Heeding the Call to Civic Duty

Watched the big debate tonight because, well, one of us had to. The Democratic primary debates were surprisingly engaging, so we figured what the Hell, let's give it a go.

By our count, only 3 of the Ten actually remain in Massachusetts, and right about 6:45 PM, we began to think those other 7 might be on to something. Listening to these 4 candidates talk about how terrible our state was can be very demoralizing, and by 7:00 we had to agree with all 4 candidates - who in their right mind would want to live here?

Quick thoughts (it helps if you actually watched it. If you didn’t, then, well, you probly don’t want to read this anyway)

It’s appropriate that the opponents were seated by their place on the political spectrum- Deval Patrick on the far left, then the Green Party lady, then Christy Mihos, then Healey on the far right.

Deval gave a good performance, but we have a hard time remembering anything he actually said. He projected leadership and charisma, but then, so did Warren Harding.

Healey managed to define her position on abortion without actually using the word abortion.

“I think where we (Romney and her) disagree is pretty clear- we’ve always differed on choice and those differences have only become more stark over time, and I respect that there are differences of opinion there but I've always been pro-choice.”

Next question goes to.... Shonda Schilling? What the hell is Shonda Schilling doing asking a question?

We’d love to see Maria Stephanos’ contract for serving as sideline reporter/tomato for the debate. It must include a clause like this:

“Section 4. Ms. Stephanos will be allowed to introduce one question per round. Any audience question will be proceeded by a long shot of her, followed by a cut to the person asking the question, then camera will return to a medium shot of Ms. Stephanos, who will then re-ask the question before turning it over to the candidates. At the conclusion of the candidates’ answers, the camera will return to Ms. Stephanos for a close up, whereby she smiles and says something of substance, such as "and we’ll have more on education in just a bit . Back to you, Chris.”

That Green Party lady really hit the ball out of the park on the race-as-an-issue question. She’s very poised and articulate, too. Who knew? Doesn’t seem to like rich people tho.

Healey is incapable of answering a question without beginning every answer with “Deval says” or Deval did.” To someone who just came in form out of town, say an unlicensed illegal immigrant watching this debate on Telemundo, the impression they’d get is that Deval is the incumbent. Examples:

• When asked what policy of Romney’s she most agrees with, she manages to say “Its hard for me to imagine that my opponent Deval, confronted with that same situation…"
  
• In response to a question about Christy Mihos serving as a spoiler to the republican candidate: “The thing that concerns me most is that if Deval Patrick wins this election…”
  

This went on all night. Highly annoying.

Say what you want about Mihos, but we love his ads.

Why is Jasper White now asking a question? Is this a debate or a pilot for a new Improper Bostonian TV show? When do Eliza Dushku and Joey Mcintyre get to ask their questions? (By the way, Jasper White looks awful. We met him a few years ago –a big bear of a man. Here, as seen on the debate he’s shriveled, and his voice was weak and raspy. Is he Okay?)

As we’ve said, the Green Party candidate really, really, REALLY hates rich people. And, about 40 minutes into the debate we get a hint why:

“I make about 20-30 thousand dollars a year, I have my entire adult life.”

That’s about $2,500 less than a veteran manager at Christy’s Market takes home. Ugh.

Deval Patrick doesn’t like the fact that the Green Peace lady hates rich people, bc it means she doesn't like him. To win her over, he explains that he wasn’t always rich- he grew up poor in Chicago. (until he came here, attended prep school, and began his meteoric rise that ended with him wealthy and “managing thousands of people across several continents.” ) We don’t think that explanation helped win her over.