Pages
Stay In Touch
More
© 2013 The Sandwich Democratic Town Committee
With less than two hours to go before the U.S. Senate starts voting on amendments to the anti-gun violence bill now pending, the unimaginable seems likely. There are still not enough votes to gain passage of the legislation with near-universal background checks in place. Multiple sources are reporting that the votes are not there and this will go down in defeat, despite a level of support in every state in the country, including among Republican voters, and gun owners that rivals apple pie and motherhood. As of this moment there are 52 Senators in favor, 40 Republicans opposed, and 8 undecided. In other words, the bill’s supporters would have to win every single one of the undecided votes.
It appears that we have a whole lot of United States Senators who provide living, breathing, walking proof that you can indeed live without a spine. There they are, cowering in their proverbial closets because of what the 7% or so of Americans who do not favor universal background checks might do to them politically. Really!! And the 90%+ who do support this bill?? Despite having a pretty good facility with two languages, both of which have rich and extensive vocabularies, I quite honestly cannot think of the right words to express what I am feeling right now.
People concerned about or just plain interested in the subject of campaign financing and finance reform have an incredible resource at their disposal. The National Institute on Money in State Politics has dedicated its web site to recording, tracking, and analyzing the flow of money to state level candidates and ballot initiatives across the country. This is an incredible, rich resource (no pun intended!) for viewing the impact of money on state politics. People interested in SDTC Action Projects on Citizens United and Eyes on Hunt will find this to be a treasure trove of data on who gave how much to whom, and to influence what ballot measures with what outcomes over the last several years. A report on Massachusetts for the period 2006-2010 states in part:
Prior to the Supreme Court’s ruling in Citizens United v. FEC, Massachusetts’ law banned corporations from spending money to influence elections; after the ruling this law ultimately fell. Institute researchers identified top spenders, targeted races, and how much was spent in the 2006-2010 elections. The money spent independently over the study period was a fraction of the $201 million contributed directly to candidates.
Tomorrow night, March 27th at 7 PM will bring the first in a series of debates between the Democratic hopefuls to fill the seat vacated by John Kerry when he became Secretary of State. The primary contestants have agreed so far to 6 debates, although only 3 have been finalized to date. The first one in the series will be broadcast by a consortium of news outlets: WGBH-TV, NECN, WCVB-TV, WHDH-TV, WGBH Radio, WBUR Radio, and Bloomberg Radio. A rumored debate to be held April 1st at Stonehill College will not take place.
Tucked away in last month’s employment report — a report that you may recall carried the happy surprise of an increase of more than 230,000 new jobs and a 2/10 percentage point drop in the unemployment rate — was a statistic that surprised experts. Among the jobs added were 48,000 new construction jobs. That made specialists sit up straight in a hurry. It signaled a surprising turnaround might be on the way for the housing market.
Today, we have confirmation of that suspicion and it appears to be unusually robust. The New York Times reports a “Sudden Rise in Home Demand Takes Builders By Surprise.” The story comments that after six years of sitting on the sidelines home buyers are streaming back into the market, a market that apparently has scant inventory for sale. In Sacramento, where the decline in the housing market was among the worst in the country, the median sales price has increased 15% in the last year. Across the country, home prices are up an average of 7.3 percent.
The housing turnaround seems to have caught almost everyone in the business by surprise. As desirable as the long-awaited improvement may be, the unusually low level of homes for sale is creating widespread problems for buyers and sellers alike, leading to bidding wars and bubblelike price jumps in places that not long ago were suffering from major declines.
The positive effects of these kinds of trends tend to build on each other and lead to better, greater results over the long term. This is good news for the country and for the Democrats, but not such good news for the negativists and doomsayers among Republicans who seem to still be intent on making this President fail.
Have you no shame, Mr. Reid? Have you no shame Mr. McConnell? Have we no shame, we the electorate, we the citizens of a country that grandly and sometimes grandiosely proclaims loudly and expansively our pride in “American exceptionalism”? Does “exceptionalism” mean that when our Founding Fathers wrote about our inalienable right to “life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness” they meant “except” when one of us loves guns so much we just have to have a military grade weapon loaded with a 100-round magazine?
“Why is the ban being dropped? According to Democratic leaders, it has no chance of passing — and if it were included, Democrats wouldn’t even be able to bring it up on the Senate floor for debate. Just bringing a bill up for consideration requires all senators to agree, and if just one objects, then it takes 60 votes to keep the process moving forward.” – NBC News
How does any American politician gather up the where-with-all to stand before broadcast media, to stand before the American electorate and with a straight face proclaim that he/she must strip a ban on private ownership of military-grade armaments out of a bill because its presence would cause a filibuster?
Photo by Yuri Gripas / Reuters.
Really!? There are not 60 out of 100 United States Senators, senators in an “exceptional” nation, who are willing to trade the mere act of purchasing a military weapon because they like them, because they have a supposed “right” to possess one, for the possibility that doing so would prevent 20 more 6-7 year olds from being murdered? Have you no shame?
Well, enjoy your “right.” Enjoy your political “realities” and parliamentary “procedures” and Senate “rules”. Enjoy them now, because the screams of the next child to be riddled by a hail of bullets from a military grade weapon someone purchased because they like them, will echo up and down the halls of heaven for all eternity.
Via SDTC member Linell Grundman we received notification of a forum hosted by the South Shore Democratic Caucus entitled: “Educational Forum on Immigration Reform: Constitutional Rights and the Financial Impact of Immigrant Entrepreneurs and Consumers.” The forum will be held on Saturday March 2, 2013 in Cohasset, see Calendar for details.
The announcement reads in part:
The public is invited to attend this forum and learn more about current and critical issues related to Immigration Reform. The panel includes:· Key Note Speaker , Marisa DeFranco, Immigration Attorney and former candidate for U.S. Senate· Steve Grossman, Massachusetts State Treasurer· Tackey Chan, Massachusetts State Representative from Quincy· Carlos DaSilva, Brazilian immigrant and civic leader· Natalicia Tracy, Executive Director, Brazilian Immigrant Center· Suzanne Curry, Health Reform Policy Coordinator from Health Care for AllEach panel member will speak and then the audience will have the opportunity to ask questions.Genevieve Davis, Chief Financial Officer at the New England Board of Higher Education and former candidate for the Massachusetts State Senate, will wrap up the forum and lead a discussion of next steps.
For more information please contact: Kevin McCarthy, Chair – South Shore Democratic Caucus at 781-534-0509 Kevin [at] cohassetdemocrats [dot] org
Interested in or concerned about immigration, voting rights protection, jobs and the economy, etc.? Read on because your chance to voice your concerns and ideas is fast approaching!
As part of the Massachusetts Democratic Party effort to prepare for the forthcoming Platform Convention this summer, the Platform Committee has been organizing “hearings” around the state. These hearings are open and designed to solicit input on a wide variety of policy matters from everyday democrats across the Commonwealth. Linell Grundman, Sandwich Democratic Town Committee member and Sandwich Alderman, was asked to facillitate a hearing on Cape Cod.
That hearing will take place in Yarmouth Port on March 23rd at the Yarmouth Port Fire Station. Click on the link below for the hearing flier, and check our Calendar for location details, including a map of the location. Other hearings are currently scheduled for Oaks Bluff and Orleans.
2013 Platform Focus Group in Yarmouth Port
Sen. Elizabeth Warren made her debut as a member of the Senate Banking Committee with a series of deceptively simple and direct questions to regulators before the committee that seemed to stun them. They apparently did not know how to handle well direct questions about taking those actors who were at the center of the financial crisis to trial. The real answer is evident in their gyrations; no one could cite a single instance in which their agency took a financier all the way to trial. Click the video icon to see a small snippet of the exchange. You can also click on this link to see the full 7 minute video on YouTube.
Various news organizations are reporting that former Senator Scott Brown will not run in the special election to fill out John Kerry’s term. He has apparently concluded that a third major Senate campaign within a few years’ time is just too much. Politics aside, his decision is entirely understandable, especially if you consider that it is not just three campaigns in proximity but four. Kerry’s term ends in 2014. That would mean Brown would have to launch a fourth major campaign close on the heels of this one.
Boston.com has details on the decision. Their post says in part:
Brown’s announcement was unusual. Rather than a formal press conference or statement, he initially released the news to the Boston Herald in a text message that said “U are the first to know.” His spokesman later confirmed the news to the Globe in a text that read “Not running.”
The full statement was released later.
Brown’s decision leaves the Republican Party scrambling to find a viable candidate for the June 25 election. To make the ballot, candidates must gather 10,000 certified signatures in four weeks.
Click here to read Brown’s full statement.
Via Kate Donaghue (Donaghue’s Democratic Dispatch) we have learned that last night the State Committee changed the Platform Convention date from June 1st to July 13th. According to Donaghue:
This date is after the special general election for U. S. Senate. Massachusetts Democratic Party Chairman, John Walsh, recommended the change so that Massachusetts Democrats can focus on ensuring that a Democrat is elected to represent us. We need to be talking to voters in this shortened election cycle. When that is over we can give our full attention to the platform.
So mark (or “re-mark”) your calendars accordingly. For now the Platform Convention date change does not impact the dates for local caucuses and delegate selection. But stay tuned in case it does.
Follow Us!