Deval Patrick does not remember Willie Horton. Deval Patrick does not remember the swiftboating of John Kerry. Deval Patrick does not remember that Bill Clinton, his former boss, had a group in his campaign called The Defense Department whose job it was to hit back the minute the opposition struck.
For those of you who don't know, Deval Patrick is a democrat running against Republican Kerry Healey for governor of Massachusetts. Healey has been playing an ad that says that Patrick tried to get a reduced sentence for a convicted cop killer who had been sentenced to death. And that is ad running constantly and it's working.
Go to Deval's website
http://www.devalpatrick.com/... and there is no rebuttal at all. None on TV. None anywhere. Only Ted Kennedy got upset and that was on Sunday. Apparently Deval's advisers are also suffering from amnesia. They had this to say in the Globe.
http://www.boston.com/...
Patrick's advisers, who would not speak for attribution because they do not publicly discuss strategy, said polling data from the weekend showed that Healey's attack ads have backfired by hurting her own standing among voters more than Patrick's.
Give me a break. That's not what the Healey camp is saying. And I believe the Healey camp is right.
At the Healey campaign, one strategist said the campaign is convinced that she has caused considerable damage to Patrick's standing among voters with her critical ad campaign and that the race has tightened. The strategist indicated Healey has cut Patrick's lead roughly in half, while reducing her unfavorable rating and raising his.
Last night my daughter who is 16 watched the ad and said, "Mom, Deval Patrick let a cop killer out of jail! That's terrible."
Of course it's terrible; terrible that Kerry Healey is getting away with this bullshit!
Here's the ad Patrick SHOULD run. I call it 1984.
It's night. Sirens are flashing. Suddenly, we see jail doors being slammed in front of us. Cut to reaction shots of worried family members. Creepy music.
NARRATOR:
Republicans have taken away our right to habeus corpus.
Today, you can be arrested and put in jail without being charged with a crime.
You can be kept in prison for as long as the government decides.
Cut to Deval speaking passionately to a group of people, plenty of reaction shots.
DEVAL
I believe in our court system. I'm not ashamed of that. I believe that anyone who is charged with a crime has the right to a lawyer; I believe in the appeals process; I believe in the Bill of Rights. I believe in the right to privacy and a free, democratic society. I don't want Big Brother being able to take away a member of my family in the middle of the night. I don't want Big Brother tracking my phone calls. I don't want to live in 1984.
Silhoutted images of creepy guys looking at phone records.
NARRATOR comes back with the creepy music:
Republicans are destroying our personal freedoms; they are taking away our right to trial and our right to privacy. Don't let them get away with it. Vote for Deval Patrick.