Former Lesbian Mayor to Run for MA State Senate

The first openly lesbian African-American mayor in the country has declared her candidacy in the MASS state senate race, reports the Advocate. The former mayor of Cambridge, Mass., E. Denise Simmons, was appointed by her colleagues on the Cambridge city council to serve as mayor for the 2008-2009 term. She is currently serving her fifth term on the council. Simmons, sworn in during 2008, was outed by a local newspaper early in her career.

She will run for the seat of Sen. Anthony D. Galluccio who was sentenced to a year in jail after being convicted of hit and run.

More at: Lez Get Real!

Blaming Homophobia on Higher Powers

The Republican who took the long-standing Democratic seat previously held by Ted Kennedy in Massachusetts was ask point-blank his thoughts on repealing Don’t Ask Don’t Tell.

The guy obviously is a smooth politician. He refuses to come out and say he supports the ban on gays serving openly in the military, even though his scorecard from the anti-gay Massachusetts Family Institute says otherwise.

As unsurprised as I am by a Republican not supporting LGBT rights and equality, the thing that worries me most about this type of non-commitment to an issue, is that as so many times, using the the “religious right” as an example, those who take a stand against LGBT equality, don’t do it directly, but rather they tend to blame their homophobia and/or bigotry on a higher power, or in the case of the religious right, God. Anti-gay people tend to blame their dislike of LGBT’s on things outside of their own character.  They don’t want to label themselves as a “bigot” so they rely on outside influences to pardon their intolerance.  In this case, Brown appears to be saving his “reason” to support maintaining the ban on the higher power of military leaders.

In his interview with Walters, he states he’s going to leave the decision of “Don’t Ask Don’t Tell” up to leaders in the field…almost as though he has a blatant disregard for the fact he serves as a Lt. Colonel in the U.S. Army National Guard.

My direct impression is Scott Brown, simply put, is a coward, not wanting to admit his stance against LGBT equality and looking for a “reason” to display his homophobia. There’s not a lot of gray area here, either you believe LGBT deserve the right to serve openly in the military or you don’t. Waiting for others to exhale your intolerance shows a lack of character and integrity. My direct impression is that Scott Brown is no different from any other anti-gay Republican politician, seeking others to blame his homophobia on. I think it’s time for Scott Brown to “man-up” and come on out of the anti-gay closet. He needs to go on record as another Republican who hates the gays. He may become a little more respectable if he’s honest.

Why Martha Coakley Lost To Scott Brown

Contributed by Lyndon Evans:

Wednesday afternoon I decided to take a look and analyze the numbers to see just where Coakley lost the Senate race in Massachusetts to Brown. What I found was surprising and came to a conclusion which Wednesday evening some of the talking heads were discussing. Using a variety of sources, the most importance of which is this interactive map of MA at the Boston Globe. Here’s what I found.

On November 24, 2009, Rasmussen Reports showed Coakley with a 15 point lead over Brown. It was after that in December that Coakley took her now infamous vacation and when Brown started his traveling in the truck campaign getting out and meeting and greeting the good folks in MA. What any good professional politician would do. I’ll leave you folks to make the comparison of good versus poor politician of Brown vs Coakley. I really don’t think I need to state the obvious.

By January 12 the percentages had changed in nightmare proportions for Coakley who then led Brown by the slim lead of 49% to 47%, again as Rasmussen Reports indicated. What was brewing for the Republicans was a perfect storm. A lackluster campaign and as I wrote in Wednesday’s commentary, the entitlement of winning Senator Ted Kennedy’s seat by Coakley.

The western part of MA went for Coakley until you start getting over to Otis. From there east to the greater Boston area the state goes to Brown. Here and there are the odd pocket of a town or two not falling in line with their counterparts for either Coakley or Brown.

But what I found most striking is the “Kennedy Kingdom” of Cape Cod.

Martha’s Vineyard went for Coakley. Chilmark 71% to 27%, West Tisbury 74% to 25% and Edgartown 56% to 43%. Nantucket also went to Coakley albeit with a tighter margin of 51% to 48%.

Now to the Cape itself where Provincetown handily gave the election to Coakley 84% to 15%, Truro 63% to 37%, Wellfleet 63% to 35% and Eastham 51% to 48%.

After that is where the Kingdom falls.

The rest of Cape Cod went to Brown. Even the “hometown” of the Kennedy’s, Barnstable went 61% for Brown and only 38% for Coakley.

To be honest when I first saw the map and started looking at the numbers for each town I sat in disbelief. The majority of the Kingdom of The Kennedys had voted Republican.

According to WHDH-TV in Boston there were 4 million registered voters in Massachusetts for Tuesday’s election.

Just over 2.2 million voted or 54%. In the 2008 election in which President Obama won, voter turnout in the Bay State was 66%. In this election 1,168,107 or 52% voted for Brown, 1,058,682 or 47% voted for Coakley and 22,237 or 1% voted for Independent candidate Joseph L. Kennedy who you know is no relation to the Kennedy’s.

The Boston Globe put up an interesting series of graphs which show the following.

Towns with more Republicans saw higher turnout. Towns with more Democrats saw lower turnout.

Towns with more Independents voted for Brown while towns with less Independents voted for Coakley.

So there are the numbers. The pundits on the Republican side claim victory by everything from folks already tired of big government and spending (guess they already forgot about Bush) to the honeymoon is over and we are taking back what was ours, to the weather, which really didn’t play a factor.

Brown won doing what politicians should do and Coakley loss by running a textbook example of how not to run a political campaign. And the Democrats who didn’t bother to vote are also to blame.

And there boys and girls you have The Perfect Storm. Good and bad politics and voter apathy.

Think about that the next time you say to yourself “why should I bother to vote ?”

Crossposted at: Focus On The Rainbow!

Sitting Out an Election is NOT an Option!

I read the post from Paula Brooks of Lez Get Real urging GLBT people in Massachusetts to sit out today’s US Senate special election, between Martha Coakley and Scott Brown and I have a few things to say about that.

Are you fracking crazy? It is never a smart play for a minority group to sit out an election.

I don’t care how mad or upset you get with the party hierarchy, or couch your displeasure with ‘tough love’ rhetoric, you’re not ‘punishing them’ by sitting out the election, you’re punishing yourselves.

I have to chuckle and shake my head in sadness at the fact that once again, white fauxgressive GLBT people wallowing in vanilla flavored privilege are falling for the okey-doke from Republifools like Brown and acting against their own economic and political interests because they’re ‘mad’ at President Obama and the Democratic Party.

Yeah, right. You white gays are pissed off because the Prez hasn’t done what you wanted him to do in one year on the job and supports civil unions but not marriage.

More at: TransGriot!

Martha Coakley’s Big Entitlement Failure

Contributed by Lyndon Evans:

Rachel Maddow was saying the Associated Press had called the Senate election in Massachusetts for Brown as the winner.

The unthinkable and horror to many, mostly outside the Bay State and within the boundaries of DC, had happened, much beloved Senator Ted Kennedy’s seat had gone to, hand out the aspirin and the Pepto, a Republican.

I’ll let other journalists, talking heads and pundits on both sides go through the numbers and dissection of what happened and the multitude of reasons why, I’m just going to focus on one theme. Entitlement.

Long before there was the term political junkie and having covered politics locally here in Danbury, CT, I have often watched elections in different parts of the US, local, state and national of course and often shook my head at what I saw long before the ballots were cast.

The only difference between Chris Matthews and myself is, a) he has a show on MSNBC and b) he speaks more eloquently on politics, whereas I speak like anyone down at the neighborhood diner.

So here’s the blue plate special.

What the Hell was this woman thinking !?!

Going on a Caribbean vacation when the biggest slice of pie in her political career was up for grabs. Not getting out and shaking hands, kissing babies, taking rides on fire trucks and doing everything up to and including helping Santa Claus deliver presents on Christmas Eve.

I was struck by one interview on one of the networks with a longtime Kennedy voter and faithful Democrat who said, to paraphrase, “I can’t stand her. She has not gone out to meet the people and feels she will win just because she’s a Democrat”. The man by the way said he would vote for Brown, a Republican.

My God, Ted must be spinning in his grave and Cloakley better start checking her closet each night and under the bed for the Ghost of Ted. I bet she’ll get a visit every Christmas Eve from now on as Ted takes her through the Christmas’ of Politics past, present, future and what should have been.

Yes I’ve seen some, well I can’t say it here so I’ll clean it up, head up the boo-de-ay campaigns and races, but this one certainly is at the top of the “WTF Did I Do” heap.

Some will say, and with legitimate argument, that the Obama honeymoon is over, or that folks are afraid of what the proposed health care package for the Nation is going to cost and by adding one more Republican to the Senate will help to keep the Democrats under control with their spending. They can say that and even more.

No boys and girls here’s why Cloakley lost. Because she was entitled to win.

When you run a campaign with the mindset that you are a shoe-in, and don’t take the normal effort of a good politician and get out among the people, show who you are and what you stand for and against, you are destined to fail. How many times have we seen that happen in baseball at the World Series or in football at the Super Bowl.

You as a politician are entitled to nothing, you earn your constituents votes. You are not handed a blank check with a signature. You don’t automatically get the keys to the Emerald City. As they use to say in the old Smith-Barney commercials, “You Earn It”.

I just hope Attorney General Richard Blumenthal here in Connecticut who will be running for retiring Senator Chris Dodd’s seat has been taking lots of notes on how not to run a campaign of entitlement.

If politicians were entitled to their positions, we would be living in a Monarchy …. or worse.

More from Lyndon Evans at: Focus On The Rainbow!

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