Someday, Maybe, Possibly

We’ve only been paying a little attention to the primary season, but this Deval Patrick phenomenon has been pretty exciting. (Don’t believe us? Just ask Kerry Healey, possibly the most excited of anyone about his Primary victory, not counting Deval himself.)

Our Minister of Information once served as a low-level speechwriter in the Bureaucratic Service. His evaluation of Patrick’s campaign is as follows:

“Brilliant. The most cynical campaign we’ve seen in years. He served voters a steady diet of pablum, and, predictably, they ate it up like it was dolphin-safe chocolate pudding produced by Oxfam-approved Fair Trade farmers in Bolivia. Our two favorites: “Together we can.” (the apparently non-copyrighted campaign slogan), and “If we win, it will be a victory for people.” (Sorry, buddy) (last soundbite via PBS's Boston /common, 9/19)

Can’t believe he got away with this stuff. If we ever submitted anything like that to our boss, we’d be kicked out on our asses. It’s brilliant, really, because if you tell voters what you’ll do if you get elected you run the huge risk that after the election people might actually ask you why you haven't done what you've promised. Better to just keep it vague, and let the voter fill in the blank themselves. That way, 4 years from now, you can look your disillusioned voter in the face and say “I never promised you that.”

“Hey, it’s not my fault. I never said I’d actually make Massachusetts a better place to live. I just said we could.”