[Cross-posted at planetgrafton.com]
A good friend of mine asked me a couple weeks ago what I thought about Governor Baker so far.
“He’s been okay,” I said.
“I really like him,” he replied.
“Quick, what was Charlie Baker’s greatest accomplishment his first year in office?”
Blank stare.
Exactly. Which isn’t to say that Charlie Baker hasn’t accomplished anything his first year in office. But it does serve as a reminder that great poll numbers are not, in and of themselves, actual accomplishments. Rather, great poll numbers serve as political capital to institute a Governor’s vision for the Commonwealth.
But what is Charlie Baker’s vision for Massachusetts?
The Governor’s best moments so far have come in crisis-management moments. He was rightly critical of the MBTA in the wake of last year’s costly public transit meltdown, and has since instituted a plan for improved service. He has instituted policy reforms at DCF in the wake of the Bella Bond tragedy that even people within the agency are heralding as “long-awaited.”
Governor Baker’s pattern thus far is read and react. He’s a management professional who reads institutional failure and moves forward quickly and unequivocally to institute common-sense management reforms. Frankly, Massachusetts needs someone with that skill set as Governor right now.
The question is though: Is that all there is? Is he just picking low-hanging fruit at this point? Is it enough to simply respond to an agency failure? At some point, shouldn’t there be a vision of what we want government to do before it fails us? Does he even have a vision of Massachusetts that goes beyond tweeking state agencies and banning Syrian refugees from settling here?
Baker’s style is interesting to contrast with former Governor Deval Patrick’s style. Patrick was, essentially, Baker’s opposite. Patrick was a visionary who had an ideal in mind for Massachusetts and pursued it doggedly, often to the chagrin of Beacon Hill insiders who didn’t like his personality. Specific agency management reforms were not, however, a strong suit.
With Patrick, you got education reform, pension reform, CORI reform, transportation reform and legalized gaming. Big picture stuff. But because of his relationship issues with two straight Speakers of the House (and others), his detractors will never let you forget about the Cadillac or the drapes. He nixed a legislative pay-raise on his way out the door and the next thing you know, there’s an investigation about “secret accounts” leaked to the Herald.
Charlie Baker, meanwhile, has a fantastic relationship with our legislators. They can’t stop talking about him in glowing terms. One local Democratic pol told me how much easier it is to work with the new Governor, contrasted with the old one.
So, now freed from the imperial reign of Governor Patrick and his chaffing management style, how much has the legislature accomplished with a friendly face in the corner office? Well, next to nothing, actually.
So much for all that.
I’m not trying to be needlessly contrarian in the face of a 74% approval rating. That’s swell. But the point of governing isn’t to be popular. The point of governing is to govern, which can sometimes be decidedly unpopular.
So, the question about Governor Baker becomes: Is that all there is?
Christopher says
…from the progressive caucus in the legislature, since those who actually hold Democratic leadership titles in the General Court seem so reluctant.
farnkoff says
I’ve never been that Impressed with governing by snappy zingers or empty pledges to “get to the bottom” of the latest scandal or crisis. He could be worse, I guess.
jconway says
And unfortunately we were saddled with Patrick’s miserable handling of basic stuff like making sure the website people got their health care from worked and making sure kids the state took care of didn’t die. Pretty glaring failures that he met head on with denial and misdirection, not to mention, reassigning the people in charge who screwed up DCF to other divisions instead of firing them. Looked about as decisive and on the ball as Cardinal law with that one.
On top of that we had Coakley run the exact same campaign she ran against Brown. Let’s try to nationalize a fundamentally local race, point out there is a D next to my name and an R next to his, point out he is a man and I am a woman, and talk about the issues like abortion and gay rights that are arguably his biggest strengths as a ‘moderate’ to be on the defensive about. Just terrible. David Vitter just ran that strategy in reverse by the way, so we can safely conclude that governor’s races are probably the last kind of modern American campaign where partisan polarization doesn’t matter.
Our next candidate has to do a lot of unpopular things. Not hire Doug Rubin or anyone who’s in line to win an Elkey, not chase after legislative endorsements during the run up to the convention, and actually have a vision for governance. Not to defend endless terms for the Speaker or look the other way when he hires his relatives. Not bow down to special interests like Partners healthcare or take their money. Have a bold vision for government and follow through with it.
The only candidate running on housing, transit, smart growth, defending civil liberties while investing in our state is Evan Falchuk. Incidentally, he was the first figure to boldly run against the Olympic fiasco which was tacitly supported by the bipartisan bromance of Walsh and Baker and the bulk of the same special interests like Fish and Continental Construction that bilked us on the Big Dig. To date, the only candidate for 2018 endorsing marijuana legalization or the progressive income tax ballot initiatives. Now he has a long way to go from 3%, but it pains me to see an upstart, largely centrist third party offer a bolder vision for progressive governance than the Massachusetts Democratic Party.
doug-rubin says
JConway, it’s easy to blame me or others like Deval Patrick and Martha Coakley. Both Patrick and Coakley accomplished a lot of good things in their time as Governor and AG – and yes, they made some mistakes as well. But on the whole, the state is a much better place for their public service.
I think the answer is not to focus on the “who” but the “what” – to develop, organize and run on a real policy agenda that truly helps working families in Massachusetts and addresses the big issues that the next Governor and the State Legislature should be tackling. Until we do that, I don’t think it really matters “who” is running for Governor.
jconway says
And I would argue it is incumbent on the legislature to share that agenda as well, but you have to concede they have fallen woefully short as a collective in that regard, especially in the House. There are wonderful individual members, but they are too few to make a significant impact and they need allies.
I think focusing on one office takes the activists eye off of a more concerted effort to make changes in the House that will require recruiting candidates that are locally viable, committed to the progressive agenda, and able to defeat entrenched incumbents who are clearly not. I haven’t seen that level of organization at play on the progressive side at the state legislature.
Make no mistake-the right knows how to do it which is why our party controls the fewest state houses in its history. Complacency and corruption are weaknesses the right should, has and will exploit to defeat us if we don’t defeat it ourselves.
doug-rubin says
You are right – the solution involves more than just putting a D in the Governor’s office. We need a focus that is bigger than that, and that is based on an agenda that is responsive to the needs of working families and will bring about real change. What I don’t think is helpful is arguing about whether Deval Patrick is better than Charlie Baker, or arguing about which Democrat to put up against Baker in 2018. The problems we have are much bigger than that.
jconway says
And I’m glad you came here on Thanksgiving to discuss these issues! I didn’t mean to call you out in a personal way. I just think the consultant class is removed from the issues that are relevant to young people like me, relevant to working people that may not have the time to tune in until the week or two before the race, and that we need to really rethink how progressives do politics around here in order to achieve long term victories that are more sustainable than a single candidate in a single office. We need a real tidal wave to have a sea change, not just a few good breaks.
doug-rubin says
The big question is – how do we accomplish that given the current political structure in Massachusetts? And how do we engage in a meaningful way with young people like you, and the many working people you reference? Maybe I am missing something, but I don’t get the sense that is happening at the level it should be happening. We are lucky to have groups like Raise Up and others out there doing great work, but more needs to be done.
Andrei Radulescu-Banu says
Why is it not helpful to argue whether Deval Patrick is better than Charlie Baker?
Sorry, Doug. Personal qualities matter. When this or other Dem do not do a good job, it is good to speak up and let them know. Especially in this state, where virtually all politicians are Democrats.
This is what maintains healthy relationships and allows the party to renew itself.
You might remember that the Dem primary for Governor had many good candidates, yet people still elected one based on name recognition more than any other qualities. That’s what set the stage for the general election loss.
doug-rubin says
I think that is part of the problem – it’s easy to make general statements like Coakley was elected on name recognition, but having gone through mounds of polling data in that election, I am quite certain that statement is not supported by the facts.
I have no problem if people want to call candidates or officials out if they do not do a good job, and if people want to debate Deval Patrick versus Charlie Baker, have at it. My point is that the focus on the individual candidates obscures a larger problem, and one that I would argue is more important. If we are going to win and make it mean something long-term, the debate has to be less about personalities and the horse race, and more about the “why” and the “what”. We need to organize and engage people around a set of values and substantive policies.
Just my two cents.
Andrei Radulescu-Banu says
You must have a better read of the data, but from my bird eye view of the Dem primary, I still think it was name recognition.
Not sure what more there was to win, after 8 years of Dems single party rule – except better representatives and better leadership in the corner office.
SomervilleTom says
I totally agree with this comment. In particular, with this sentence: “What I don’t think is helpful is arguing about whether Deval Patrick is better than Charlie Baker, or arguing about which Democrat to put up against Baker in 2018”.
Some of us name those “bigger” problems “political structure”. Others of us use phrases like “current House leadership” or “Bob DeLeo” (though of course the problems are much deeper than just Mr. DeLeo). Still, I think these are different names for the same rose (although the smell is not sweet to many of us).
We face several huge, immediate, and very real crises, right here at home:
1. Failed public transportation infrastructure
2. Catastrophic and obscene wealth concentration
3. Catastrophically high and obscene student debt burdens, combined with a dismal economic future for those graduates and skyrocketing housing costs
4. Dismally low household formation rates, especially among young people, combined with uncontrolled speculation in residential real estate (see 2 and 3). These historically low household formation rates mean that most of our young people have already lost the American dream of home ownership.
5. Accelerating and out-of-control militarization of our law-enforcement, combined with the wholesale shredding of our constitutional protections — with NO measurable benefit whatsoever. After a decade of spending enormous sums on “security” and “emergency preparedness”, two rank amateurs paralyzed this city, caused the entire public transportation system to shutdown, and endangered entire communities with an out-of-control display of utter mayhem as untrained and uncoordinated heavily armed police engaged in a fire-fight and siege that STILL left one amateur perpetrator unaccounted for.
6. A pervasive culture of political corruption throughout statewide government.
Meaningful progress towards solving these problems requires vision, political skills, political courage, and — most of all — raising taxes on the wealthy.
Deval Patrick did accomplish many good things as Governor. In my view, those accomplishments did not include substantive progress on any of these issues. In my view, the list of accomplishments of Ms. Coakley is far shorter, and she in fact actively worsened (5) and (6) on my list.
I said during the campaign that neither Mr. Baker nor our nominee would address any of the above issues in any meaningful way, just as Mr. Patrick made no meaningful progress in the above issues. I therefore agree with you that further belaboring of comparisons among these three is pointless.
A fundamental reason for that pointlessness is the gravity of our “political structure” problem. Until we solve that, it doesn’t matter who holds the corner office — the declared party affiliation of the Governor is as devoid of meaning as the declared party affiliation of our current Speaker.
We must address the above problems. Most pervasively, we MUST raise taxes on the wealthy. No governor is going to accomplish that while the current House leadership is in place.
doug-rubin says
Right now, we define success as a party by how many D’s we elect. But I think it’s more important to define success going forward by how successful we are in driving policies that address some of the issues you raise – in particular, numbers 1-3. If we can’t start to make real headway on those issues, it really doesn’t matter if we elect more D’s or who occupies in the corner office, in my humble opinion.
jconway says
It often seemed during the heat of the campaign that the message was only Coakley could provide this change and those of us skeptical of her abilities to do so were tacitly supporting Baker by default. I also think you are conceding here that had she won, she would’ve faced the same legislative recalitrance that arguably Patrick faced and fares about as well as he did facing it down. It’s time to target enough legislative seats to flip over to the progressive column.
I am willing to elect Democrats as well as non-Democrats that are more progressive than the Democratic incumbents they are facing off with. It’s time for the movement to work inside and outside the party towards change, since the party is not the vehicle for change at the present. Let’s identity the vehicles, fund them and staff them, and get the feet to the right doorbells.
Andrei Radulescu-Banu says
Good points 1-5.
#6 is debatable. If it is pervasive corruption, why not name names? In reality, I think it is some corruption, and a lot more haplessness – inability to do something to move the needle on the stated problems 1-5.
One has to be careful with the charges of corruption, because they can be easily misused or misunderstood. Legislature patronage at Probation? Yes, but also keep in mind that a state court blocked a competence test for probation officers. So it is more than just the Legislature at fault.
Also, the House Speaker is the one holding the purse strings in the state. The buck stops with him, not with the Governor. The Speaker can’t raise taxes, because the tax rate is flat, and it hurts the working class. Also, ballot questions on the tax rate have tied his hands. On the other, this or other worthy cause needs more money at the expense of this third worthy cause. And the Speaker has to prioritize, because the budget is limited.
One should not mistake criticism of the Speaker designed budge him to spend more on X with the always legitimate criticism on the vote to eliminate Speakership term limits, or on what happened at Probation.
jconway says
I think we underestimated how unpopular Deval Patrick was with unenrolled voters and even many Democrats, particularly in his response to crisis management in his second term. We underestimated how much of a gift Tim Cahill was in 2010. I think we underestimate, routinely, how unpopular the legislature is with the broad electorate and how ingrained the idea of ‘balance’ is that views a Beacon Hill insider with an ‘R’ next to his name as a check on the Speaker’s power.
Lastly, we overestimate how critical the governorship is to advancing progressive policies and severely underestimate how critical the legislature is. It’s a national problem, but the messiah complex is endemic locally as it is nationally.
merrimackguy says
It was time for an anti-Baker post though- there hadn’t been one for a few days.
jconway says
Basically it’s attacking him for being popular and being a more effective manager than his predecessor? If this is our attack ad, I hate to see what the positive ads for our candidate turn out to be. Whom is who again? I don’t see that many people lining up to be the Mark Roosevelt of 2018.
farnkoff says
Which of our state’s many problems has Baker solved, again? Where are these Improvements that justify such praise and popularity? Did I miss something? There’s been a good amount of rhetoric, some of it (lately) a bit xenophobic and nasty, some of it just stating the obvious, like “dcf is broken”, etc. What have you seen that I haven’t, jconway?
jconway says
I am saying Deval didn’t fire anyone, admit mistakes,’or make changes to those two examples while Baker has a significant amount of praise from DCF workers for actually taking the time to understand their job and give them the resources to do it, while sacking those that don’t. It’s apparently something that’s super easy and isn’t a vision but something Deval didn’t do for eight full years while kids died under our care. I guess that’s the point of the thread starter?
I believe in smart government which is why I hate it when dumb government happens like when the DCF, the T, or the connector fails since people lose their trust and their faith and foes of government like Baker can turn and say “see? Let’s cut some taxes and starve this beast”. It doesn’t help when that beast, starved as it is in critical areas, is apparently plump enough to feed the entire DeLeo extended family without a peep from any elected Democrat of note or import.
We will likely see our fourth speaker in a row hauled off to jail and our party has done nothing to stop this culture, since it’s part of that culture and profits handsomely from it. It’s why we give out Elkeys to the consultants! So no, don’t bash Baker without looking at the hulking waste of a supermajority that has done very little to help the working class get a job, an education, or affordable housing or fix our ailing infrastructure which is obviously failing. Absolutely Baker won’t help with any of that, at least he is up front about his goals and hasn’t run the government for 60 years pretending otherwise. But his 11 months of management are what have stalled progress in this state, it’s legislative culture has nothing to do with it. Needle skip as our representative unenrolled voter would say, as he will cash another vote for Baker in 2018.
jconway says
At the opening gavel of this session when it eliminated term limits for the Speaker.
merrimackguy says
in the ten months he’s been there? Give him a chance for Pete’s sake. Also note it’s a democracy not a dictatorship, so there’s this thing called “process” that takes a while.
Mark L. Bail says
Baker is a better manager than Patrick ever was a visionary. Am I the Democrat that realizes just how much Patrick sucked? He was a great retail politician. Period. Education reform? The best that can be said is that Patrick was better than Obama on education. Gas tax? Good idea, hardly visionary. Gaming? A visionary would have opposed it.
Baker has turned out to a pretty good politician. He objects to Syrian refugees and then turns around and refuses to sign the Republican Governor’s letter. This may have been a mistake on his part, but it looked to me like he was, yet again, threading the partisan needle.
In the end, we’ll judge him on what gets accomplished, but it’s hard to object to a politically astute manager.
ryepower12 says
before a Great Recession and recalcitrant legislature beat back almost all his really good ideas, and made him pretty reticent to introduce new ones.
I said many, many times when Patrick was Governor that the legislature considered a democratic governor a bigger threat than a republican, and were quicker to squash his ideas than any of the 4 Republican governors who proceeded him (and now will be with Baker). I was right about that.
I too am disappointed by the Patrick administration, and think it made some pretty bad moves… but one of the reasons why I’m disappointed was that Governor Patrick wasn’t willing to take the legislature on, like he made many of us believe he would as Candidate Patrick in the 2006 election.
The leg is more than willing to get along with a Republican Governor because a Republican Governor is no threat to drive the agenda. The worst a Republican Gov can do in MA is make a veto that will be overridden. Legislative leadership drives the agenda, and it knows that the only threat to their capacity to drive the agenda would be a very popular, progressive Democratic Governor.
Mark L. Bail says
Patrick lacked the chops to take on or work with the legislature. He frequently appointed incompetents and semi-competents, even after his major screwup’s in the beginning.
He was no more a visionary than he was a manager. On the other hand, he wasn’t Tom Reilly or Kerry Healey either.
ryepower12 says
Because that’s part of what I was saying. I agree with you that Patrick didn’t have the chops to take on the legislature, but there were many really good and “visionary” things Patrick proposed early on that were rejected out of hand by the legislature, and would have been no matter what the level of graveling Patrick would be willing to do to accomplish it.
Here’s one example: one of the first things Patrick proposed after being elected would be to allow any high school graduates in MA to go to community college for free. It would have cost the state less than $100 million a year — peanuts for a program that would have done so much for economic development in this state. The idea was practically laughed out of the building, even given its low cost and the fact that it would have expanded educational access to hundreds of thousands of families across the state.
It was visionary, it was cheap and it would have done a whole lot of good. Leadership in our legislature wasn’t even willing to so much as set up a committee or task force to look at it.
So… yes, there’s plenty of blame to go around, but let’s make sure we recognize where most of the blame in this state belongs. The legislature writes the law and the leadership in the legislature has more of an iron fist over its membership than in almost any other state in this country.
Whatever good or bad happens through legislation in this state is wholly owned by leadership, good or bad. If this state, as a whole, ensured that our legislative leadership was held accountable — rewarded or penalized — for its actions, I think our state would be a drastically different place.
jconway says
I think we need to have challengers-in the primary or otherwise-for more and more of these incumbents who routinely reject the views of the voters in simple stuff like that. They thrive off the ignorance the general population has towards government and towards the process. An as soon as a voter says “pox on both, I won’t vote” they win and the rest of us lose. My parents are near that point, my brother and his wife are at that point, and I don’t see enough happening at the local level to get activists fired up to campaign and win this challenges. They either excuse their reps voting against term limits, write laughable defenses of indicted criminals like DiMasi, or blame it all on Baker who is a convenient Republican scapegoat for what’s been a widespread problem in our party which has been governing for decades without any major opposition.
There isn’t any accountability since the insiders don’t care what we write here, what we do at our conventions or what we do in our pressure organizations. They won’t until some of them are votes out. It doesn’t even have to be that many. Malden is better represented now that Fallon is gone and Ultrino is in, Sonia Chang Diaz is a far better state senator than Dianne Wilkerson ever was. We saw detritus on the Boston and Quincy City Council get cleared out by new blood. I’m over the state democrats, let’s have new blood. At every level.
SomervilleTom says
Perhaps our Attorney General might actively and aggressively investigate and prosecute any and every legislator who appears to be corrupt. That would clear up at least a few leadership seats.
I think it is significant that pretty much ALL the corruption prosecutions of recent memory have come from the US Attorney’s office rather than our Attorney General. Certainly Martha Coakley showed zero interest in prosecuting fellow Democrats — if anything, she was eager to criticize or scorn those who made such suggestions.
You cite the example of Diane Wilkerson — prosecuted by the feds, rather than by state authorities. While I will always believe that her primary offense was “serving while black” (her corruption was trivial compared to several of her white male colleagues), I agree that Sonia Chang Diaz is a far superior replacement.
There has been idle speculation of Maura Healey as a gubernatorial candidate. One way for Ms. Healey to distinguish herself from her predecessors — and gain support from our unenrolled voters — is to very aggressively and publicly attack the pervasive corruption that so epitomizes the current Massachusetts legislature.
It is long past time to update the “unindicted” status of at least one high-profile legislator.
Mark L. Bail says
investigations by the attorney general. Now, of course it shouldn’t. But it does. If Healey has plans for governor, she’ll need all the help she can get from those in power. Moral chutzpah is not enough. She already has enough to do.
Sadly, the research I’ve read on the working class suggests that prosecuting corruption would definitely attract them as voters.
scott12mass says
Why is that sad?
jconway says
That it is sad that prosecuting the corrupt members of state government would likely propel her into power and alienate her from the legislature who she would need to pass laws.
Mark L. Bail says
won’t happen.
SomervilleTom says
While I’m well aware of the later personal scandal that destroyed his career, it seems to me that the ascent of Eliot Spitzer to Attorney General and then Governor of New York — not exactly the bush-leagues — refutes your contention that “politics” precludes an aggressive stance against pervasive political corruption within a state legislature (or political party).
Mr. Spitzer won a landslide by focusing his gubernatorial campaign on political corruption, after obtaining significant victories against corrupt and fraudulent Wall Street practices during his tenure as Attorney General.
As you observe, a great many Massachusetts voters will respond favorably to an Attorney General who ACTUALLY PROSECUTES corrupt state government officials, and who then mounts a gubernatorial campaign.
If “politics” really does preclude a Democrat from accomplishing this (either as AG or as Governor), then I have two observations:
1. The Massachusetts Democratic Party is MUCH MORE badly broken than we have admitted here, and
2. The Massachusetts GOP will, sooner or later, do this for us. That will be bad for Democrats and bad for Massachusetts.
The idea that the pervasive corruption of the overwhelmingly Democratic legislature is something that we can just continue to ignore year after year, term after term, decade after decade, is toxic anathema to good government and to the long-term sustainability of the state we love and call home.
whoaitsjoe says
if he fights corruption.
Mark L. Bail says
the senate that’s the problem. Not sure if we all think that.
scott12mass says
Corruption is my primary concern at the local and state level. If the delivery of services comes attached to relatives getting no-show jobs, or payoffs for contracts I would rather not have any service. My town does not pick up trash, individual homeowners pay a private service. Would it be better to have our town do it, probably yes. Re-cycling would be better. It should be cheap with everyone on board and my taxes would go up accordingly.
I would rather keep it the way it is since corruption will be the inevitable result of the government taking over the service.
Mark L. Bail says
that qualifies as visionary. It’s a good idea. One that had been batted around, so not it’s not original.
But you’re right, Patrick earned more in that regard than I’m granting him.
petr says
People mistake having a vision with getting things done. These are the people for whom the phrase “don’t let the perfect become the enemy of the good,” was invented: Some of the people on this particular thread who are bad-mouthing Patrick now are like Social Democrats who hate, more than anything else and for same reasons, Democratic Socialists; too much the same for comfort and so different as to engender bile.
I think Patrick came into office without the chops, that much is clear. But by the time he muscled up and reached fighting trim, two years into his first term, very nearly the entire global economy came within a gnats whisker of a complete meltdown. People forget the Pike was beholden to UBS for some truly nasty swaps — which swaps were hedges against equally nasty Lehman swaps that evaporated when Lehman did– that threaten the stability of the entire CommonWealth. Patrick tackled that head on and got it fixed. Then he smoothly managed the recession and did what he was able to get us out of it as quickly as possible. Within the resulting framework of other peoples austerity and despair, getting this particular legislature to even consider, much less pass, a sales tax when he wanted a gas tax and a gas tax when he wanted a sales tax counts as accomplishments… especially since the lege, just prior to his arrival, was still talking tax cuts. Keeping the government going under 9C cuts and not letting unemployment get out of hand, and indeed recover rather well, counts as accomplishments also. Good decent stewardship, where the perfect isn’t the enemy of the good, is a vision also: Maybe he didn’t cure cancer, much as his first big ‘life sciences initiative’ was tailored in much that direction, but that’s mostly because he was fighting off things that can kill you quicker, so to speak, than cancer…
Andrei Radulescu-Banu says
Petr, you left out the Health Connector disaster, failure to ensure the MBTA was doing its basic repairs, inability to organize Cape Wind into a sustainable project, a long list of incompetent appointees to various boards and commissions…
petr says
… you’re moving the goalposts.
Ed Prisby wrote ’bout a visionary who doggedly pursued his goals. Ed Prisby was not writing about Jesus. He was writing about Deval Patrick.
Patrick was a visionary. He did articulate and did pursue many goals: the fact of tangible defeats only underlines this. Patrick did not succeed in all of his goals and, in point of fact, in none of them did he achieve the perfection of a whole loaf. Whether by circumstances or circumvention by the lege Patricks plans were often stymied. This is true for all visionaries on scales both large and small. But that does not make them less than visionaries and a half a loaf, or even less, isn’t indictment.
In contrast to Governor Charlie Baker, whose entire vision is a head scratch and a desire to see more data before making a decision, Deval Patrick was engaged and diligent in his efforts towards clearly articulated goals. That he did not always achieve them does not make them lesser. Charlie Baker doesn’t even have a clear goal in mind to measure success or failure by… He just wants to see more data, hon.
merrimackguy says
Deval Patrick didn’t do that. The actual running of the government (I’m not talking legislation) was done poorly and not only have the costs been high (like in the Dookhan situation, or the Health Connector), but actual people have died as a result of that administration’s ineptitude.
This comment is just another excuse to say rude things about Baker.
jconway says
Neither Baker nor Coakley had a vision for governance. Neither one of them had a new idea, a new plan, or a means of achieving that plan. Both basically said it was a good state and they would work to make it better on the margins where they could.
Patrick, the guy I canvassed for, had a much bolder vision. That we could be a state where no family was left behind, everyone was assured of economic opportunity, every child would get world class education like he did at Milton Academy, every community would get assistance from the state to improve itself, and a grassroots army of activists would storm Beacon Hill and cure the culture of corruption.
Almost none of that happened. Casinos happened, cuts to social services especially mental health and child services happened, and our dysfunctional legislature and tax code continued without modification. Some of that is on him, some is on the culture, but there was a grassroots army at his finger tips waiting to storm the gates and he never gave the order. And then websites failed and kids in our care died and it was just obvious he had checked out and didn’t care enough to fix the problem.
So we had to pick between two people promising to fix the potholes and the voters decided Baker had a better shot at doing that, probably as a default since the alternative was a candidate who would rather investigate light brights than public corruption. The fact that the goals he set are far less lofty helps his popularity since it makes it more likely he will deliver on them, and thus far, at least with DCF he has. He has also shown that bigotry is still the default of the GOP base when it comes to immigrants and refugees, so I want an alternative. But it should be an alternative that recognizes that Deval’s strategy of governance was a flawed one.
petr says
… ‘Cept he did EXACTLY that through the worst economic downturn in our lifetime. When Deval Patrick took office Mass unemployment was at about 4.9%. When he left office it was at 5.1%. In the intervening years it zoomed all the way to 8.8% (twice) when the national rate was hovering around 9-10%. I don’t use this to point out Patricks impact on unemployment but that unemployment is a marker of the economy and since the economy had an impact on the CommonWealth, the Governor of said CommonWealth, not leaving a trail of debris and detritus behind him, constitutes actual leadership.
This comment is just another excuse to avoid the rude truth.
Andrei Radulescu-Banu says
Political movements have a logic of their own. Sometimes the hype is reaching too far out there to turn into something constructive. Without the hype, candidates are not inspiring. With too much hype, nothing practical gets achieved.
The situation reminds me of the 2001 tech bubble. All those little web companies that got venture capital funding to sell things like doggie crackers through the web, trying to devine the future and bank on it. Valuations sky high, no relation to earnings – then, the market collapses.
We have not gotten any better to predict when too much hype is roaming freely, and when the tail wags the dog.
What happened to the Patrick administration, I think, is something along those lines. The criticism to Baker is, on the contrary, that he’s purveying no hype. He’s too much of a cold, data guy. He never moves ahead two steps in one single move.
At this point, maybe that’s not such a bad thing.
But let’s see. I am hearing plans to reform vocational education in the state. To build up the North Shore, and revitalize Lynn. To reform UMass, through appointment of Marty Meehan as President, who is no-nonsense and very well respected.
But bold vision, something on the scale of Romneycare? Not yet.
One other difference is that Baker came from local government, while Patrick came from federal government appointments. There is a world of difference between one and the other. Baker was a Selectman in Swampscott, and has talked in very direct terms about how that experience informed him:
http://beverly.wickedlocal.com/article/20150106/news/150108555
“During his one-term on the board, which ended in 2007, many described Baker as a focused listener and a thoughtful explainer of town issues and policies. He took a deep interest in assembling the town’s budget, an exercise that helped him understand unfunded mandates the state imposes on local communities and the ways they “figure out how to pay” for them.”
I think that says a lot about who this guy is, and what makes him tick.
Local government, at its best, tends to be non-partisan. All towns folk pitch in to problem solve together. Ideology is left at the door. Compromise is found, community feedback is actively sought and has immediate impact. People disagree, but respectfully, and seek a constructive path together.
I would really hope that’s the model we’re heading towards at the State level as well.
merrimackguy says
You’re blaming the recession for all the problems? Really?
Peter Porcupine says
Here is the first year in office – from the rosiest perspective.
http://vps28478.inmotionhosting.com/~bluema24/2008/06/patrick-committee-releases-top-20-accomplishments/
All the big picture stuff alluded to wsn’t even in the first term, let alone first year.
Mostly, it’s spending money and promising we could pay for it because we would have casinos. Some of it is just sad, like the claims that the Pike and infrastructure are fixed now. And who knew he signed a right-to-work bill?
Mark L. Bail says
agree with the differently-winged, yep.
jcohn88 says
His popularity and his lack of big accomplishments are closely related. His popularity is based on seeming likable, and particularly seeming non-threatening to Democrats. So technocratic management, in ways often designed to redistribute wealth upwards (but not too flagrantly so), is what will result.
He can’t do anything “big” because whatever “big” he’d really want to do would be despised by Democrats.
I don’t get what’s impressive about his MBTA “reforms.” He seems to want to lay the foundation for privatization, he’s open to fare hikes, and he is opposed to increasing revenue for it.
Andrei Radulescu-Banu says
> His popularity and his lack of big accomplishments are closely related. His popularity is based on seeming likable, and particularly seeming non-threatening to Democrats.
For a moment there, I thought you were writing about Patrick.
dasox1 says
I hope some serious candidates will step up and take Baker on. The way it’s going, it’s not going to an easy race. Someone up thread mentioned Mark Roosevelt, and that’s probably what the race—if not the outcome—will resemble, at least in terms of the popularity of the incumbent. We need a candidate who people will think is Baker’s equal in terms of a heartfelt desire to make government work—a highly competent manager. Before people start writing me hate mail, it’s not that I share this view of Baker. But, the reality is that this narrative has taken shape. Our candidate will also have to have a bold, progressive vision for the state that motivates the base, and contrasts with Baker’s style and vision. Baker isn’t dynamic, he may make some mistakes, and tell some fish-tales, so hopefully he’ll be beatable. As for judging Baker’s accomplishments, he’s through more than 20% of his term so what’s unfair about judging his accomplishments? Unfortunately, I think that progressives have to admit that the promise and vision of Gov. Patrick far out weighed the reality and the policy. I supported him early on, and I really wanted to be able to say that he was a fabulous governor. He wasn’t. He was a great politician with a compelling vision, but he didn’t translate it into policy well. Ironically, he will probably be most remembered for gaming legislation which is not only a complete disaster, but (at least to me) is completely contrary to Patrick’s own vision of how a society works best. The degree to which the absolutely miserable Democratic legislative leadership sucks is a part of Patrick’s shortcomings but anyone who runs for Gov. knows that a high degree of power is vested in the legislature. Happy Thanksgiving to all my kindred spirits at BMG.
whoaitsjoe says
Other than the fact he’s got an (R) rather than a (D) next to his name?
dasox1 says
I would much rather have Dan Wolf or Maura Healy or Don Berwick or Joe Kennedy or someone else who shares my political philosophy in that position than Charlie Baker. Is it more important than the presidential election? Maybe not. Personally, I don’t find Baker as abhorrent as Ted Cruz, Dr. Carson, Donald Trump, or some others. But, I do still care about that race. As for the D vs. R — I’d gladly vote for an R who I thought shared my values. And, I did, when I voted for Ralph Martin. The reality is that party affiliation usually does serve as an indicator of a belief system.
jconway says
I would be more interested in fundamentally targeting a chunk of the legislature to turn over to actual progressives or even the UIP (which unlike the Greens, are actively pursuing legislative races) and getting enough of a majority with the Republicans to deny DeLeo another term as Speaker, reinstate term limits, and begin recording the votes and ensuring transparency in the House.
Barring that-good luck to any of those fine Democrats when they are confronted with the same paper tiger supermajority that seems to excel in literally putting of to tomorrow what we desperately need it to do today. You know, when it’s not busy facing down federal indictment or stripping people of their pensions in the dead of night.
Mark L. Bail says
the senate that’s the problem. Not sure if we all think that.
jconway says
Stan’s been doing a good job, and it’s a more transparent body overall. I am sure the strong tradition of term limited Senate Presidents has helped contribute to that. I have yet to hear of any retaliation in that body equivalent to the kind my old rep John Hecht received in the House for his term limits vote. Interestingly, when he and Brownsbeger knocked on our door during the state senate special they both said they hated the House leadership and wanted to serve in the Senate where it’s more open.
jcohn88 says
Controlling state agencies is really important. Charlie may not be as bad as his Republican peers in other states on the environment, but it’s still dangerous to have him in control of DEP. EO 562 is a great example here: http://www.mass.gov/governor/legislationexecorder/execorders/executive-order-no-562.html.
And I think Charlie would love to privatize the T, and I wouldn’t put it past DeLeo to agree to it. I don’t want a governor with such aspirations.
afertig says
The real question for Speaker DeLeo is: is that all there is?
It’s not like DeLeo is passing bills he could easily get passed in this Legislature that Charlie Baker is vetoing. I get that the Governor sets the vision in many instances, but ultimately, it’s the Speaker who gets it done in this Commonwealth. So, what bills, big picture items, etc. are before the Speaker that the Governor could choose to sign – or not?
RaiseUp maybe the only outside progressive coalition that has the power to force some vision in the state – and they are doing it by pushing progressive ballot initiatives. But even there, they won an increase in the minimum wage but the leg didn’t tie it to cost-of-living or inflation, so we’re going to have to come back once again in just a few years. And, the Fight for 15 is making RaiseUp look progressive, but not exactly like the national leader Massachusetts could be. (I say this knowing RaiseUp is involved in Fight for 15… my point is more that the minimum wage increase won is not like Seattle’s $15, and nobody really thinks MA is the leader on wages in the way that we were on marriage equality or health reform.)
jconway says
I appreciate the work Raise Up, Progressive Mass, and other allies are doing collectively and together. Mass Budget and Policy Center is also a great think tank powering many reforms with tangible policy ideas. I just feel like the GOP, even locally, has a direct pipeline between the grassroots-think tanks-and elected officials. Baker is a Pioneer alumn and sunk his teeth into the DHs under Weld. Is there a similar pipeline on our side?
As a minority I think they are committed to a cohesive, free market ideological agenda that drives all of their policymakers to serve. I just don’t see that in our side, a lot of our policymakers seem detached and even disinterested in making policy and are more concerned about keeping their jobs, their power, their perks and their patronage. It’ll be uphill convincing the average voter that the seemingly regular guy who shows up to little
League games and rotary meetings regularly votes to keep us in the dark,
keep the same bad system in place, and stymie progress.
jcohn88 says
This reminds me of the gaping chasm between the party platform and the legislature. Also, the Progressive Mass scorecard, which shows how broad of a church the MA Democratic Party is.
The centralization of power combined with the lack of competitive elections (especially at the primary level—once you’re an incumbent, you’re golden) is quite corrosive.
jcohn88 says
Yep, the Democrats have massive supermajorities in both houses: 78% in the House and 85% in the Senate. In theory, they could pass whatever they want, regardless of what Charlie says. But, of course, people like DeLeo like having a Republican governor because it allows them to fall back into their natural conservatism and gives them an easy excuse for not doing things.
It’s embarrassing that Raise Up even has to go to the ballot (or use the threat of the ballot initiative) to get progressive things passed when Democrats have that large of a majority. What good is a supermajority if you’re almost never going to use it?
Back to Charlie, I think part of the question of “Is that all there is?” to me is “Why do people in this state love this guy who has minor accomplishments, if anything?” The fact that Democrats trip over each other to compliment him is no small part of that, and it shows their lack of ambition both on political and on policy matters.
SomervilleTom says
It appears to me that Mr. Baker has strong polling numbers, especially among unenrolled voters. In the last gubernatorial campaign, we Democrats offered a nominee who did not appeal to those unenrolled voters. I think that reflects strenth among residents — not “Democrats”, and certainly not elected Democrats (if you exclude our many DINOs).
Meanwhile, the Democratic supermajority in the legislature — especially in the house — is a
liefiction that allows actual Democrats to be marginalized and keeps the Massachusetts GOP in its un-dead status by forcing candidates who are actually moderate Republicans (in the now-obsolete Frank Sargent sense of the word) to run as Democrats (in name only).It appears to me that if we’re talking about voters, it is our unenrolled majority who “love this guy who has minor accomplishments”. If we’re talking about elected officials, most of the complimentary noise is from closet Republicans — elected as Democrats — who, if anything suffer from an excess of ambition on policy matters. They vote Republican, and they suppress their party loyalty (to the GOP) because affiliating with today’s Massachusetts GOP is a surefire guarantee of defeat.
jcohn88 says
In the latest Suffolk poll, Charlie’s favorability rating among Democrats is 59% – 28%. They don’t like him as much as Republicans (89% – 2%) or Indies (75% – 8%) do, but 2:1 is still really high.
Christopher says
…but then again, many rank and file Dems, including more members of local party committees than I would like, are cut from the same cloth as some of the Dem office holders we are complaining about.
With reference to the promotion question, Dems should ALWAYS go all in for the statewide races, no questions asked. There is also no excuse for not contesting every partisan race in the state.
SomervilleTom says
I’m not sure what “all in” means for a district like Dracut where the district itself is Republican. If it means helping Ms. Garry and her ilk win as “Democrats”, I think it’s mistaken.
I think it’s far more important that our “Democratic” legislature actually be Democrats from the Democratic wing of the Democratic party than what we have today.
I think the same is true for the statewide races. I think it’s more important to nominate candidates who reflect actual Democratic values than Republicans who pretend to be Democrats in order to win an election. If nothing else, that practice starves the Massachusetts GOP of the moderate republican candidates IT desperately needs in order to be competitive.
Christopher says
I thought it was being suggested that we might be OK with deliberately putting up a sacrificial lamb for Governor and not really try to win that election, which is something I emphatically do not agree with. The two paragraphs in my above comment were not intended to be read in relation to each other.
SomervilleTom says
It tells me that even registered Democrats in Massachusetts have had enough of the pervasively corrupt and incompetent overwhelmingly Democratic legislature.
hesterprynne says
included an increase in the state’s Earned Income Tax Credit among his top budget priorities, and, while the Legislature ended up enacting a smaller increase than he was recommending, that increase marked the first time in 14 years that a Governor had even proposed a boost in public benefits for the state’s low income families.
A: Baker.
PS – comments are not necessarily endorsements, especially in this case.
David says
of how tinkering around the edges can make a tangible difference in the lives of people who could use some help.
SomervilleTom says
Perhaps Mr. Baker can now tinker around the edges of our public rail transportation system, with winter fast approaching.
The Boston subway and commuter rail system is crucial bedrock to an ENORMOUS number of people who rely on it to, for example, get to jobs that they desperately need because they can’t afford to own an automobile where they live.
The Earned Income Tax Credit is only meaningful to workers who need it. An enormous number of EITC recipients are included in the set of people who desperately need public rail transportation and who can’t afford to take the winter off.
I wonder how many of those who today qualify for the improved EITC benefits will lose those gains when they lose their jobs because they can’t get to work. I wonder how many of them will end up ratcheting up their Lottery and Keno habits, or become regulars at our new casinos.
Perhaps Mr. Baker might find a way to “tinker around the edges” of our public rail transportation system in a way that actually improves it, rather than creating illusory spread-sheet gains that do nothing to change the actual problems that destroyed public transportation last winter and are likely to do the same this winter.
historian says
A Governor who begins with the assumption that any problem can be solved without spending money and legislators who do not want do do anything that could creat the slightest risk. They seem to think that a bunch of bills protecting the honor of veterans can substitute for taking any risks on their part.
Clark Healey, and Moultn aren’t gong to run for governor, so the candidate will most likely be either a little-known politician or a non-traditional outsider.
thegreenmiles says
The cozy Democratic insider establishment on Beacon Hill is a much more powerful obstacle to progressive solutions than Republicans.