Just a short post about two political emails I got this week. Here’s the subject line of the email I got from the Massachusetts Democratic Party:
Now, I am not a political ad wizard, but right away I was annoyed that the party was emailing me without focusing directly on Charlie Baker. Sure enough, the entire email didn’t use his name for whatever reason.
Why not go directly at him? Why not say something like: You know how Congressional Republicans are fighting so the ultra-wealthy don’t have to pay their fair share, and are trying to balance the budget instead by cutting the services and benefits you depend on? Stop me if that sounds familiar – it’s exactly what Charlie Baker’s been doing here in Massachusetts the last three years.
A couple of days later, I got this email from Setti Warren’s campaign:
THAT got me fired up to read the email. Made me feel like the campaign knows who our opponent is and how to win next November. (Here’s the Boston Globe story it linked to and pogo’s post on it.)
I know the state party has to work to help every Democrat win every race across the state, while the Setti Warren campaign has one candidate and one race. But if a massive horde of people come out to vote against Charlie Baker next November (and for the progressive ballot questions), downballot candidates will have nothing to worry about. Unlike the purported benefits of tax cuts for the 1%, a blue wave really WILL lift all ships. If Baker cruises, it’s going to be choppy seas (or worse) downballot.
There are plenty of emails, some about Baker, some not. This one is clearly about federal legislation which Baker doesn’t get a vote on, and I’m not aware of him pushing similar legislation in MA.
Gus Bickford and Mass Dems have been feckless in their messaging. Why is the Mass Party Chair seemingly never on TV? radio? op-eds?
At this point, I am convinced that the Mass. Dem. Party has convinced itself that it is in their best interest for Charlie Baker to remain governor. With a veto-proof majority, they can enact most important bits of policy while having a scapegoat for the hard bits they don’t feel like fighting for. Winning the governorship would mean clear accountability, which many Democratic officials don’t want. So they’d rather have 80% power and no accountability than full power and full accountability.
Sure, this has the effect of throttling the career of any statewide official who should be in a national conversation at this point, but there’s not much collateral damage that’s rendered unacceptable for this “party”.
The Democratic State Committee definitely wants a Democratic Governor.