Today, UMASS Dartmouth and the South Coast Alliance held the final candidates forum for the Democratic US Senate candidates before the December 8, 2009 special election primary. All four of the candidates did a wonderful job i thought in articulating why it is they should be the one to try and fill the shoes of beloved longtime Senator Ted Kennedy. There's nothing better than confrontation early in the morning and my expectations were for some fireworks.
I was excited looking forward to some early morning fireworks and frisky exchanges between the candidates, particularly between Steve Pagliuca and Congressman Mike Capuano. I enjoyed the fireworks so much the other night that i had them on replay to chuckle, but I dont think the two candidates realized that they came off as somewhat combative to voters, while Martha Coakley kind of just had to hang out and smile and wait her turn to make points.
http://www.necn.com/...
My favorite line was when Steve Pagliuca called Mike Capuano the Sarah Palin of the healthcare bill or something. Someone should have handed Martha a referee's whistle. At UMASS, Pagliuca stressed public-private partnerships as a way to move Massachusetts job training and create more job opportunities.
Capuano for his part expanded upon Pagliuca's point saying we need the "jobs" to go into after the job training. However, it was a little awkward and funny for me to see Capuano suggest in a round about way, "well if you dont know who to vote for... vote for the candidate that your elected officials Barney Frank and Ed Markey have decided to support."
Alan Khazei for his part came off positive, is very visionary in terms of the future of the country, saying Massachusetts can be a center for green jobs and that New Bedford could be dredged and become the deep port we need coming out of Massachusetts. I think essentially everyone in the room agreed with him, but when he refered to the "jobs of the future" and green jobs... no one ever articulates on what exactly those are. Thats a problem. A "vague" problem.
Attorney General Martha Coakley impressed me and came off very "sunny" to me particularly as she pointed out regarding education that MORE MORE mentality alone is not the answer, and that we have to make sure we fund higher education and "No child left behind" programs. However, she elaborated and made a key point which registered... that these kids are not statistics and numbers, and we need to tailor our focus on the individual child's needs.
Coakley also made a key point which really registered with me. She has been agressive in suing the EPA and has gone after Goldman Sachs and pharmaceutical companies for ripping consumers off and, I really like the fact that she cares alot about consumers, but also for taxpayers. By being sent to Washington, I feel she will be an asset because of her extensive watchdog experience and compassion for consumers. I also particularly like the fact that her being so effective in the Attorney General's office, she has had diverse experience going after the bad guys... taking on banking and corporations, and has also been working on legislation.
That being said, with funky bailout programs in Washington such as TARP and a seeming disconnect between providing massive financial institutions with billions of dollars, yet failing to see that funding needs allocated to jump start and "Reinvest" in mom and pop Main Street stores in Massachusetts and small towns across America, the choice became clear to me today: We need a watch dog and true custodian of the public trust, and thats why I've decided MARTHA COAKLEY is the candidate to vote for on December 8th.