a very good sense of constituents by making the rounds of these various social service advocacy entities and doing a bit of volunteer time.
Yes.
On ideological grounds: the whole point of progressivism is to remove constraints upon peoples choices and to respect them when they make them. You feel an abortion is the right choice for you? Here, have a safe one. You want the option to treat your medical issues with Marijuana? By all means. Choices are sometimes difficult. Sometimes not. Removing options and setting arbitrary constraints isn’t progressive.
On grounds that term limits are irrelevant: if the entire House doesn’t have the backbone to stand up to DeLeo, forcing the Speaker to step down arbitrarily isn’t going to do it. We’ll have a new speaker and the same old lack of backbone.
On practical grounds: as much as I detest the current Speaker of the Massachusetts house when and if we ever get a truly progressive Speaker I don’t want his/her time curtailed in any way.
…and thinks he should stay on.
FWIW, here:
The new House rules package also includes a ban on any picture taking in the House chamber or gallery. God forbid the public should be able to see what their elected representatives are doing. This is small potatoes compared to DeLeo’s power grab but nonetheless an example of closing out the public.
Next thing you know they’ll be requiring perukes.
FYI
From the State House News Service earlier today:
“Members, staff and guests shall not take photographs or videos of, or in, the House Chamber during formal or informal sessions,” the proposed rules say, according to a copy provided to the News Service. “The use of audio-visual aids including, without limitation, videos, computers, posters, displays or charts shall be permitted only upon approval of the Speaker.”
The House in recent years has had an uneven policy when it comes to taking photos during sessions, with reporters and guests in the public gallery banned from doing so. But lawmakers and their guests on the floor often take pictures and post them on social media.
The rule was not included in the rules for the 2013-2014 session, though court
officers frequently and sometimes angrily admonished guests and reporters to not take photographs.
Unless you can show a previous iteration of the rule, I stand by my statement.
…against enforcing that.
pays great deference to the legislative branch in running its affairs, and expects the same in return.
The quirky thing is that court office cannot arrest an offender and would need to either muscle them or call upon the State Police. The court officers can use their authority and uniforms to stop guests admitted to the chamber from taking selfies and the like, but…I have seen a few instances when the court officers try to get tough with outsiders. I doubt any have professional training in law enforcement or could do anything than make a mess of the situation. I pray we never see this come to pass.
court officers trying to muscle the press into keep them from attending a Democratic caucus even though the rules of the caucus make them open to the public until and unless there is a vote to close the caucus to the public.
I am shocked, shocked, I say that this would happen.
I wonder again why you guys support candidates who support this guy. It was obvious, even last summer, that THIS is what you were all campaigning for. We don’t need a tea party in Massachusetts because here the Democrats will do the union-busting all by themselves, and then congratulate themselves for being friends of labor.
I guess they are “easier to talk to” though. I honestly do not understand how so many posters here can be such enthusiastic members of the party that backs this guy on everything. Someone upthread is right– the “liberals” will support DeLeo’s conservative budget, and then try to blame it all on Baker. And then you guys will just lap it up, beacuse…?
What a useless dungheap the Massachusetts Democratic Party is.
DeLeo has never gotten a lot of love here as far as I can tell. Many have called for more primaries, but still prefer Dem voting records when it comes to a general election. A GOP majority is not the answer.
For Governor Patriot Act, that noted progressive.
And for candidates that would obviously back an extension for Speaker DeLeo, and, what’s more, will follow his every command. Who cares if he gets a lot of love from BMG– he gets the support of the MA Democratic Party, and what else really matters?
Thank goodness those union-busting, casino-bringing votes are Democratic voting records. They’re so much better that way.
…but when you have two choices (OK, technically 5, but three didn’t really count) you go with the better one (and note here that I did NOT say lesser of the evils because I don’t believe that). On social issues and middle class issues Coakley is planted firmly on progressive ground.
And a big reason she lost is because of the sweetheart deal she gave Partners, the fact she didn’t do anything to prosecute corruption among local Democratic pols during the probation scandal, the fact that Baker holds the same positions she did on social issues, and the fact that she didn’t get her economic message across.
And frankly, today shows you who the top dog is in MA politics-it’s not any of the folks that were on the statewide ballot in November. Pretty sure he was only on the ballot in EaBo and Winthrop.
that the voters were paying that much attention to the Partners deal. It seems pretty low on the list of what I was hearing and reading. Fortunately, that deal is dead as of today.
“On social issues and middle class issues” should read “on issues on which there was absolutely no political risk whatsoever, to the extent that even the GOP candidate shared these positions” she was planted firmly on progressive ground.
Furthermore, most people who think that police state authoritarianism is a “middle class issue” identify as rock-ribbed Red State Republicans.
Sorry, Christopher, but YOU went with “the better one”. You, and others, also berated those of us who chose otherwise.
Ms. Coakley is approximately as progressive as Mr. DeLeo — both have long careers in public service that demonstrate that their only real (as in actionable) priorities are protecting themselves and doing whatever seems to suit their personal agenda that day.
This latest action from Mr. DeLeo, just like the outcome of the November election, is the obvious and predicted result of ignoring compelling evidence of pervasive political (and venal) corruption.
…unless you can show that the GOP would have given the unions a better deal and would have stopped casinos, which I suspect you can’t, you don’t have much of an argument.
He is showing that the Democrats gave the unions a bad deal and didn’t do a damn thing to stop casinos. Er go, the Simon Garfunkel line is apropos ‘laugh about it, shout about it, when you got to choose-any way you look at it you lose’. I doubt Gov. Coakley would’ve done anything to stop this from happening, at least Baker looks good opposing it in theory since he can’t do anything about it in practice. He might’ve already won his second term today. That is something MA Dems need to wake up about.
Really. There is simply no other way to describe it.
GOP Tea Party strips unions of bargaining rights as a part of their party program. In most states, elected Democrats oppose them to the extent possible, as loudly as possible, and campaign on that opposition. Here, it is the Democrats that strip unions of bargaining rights, but they do it in the dead of night, without opposition, and quietly.
But, really, its OK, because maybe Republicans who are actually honest about their positions would have been worse? That is the standard to satisfy you? What, do you suppose would be our local party’s position toward unions or toward casinos if they actually had pressure from the right? Because they have demonstrated that they won’t defend actual liberal values, even when those values aren’t under threat from the GOP.
..if you rock the boat with terms like ‘oligarchs’ in reference to plans to impose an olympic monstrosity from above on an ignored public.
They seem to inhabit some strange sterile world of yuppie politeness where calling attention to things as they are must be done with a proper curtsy count and significant interludes of bowing, scraping, kow tows and prostrations.
Much of it is just layered posturing and Kabuki without much risk of anything substantive.
She knows from experience.
http://www.bostonglobe.com/metro/2014/07/02/house-quietly-approved-amendment-help-state-gop/DzXXcgHrKyr7TtcZ53dhmN/story.html?utm_content=bufferbcd6e&utm_medium=social&utm_source=twitter.com&utm_campaign=buffer
And the amendment to let the state party committees create legal defense funds went on to become law. In other ords, Dems agreed to let GOP establishment collect money to defend itself from Mark Fisher.
then why has Brad Jones been minority leader for 12 years!
….that would be the most hypocritical part of all of this.