A plea for common decency.
As can be expected, Deval Patrick’s press release of his intention to step down from Ameriquest has been the subject of much speculation. No good deed goes unpunished in some circles and within the chattering classes that makes up the lefty blogsphere here in Massachusetts there are many opinions regarding Deval’s motivation for his resignation.
I understand that supporters can be very partisan, I know I am, but there is a line, or should be, that we should endeavour to keep our comments factual, reality-based and productive. The kind of mudslinging that’s been going on at Blue Mass. Group and other places recently is none of those things.
As soon as Deval sent out his press release, the chattering started. Being skeptical of a politician’s motivation is one thing, but to imply that the press release regarding Deval’s departure from Ameriquest was timed to coincide with the flood coverage is frankly craven in its complete disregard for plain common decency.
Can we just wait until people are out of shelters and back in their homes before trying to spin this terrible situation to a politician’s advantage? I may not support Tom Reilly, or agree with his stand on the issues, but I do believe that he is a decent man and I doubt he would appreciate his supporters using this event to score political points.
Factual, reality-based and productive. Learn it. Live it.
Putting out announcements that may result in unfavorable press coverage when other matters are capturing the media’s attention is standard operating procedure for any good campaign, and any good politician. There’s nothing bad, unethical, or uncaring about it. I don’t know if that’s what the Patrick campaign was doing with the Ameriquest announcement, but if it is, I say good for them. No need for any Patrick supporter to be defensive about good campaign strategy.
Posted on May 17th, 2006 at 9:25 am
David - I appreciate your comment and I understand that your opinion is shared by others. I just don’t agree for the reasons I stated in my post.
Posted on May 17th, 2006 at 12:21 pm
I agree with you, David. This opinion was also shared by Jim Braude on the “Eagan and Braude” radio show yesterday afternoon, so it’s not just bloggers that feel this way.
Posted on May 17th, 2006 at 8:22 pm
Aaron, can you clarify - You agree with David.
Jim Braude agrees with….?
What time is Eagan and Braude on anyway? I never seem to catch it. When I listen to the radio I tend to listen to WBUR during the day.
Posted on May 17th, 2006 at 9:02 pm
Only geeks listen to NPR
And that is why I am an NPR super supporter! I crack myself up. I could be wrong but I think E&B are on from 12-1 everyday. The show is good but Al Franken is on from 12-3 and I CANNOT miss his show when I am in the car during those hours.
I have to disagree pretty strongly with you David on your assertion that good politicians should take advantage of natural disasters to release negative info. It is one thing to slip out a bad press release when the other guy is getting nailed but it is an entirely different thing to take advantage of disaster.
That said I do not believe at all that Patrick decided to resign because the flooding was an opportune moment to have the story buried.
Posted on May 18th, 2006 at 9:01 am
Hello,
I’m having trouble with your Feedburner feed– is there another RSS feed I could use to get your page?
Posted on May 19th, 2006 at 12:27 pm
Aaron - yes, Feedburner sucks. I really wished I knew that before I signed up. I was just being a lazy blogger and didn’t want to have to deal with all the hassle of setting up rss for wordpress - which isn’t a big deal, as I recently found out, but for now, I’m stuck with feedburner.
Sorry that’s a long answer to a simple question. For now I’m stuck, but I hope to get unstuck soon.
Sorry for the trouble.
Posted on May 19th, 2006 at 2:50 pm
I meant that I agree with David that it is standard for politicians running for office to release things on big news days that they don’t want to get a lot of attention. Jim Braude stated last week that he felt Deval purposely released the Ameriquest announcement on the flood day for that very reason.
Eagan and Braude is on 96.9 FM weekdays from 12-1. It’s the only good thing on that station, too bad it’s only an hour.
Posted on May 20th, 2006 at 1:10 pm