In what can most charitably be chalked up to the dangers of wading into territory outside of one’s zone of competence, The New Republic ‘s Marty Peretz has weighed in on the change of leadership in the Massachusetts House of Representatives with a line of analysis that is more than a tad wanting.
In a post titled “Democratic Lurch to the Right; Liberal New York, Liberal Massachusetts,” Peretz links the US Senate appointment of Kirsten Gillibrand in New York and the ascension of new Massachusetts House Speaker Robert DeLeo as curious moves to the right of in two of the country’s most liberal states. Leaving any critique of Peretz’s analysis of New York politics to the New Yorkers, his take on the recent Bay State moves gets just about everything wrong except the names of the principals.
Peretz first states that Gov. Deval Patrick “neither liked nor trusted” former House speaker Sal DiMasi. The truth is probably a good bit more complicated than that. Peretz goes on to say that liberalism in Massachusetts is defined by one’s stand on “gambling casinos, slot machines, seat belts.” And by that measure, he brands DiMasi a liberal. Peretz then says Patrick is Barack Obama’s closest ally in the state, and that by installing DeLeo as DiMasi’s successor, House members “were voting against Patrick and, without a doubt, against Obama, too.”
The only logical response to such mishegas: huh?
To begin with, it’s doubtful that a single Democratic state rep was thinking about Patrick or Obama when choosing the new speaker. If they were, how would DeLeo’s election represent a snub of the governor and president? DeLeo may be to DiMasi’s right on some issues, but in the speaker’s battle between him and House majority leader John Rogers, nearly every one of the voices of unvarnished liberalism in the House sided with DeLeo. The claim that liberalism in Massachusetts is defined by one’s stand on gambling also vastly oversimplifies the issue. Many liberals oppose expanded gambling, but so too does the Archdiocese of Boston, which is itself hard to pigeonhole, being liberal on spending for the poor but conservative on all of the “pelvic issues” (abortion, same-sex marriage, birth control, etc.).
Peretz doesn’t bother to actually characterize DeLeo’s positions on anything, so the entire premise of his claim of a Bay State turn to the right is unclear. If it has to do with gambling, as Peretz seems to be suggesting, in contrast to DiMasi, who killed a contentious casino bill last year, DeLeo is a strong supporter of expanded gambling. By Peretz’s yardstick, perhaps that means DeLeo is no liberal. But that would surely mean Patrick isn’t one, either, since it was his proposal for three huge casinos that DiMasi drove a stake through. And since the governor is the new president’s closest ally in Massachusetts, that presumably makes Obama part of this vast lean-to-the-right conspiracy, too.
