It's casual Friday at the NU Dems blog, so how about some sillyness?

Deval Patrick or Dead Prez?

1.
"My uncle shot up heroin in the front room when he thought no one was watching."
"It's like watching your own father smoke crack. I have nightmares..."

2.
"Our people are poor, and you know damn well nobody wants to be poor"
"All of us – especially the poor – are on our own."

3.
"The same people who control the school system control the prison system, and the whole social system."
"We need black men and women in our schools."

4.
"I took history class serious. Front row, every day of the week, 3rd period"
"You know the history: how for a century our nation denied the legal rights of its black citizens."







Answers: 1. Deval, Dead Prez 2. Dead Prez, Deval 3. Dead Prez, Deval 4. Dead Prez, Deval

This is probably a case of the Herald turning nothing into something that will sell papers, but today they had a brief article on comments Barack Obama made on NBC after the State of the Union.

Read the article for exact quotes, but he essentially said that he admired Mitt's health care plan and said that Democrats should pay some attention to it. The Herald took this to be a snub of Obama's good friend, Deval Patrick, who supports the health care plan offered in the House and not Romney's. Of course both parties said that Barack and Deval are cool and that there is nothing to worry about.

The main point I took from the article was that Deval and Barack are great friends, which makes me wonder (pray) if there will be a Deval-Obama event going down somewhere in Boston near the election. Needless to say, I have already soiled myself in excitement.

The big headline winner out of the President's State of the Union address Tuesday night is his line that, "America is addicted to oil." It was really touching to see our Texas oil man/President stating something that has been said over and over again since the 1970s by Republicans and Democrats alike. Sadly, not a heck of a lot has been done about our dependence on foreign oil. Every time the prices go up, we all yack about it and get really afraid and decide the world is coming to an end and Americans are going to have to live in the dark rubbing sticks together and then all of the sudden, prices go down and everyone forgets. I would hope that the Democrats have the mind to keep this issue at the forefront for more than a few day or weeks at best right now. I really hope that the democrats do more than just keep this issue in the forefront but instead choose to capitalize on this important issue.

The other night in his speech, the president basically said that all we gotta do here in America is spend a few extra bucks and invent some stuff. Not once in his entire section on energy independence did the President ask for sacrifice. Yes, we have to work hard to increase energy independence through innovation but we must also conserve energy and sacrifice a little. That means less SUVs, taking public transportation, not sleeping with the TV, better standards on fuel efficiency and the list goes on. Jacob Weisberg notices this lack of asking for anything relating to conservation from our favorite conservative, "Conservation measures like fuel-economy standards and dedicated taxes can plausibly serve all three of his objectives, but Bush has a quasi-religious aversion to conservation and taxes and didn't so much as refer to either." (story here)

As noted in this Washington Post story:

The single biggest step that Congress could take to reduce our oil dependency is to significantly increase the fuel economy standards of the cars and trucks that Americans buy and drive," said Kevin Knobloch, president of the Union of Concerned Scientists, which works on environmental issues.

I am truley surprised by the fact that the President does not once encourage any sort of conservation or sacrifice on this issue. Because the president is clearly not serious about this issue, I think that the democrats have a very real issue to put out a far ranging energy independence plan of their own. This plan can relate in part to greater innovation in the American economy as well as less problems relating to oil and the middle east. Lastly, any sort of solutions to out big appetite for foreign oil will be geared towards greatly improving the conditions of our envrionment. For all these reasons, the democrats could frame this issue into a big winner for them.

As the following policy papers from the Progressive Policy Institute point out, Green technology can drive the economy

In such ways as green buildings which, "use power and other natural resources far more efficiently and generate less pollution than buildings simply constructed to comply with local codes." In another article, the PPI discusses:

Our once-pioneering laws and policies made us an early leader in the field. But we now find ourselves being beaten on a wide range of environmental technologies, from the wind turbines and photovoltaic panels used to convert wind and sunlight into electricity, to the hybrid engines that power automobiles on a combination of gasoline and electricity. Indeed, the United States is the only developed country that has managed to reduce the average fuel efficiency of its automobile fleet for over a decade -- an incredible technological feat, but not one that deserves emulation.

Ultimately, Energy independence is a strategy and an issue that Democrats can use to move forward and make our party the leader in years going forward. We cannot afford to be beat on this issue.

I know some people don't like the Center for American Progress but they are basically the strongest progressive think tank type group out there. They are constantly putting out new ideas and Democrats should pick up on at least a few of these. Not only are the ideas they put out pretty good. Not only are the ideas good but they make an effort to present them in a simple way -- something that would probably work well with voters. They recently released a report on 15 Ideas on Issues that will make a big difference. I think everyone should take a look at this:
15 New Ideas

Let's run down Tom Reilly's week:

First:
Campaign leaks that Chris Gabrieli may be named TR's running mate, as the two have had many talks on the issue. Chris Gabrieli has lots and lots of money and is liked by nearly all Democrats in the state, so he would have been a pretty good choice. Just the leak, though, made the other Lieutenant Governor candidates quite mad, because Reilly had promised to let the race play itself out and not pick a running mate.

Next:
Out of the blue TR picks Marie St. Fleur (see a couple of posts down). One top of being an obvious grab at voters of color and women, this pushes the angry LG candidates over the edge. Especially furious was Tim Murray, the Worchester mayor had support from many mayors around the state, and by losing their support, one person quoted in the Globe said that TR had lost 20% of his supporters.

Now:
Marie St. Fleur withdraws from the race after the Globe exposes her tax evasion problems.

Conclusion:
Tom Reilly managed to throw the mayors of Massachusetts under the bus and didn't even get the transparent political benefit he was hoping for. Worse yet, TR claims that the decisions were made by he alone, so I guess he can't fire anyone. It's starting to look like the only person caucusing for Reilly on Saturday will be Tom Menino.

The state party estimates that caucus participation will be half of what it was four years ago and a quarter of what it was in 1982, according to this article in today Globe. This is just one example of a steady decline in Democratic participation in the state, and one of the theories is that our generation has become cynical about the party system. It good to know that people like us exist, who are helping to reverse this trend. Check the article out, it's an interesting look into state party politics that you almost never get.

That's what some staffers in City Council were saying today. For those who didn't notice or care, Tom Reilly--boring old white guy--picked Marie St. Fleur--State Rep. from Dorchester and Massachusetts' first ever Haitian-American elected official--to be his running mate. It was a pretty obvious ploy to win some of the black vote from Deval Patrick and then some of the woman vote from Kerry Healey. I hope they do a joint rally soon, it will interesting to see St. Fleur's ideas and charisma clash with Reilly's... um... experience. (Maybe Deval should tap Dr. Sam to try and win some of TR's boring white guy vote?)

An interesting political side plot (well, it's pretty much the whole plot actually) is that St. Fleur had previously stated that she would support Deb Goldberg's run for Lieutenant Governor, and Tom Reilly had originally said he wouldn't pick a running mate and instead let the race play itself out.

The very act of picking a running mate is a bit odd, because in Massachusetts, Gov. and LG candidates don't run on a single ticket until the general election. Tom Reilly will only run with Marie St. Fleur if they both win their respective primaries. In other words, Deval supporters who like St. Fleur can vote for both if they want, despite St. Fleur's title as Reilly's "running mate".

This also means there are now five Democrats vying for the Lieutenant Governor nomination:

Marie St. Fleur
Deborah Goldberg
Sam Kelley
Tim Murray
Andrea Silbert