It turns out we got 15 minutes, though only 1 minute was aired on the CBS evening news.
Click here to watch the full mini-debate.
Thanks to Jon Keller for making this happen, however brief it may have been.
Endorsement: Jill Stein for Secretary of State
Tuesday, October 31, 2006
The shrinking of the Massachusetts Republican Party is especially evident in the lower part of the ballot. No Republicans have come forward to challenge William Galvin, who has served 12 years as secretary of state, Joe DeNucci, who has been auditor for nearly 20 years, or Timothy Cahill, elected treasurer in 2002.
If the polls are correct, there is a good chance Democrats will control every statewide office and every seat in the Congressional delegation. The small band of Republicans in the state Legislature continues to dwindle. Contested legislative races are increasingly rare, with close to 98 percent of incumbents re-elected. We can’t blame the Democrats for the Republicans’ inability to compete, but their success prompts a concern: Who’ll be left to blow the whistle if the Democrats misbehave?
There is already too much secrecy on Beacon Hill. The Legislature, having exempted itself from the Open Meeting Law, regularly locks the people and press out of its deliberations. Budgets are written in secret, and released with little time for even legislators, let alone ordinary citizens, to figure out what is in them. The online versions are so opaque as to be nearly worthless to anyone who isn’t a state employee or lobbyist.
Lobbyists, by the way, spent more than $31 million working Beacon Hill in 2004. When it comes to issues such as health care reform, auto insurance reform, taxes and economic incentives, the lobbyists’ ideas and preferences are reflected in clauses that defy public scrutiny.
What Massachusetts needs is a champion for government transparency and democratic reform. We need someone who will speak up when the political bosses and special interests are cutting the rest of us out of the discussion, someone who will advocate for stronger civic engagement and healthier politics.
The secretary of state, whose responsibilities include managing elections, regulating lobbyists and supervising public records, could be such an advocate. But Galvin doesn’t see his office that way. He was all but silent when legislative leaders killed the Clean Elections Law; he raised no fuss when they redrew legislative district lines to further strengthen Democratic incumbents. When lobbyists and lawmakers cut deals behind closed doors, Galvin goes along.
Galvin does have an opponent on the Nov. 7 ballot: Jill Stein of the Green-Rainbow Party. Stein, a Lexington physician, is a soft-spoken and articulate critic of state politics and government policy. She makes a convincing case that an aggressive secretary of state could treat the ills that beset the Beacon Hill establishment, and save us from what she calls “the hidden tax of influence-peddling.”
Galvin has had some success in protecting consumers from investment fraud. He’s made some improvement in voter registration and election procedures, though he is now missing a federal deadline for making voting machines more accessible to voters with disabilities.
But Galvin is a pillar of the Democratic establishment who shows little interest in rocking the boat. What Massachusetts needs in that office is a champion of good government, a referee willing to blow the whistle on the other players, a watchdog who’ll protect voters and taxpayers. For these reasons, we endorse JILL STEIN for secretary of state.
http://www.metrowestdailynews.com/opinion/view.bg?articleid=144219
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