Hey everybody, Happy President's Day! When I was a kid they used to call it George Washington's Birthday, but then someone got the lame idea of making the holiday honor ALL the presidents. You mean like President Nixon? Or Clinton? Or Chester Arthur?
Westfield State Senator Mike Knapik noticed this oddity today at a McDonald's President's Day display. Along with George Washington and Abe Lincoln we have - President Ben Franklin!
Actually Ben Franklin probably should have been president, and might well have been had he been younger at the time of the revolution, but somebody needs to tell Micky-D that wise ol' Ben was never a President, nor did he ever even attempt to run for the office.
Speaking of State Senators, Northampton's Stanley Rosenberg is taking some well-deserved flack for his latest attempt to make more difficult the process for putting policy questions on the ballot. Every few years he claims that the ballot questions favor special interests, but the truth he just doesn't like the causes that the public puts on the ballot.
Lovers in a Northampton alley.
Local musical treasure Jim Armenti has a new solo album out.
You can listen to some of it by clicking here.
Another local musical talent is Tom Pappalardo, although he's best known for his Valley Advocate cartoons, such as this one mercilessly attacking Valley hipsters. (click to enlarge)
When the final campaign filings from the Pioneer Valley 2010 political races came out on Monday, eyebrows were raised behind closed doors at the report filed by south Valley Congressman Richard Neal. I say behind closed doors, because the general public was never informed of the figures by the mainstream local media, which is typical regarding anything pertaining to "The Congressman" that might be interpreted as embarrassing.
But the mind-boggling sum spent by Richie Neal to win re-election last year was really the great uncovered story of our local elections in 2010. How much was Richie forced to spend this time around? According to his filing, he spent a staggering $2,235,180, which I believe qualifies as the most expensive race in Pioneer Valley history.
What also makes Richie's massive money bomb so unique is not just its size, but the target against which all that cash was directed - Neal's almost penniless and unknown opponent, political novice Tom Wesley. To attempt to unseat Neal, Wesley raised a paltry $123,203, which on the congressional level is practically the equivalent of challenging your opponent on the proceeds of a lemonade stand.
Even more awkward for Neal is how little he got for firing this cannon of cash against a housefly. Although Republicans of a certain stripe can occasionally win in the Pioneer Valley, Wesley was not of that type. He had a military background in a district of peaceniks, was anti-abortion among rabid feminists, and against gay marriage in one of the queerest parts of the state. Wesley was also running as a Republican Tea Partier in a year when Massachusetts (and California) were unique in resisting the GOP wave that swept the other 48 states.
And yet, even with all that against him, the final tally was startlingly close, with Wesley winning a very solid 43% of the vote. It is hard to believe that a sudden attraction to Wesley's right-wing views can account for that turnout, especially since there was no Republican surge in any other local races. Although Wesley did have an enthusiastic base, his high vote total can only be fully explained as a personal anti-Neal backlash. In other words, there were a surprisingly large number of voters out there who were prepared to hold their nose and vote for a candidate they philosophically disagreed with rather than cast their ballot for Richie Neal.
And no doubt they had their reasons. Years of unchallenged incumbency had made Neal appear as if he took the seat for granted, with many voters even asking "Richie who?" since the lack of the need for Neal to campaign for the seat for 16 years had left much of the public uncertain of who he was. No doubt Neal's inside polling showed him in trouble, thereby explaining his frantic spending spree, even against an unpopular opponent with no money. That is the only logical explanation for how you end up with the bizarre sight of a two million dollar race against a guy with pocket change.
Neal won by a margin slim enough to leave one wondering whether Neal would have lost the seat had the GOP had the sense to have nominated the much more electable libertarian Republican Dr. Jay Fleitman of Northampton, who had challenged Wesley in the primary. But that's just idle speculation at this point, in politics the winner takes all, whether victory comes by a sliver or a landslide, and under normal circumstances Neal would be able to sigh with post-election relief and enjoy another term.
Neal and Olver
But these are not normal circumstances. As a result of slow population growth in Massachusetts, we are losing one of our ten congressional seats. That means that if all ten incumbents want to run for re-election, one of them is going to have to be forced to run against a fellow incumbent. And if you know anything about the way things are done in Massachusetts politics, it ain't gonna be somebody in Boston who is going to have that problem. As usual they will shaft - I mean shift - that difficulty to us here in the Wild West, and make our two congressmen, Neal and John Olver of Amherst do an electoral duel to the death in a Democrat Party primary.
Both Neal and Olver (like the other eight incumbents) have publicly announced that they are seeking re-election in 2012; but how seriously can we take their intentions? There is no doubt that Neal is sincere, he is poised to possibly become chair of the powerful Ways and Means Committee in the unlikely chance that the Democrats retake the House. Neal is also just in his early 60's and considered still young by congressional standards.
Olver however, is a another story. For one thing, doubt is raised by the fact that Olver is required to say he is running in 2012 even if he has no intention of doing so, just to preserve any chance of saving the two Western Mass seats from consolidation. The ten incumbents are just dying to be relieved of the pressure of removing a seat by having someone retire, since then they could just wipe out that person's seat and leave all nine remaining incumbents safe and sound. So if Olver did not say he was running, it would become an inescapable certainty that we would lose the second seat, with no possibility of escaping Boston combining Neal's and Olver's districts.
Despite such political posing, everyone is all but certain that Neal and Olver's districts will be combined, as it just isn't possible to imagine the scenario where Boston would kill off one of their own to accommodate Western Mass. So would Olver really compete in such a brutal political death match with Neal? He is well into his seventies and frankly did not impress people with his sometimes doddering, spacy performance in last year's debates against his GOP challenger Bill Gunn. Many suspect that if push comes to shove, Olver will defer to Neal by retiring should it turn out that only one of them can fill the seat.
But of course the Pioneer Valley political universe does not consist only of Richard Neal and John Olver. Some powerful Democrat could come forward, and the whispering is growing louder that the someone who may step in to challenge Neal if Olver steps down may be Amherst State Senator Stan Rosenberg. After all, Rosenberg is widely considered to be Olver's hand-picked heir, and previous speculation about Olver's retirement has regarded Rosenberg's candidacy to be a foregone conclusion. Why would that certainty be changed should the seat have Richie Neal competing for it?
My personal opinion is that if it is a Neal versus Olver Democrat primary, Neal will win because of his relative youth and the lopsided margin the Democrat machine in Springfield can deliver to Neal to overcome all the small towns that comprise Olver's base. However, a Neal versus Rosenberg race, now that's a whole other story. It's too early yet, but meanwhile let us watch with keen interest as events unfold.
The rising sun hits the woodland way into downtown Northampton.
Transforming it into a golden road of unlimited devotion.
Singing along to animal posters in Northampton last week.
Rosenberg's Announcement
Yesterday in Amherst as I was about to cross the street to go shop at the Big Y, Amherst bloglord Larry Kelley pulled up.
"Hey sailor," he called out, "ya lookin' for a date?"
Just kidding! Actually Kelley was on the way to pick up his daughter, but we chatted a little about recent blogworthy events, such as how State Representative Stan Rosenberg has publicly confirmed that he is gay. He did it in an offhand, almost by the way manner, as part of a Fourth of July essay he wrote for The Hampshire Gazette. As a foster child who grew up as a ward of the state, as a gay man, as a Jew, I understand what it's like to be cast as "the other." I rarely discuss these facets of my character because I don't practice identity politics. I practice policy politics. And I firmly believe that we will never fulfill our potential as a just society until we embrace the principle of equality for all and adhere to it as fundamental, immutable policy.
Kelley and I agreed that the statement was no surprise. Not just in the gay community, but among straights as well it was pretty obvious to anyone who cared to contemplate the subject that the never-married, never seen on the straight dating scene Rosenberg was probably gay. But does it matter that he came out and said so?
Sorta. It doesn't hurt to have straight people see that gays are not creepy deviants from the fringe of society, but are people they actually know and who are successful in public life. It is especially important for young gay people to see that. On the other hand I have no qualms about any gay person who doesn't care to talk it about it. Who wants to go through all the crap you have to put up with from ignorant people who have all kinds of misconceived notions and ugly labels they want to put on you once you say that you are gay?
Personally I never pretended to be straight, as I knew early on that the damage I would do to myself by faking straightness would be worse for my psyche than anything any gay basher might do. But I've seen plenty of people come out and what they have to put up with. Beforehand, everyone is always whispering behind your back, "Is he gay? Is he gay?" Then when you finally come out and say, "Yeah, I'm gay," the straights go, "Aha, I always knew it!" Well if you always knew it, why all the whispering? Then they criticize you for being dishonest for not coming out sooner. However, if you then go on to talk about your sexuality more than a couple of times after that, they tell you to "stop shoving your sex life down our throats."
Straight people - I'll never understand them.
As a politician Rosenberg is not ideologically aligned with me. For example, from what I've seen he never saw a tax increase he didn't like. But I was impressed with Rosenberg when I met him in person last year at the Amherst Survival Center. Here's a picture of him I took that day.
What impressed me was that Rosenberg was genuinely interested in learning about the Survival Center and how it operated. I could see that this was not some politician blowing through on some photo opportunity for a political campaign. He asked intelligent questions and made insightful comments. He actually sat down and ate lunch with all our regular customers, and again showed an interest in what people had to say. In other words he acted like a real person gathering information about an issue he cared about, instead of just going through the motions required of a politician.
Kelley pointed out to me other admirable aspects of Rosenberg's character. Several years ago Amherst got embroiled in one of those political correctness scandals that only Amherst seems capable of, this time regarding the play Westside Story being performed at the local high school. Most people regard that play as a beloved American classic, but a handful of dizzy leftists were demanding that the play be cancelled on the grounds that it had subtle racist overtones that no one had ever noticed before.
In other words, it was precisely the sort of issue that politicians abhor, since politically there is no winning position on it. Whatever side you take, you're going to alienate some people. Yet Kelley expressed admiration for the fact that Rosenberg came out publicly on the side of those who wanted to show the play, citing First Amendment issues. That did not please some members of Rosenberg's core constituency, but he defied them anyway. Few would have criticized Rosenberg for staying silent, but he spoke out because he felt there was a larger issue at stake.
Kelley also reminded me that Rosenberg, despite representing the district that includes UMass, recently caused the UMass hotel to lose its special tax exemption. For Rosenberg it was a simply matter of fairness, why should the region's privately owned hotels be placed at a competitive disadvantage? Such commonsense thinking is in too short supply in politics these days.
In other words, Stan Rosenberg is a person that, whatever your political persuasion, must be considered a man of principle who isn't afraid to do what is not politically popular. Sadly, there are not many in politics like him today. These are characteristics that dwarf into insignificance anything to do with Rosenberg's sexual orientation.
Yet, I'm sure there are those who, having supported him in the past, will now not do so because Rosenberg has become "officially gay." But that's okay. Who wants the support of such mental midgets anyway?
Says it All
I love this graphic in today's Boston Herald:
The "GOP hopeful" referred to is Charlie Baker, a former bureaucrat under William Weld who is running for Governor. But the fact is every candidate for Massachusetts Governor this year from both parties (and third parties) is going to lambaste Deval Patrick for the recent round of tax increases by linking him to the still reviled former governor Michael Dukakis. The tax-raising Dukakis handed control of the governorship to the Republicans for sixteen years. Will that be the Patrick legacy as well?
High Times
Captain Skypilot Ken Babbs the Intrepid Traveler (above) invited the Merry Pranksters over for a Fourth of July bash. Check out the home movie.
Gathering Clouds
Bill Dusty took this cool photo of a massive thunderstorm descending on Springfield's Eastfield Mall.
Orientation
The UMass campus was filled this morning with new students undergoing orientation for the start of school in September.
The UMass Alumni Association had a little display set up offering the members of the Class of 2013 free UMass flip-flops (useful when dealing with ideologically rigid professors) and Cape Cod potato chips.
Everyday at the Amherst Survival Center we get people for lunch from every walk of life. Today we had a very special guest to serve, State Senator Stan Rosenberg!
He was there to have lunch and to check out what the taxpayers are getting for their money. As he inspected our kitchen he seemed impressed.
The Senator was very nice to the staff and seemed genuinely interested in the operation of the Center. Accompanying Rosenberg was the wicked witch of Massachusetts politics, Martha Coakley.
When it came time for the guests to be served their meal, the Senator joined them but insisted on being served last. I was one of the workers serving him.
Usually I'm more inclined to bash politicians than feed them, but I welcome every opportunity God gives me to learn humility. It was good to have a Senator in the house for lunch, and so we say to him what we do to everyone who eats at the Center:
"Come again."
In the Amherst Big Y this morning while waiting at the checkout counter I noticed that presidential hopeful Barack Obama is starting to make the tabloids. I laughed to see this front page headline: Obama Betrays Oprah - His Shocking Snub.
That's odd, I didn't read about that anywhere else! How did the New York Times miss that story? Accompanying the article was this photo meant to suggest how Oprah is responding to being snubbed.
The online version of the tabloid had this to say:
PRESIDENTIAL hopeful Barack Obama has betrayed Oprah Winfrey, his No. 1 celebrity supporter, telling her he no longer needs her backing in his bid to win the White House, reveal sources. Only GLOBE has the inside story of the rift between the talk show queen bee and the presidential wannabe. Sources tell us the shocking reason Obama's people have told Oprah to back off from the campaign.
To find out the shocking reason, you have to subscribe. Oh well, I'll just wait for the mainstream media to catch up with this story so that I can be shocked for free. In the meantime, Obama shouldn't be too upset that the supermarket tabloids are starting to make up stuff about him. Those papers are sometimes an weird but reliable bellweather of the national mood. For example, one of the few harbingers that the Republicans were going to take over Congress in the 1990's was when the tabloids started writing about Newt Gingrich.
A fan sends along this photo of Fright Night's Stephen Geoffreys signing autographs last month. I'm told he's been refusing to answer fans questions about his porn career. That's odd, because his porn films were really hot! However, I also hear that his porn career may have had as much to do with a serious drug habit than gay pride.
Early spring at UMass?
