Three of us jumped in the car at 6:30 this morning to get out to Worcester in time to participate as delegates to the Massachusetts democratic Party Convention. It was a mostly an uneventful day as the convention lacked any real drama. Just about everything that was expected to come to pass did so.
There had been speculation that the 15% rule might affect Chris Gabrieli or Thomas Reilly in terms of keeping them off the September primary ballot however that did not come to pass as Reilly got the 15 % easily and although it was a close call for Gabrieli he to managed to cross the threshold by a mere 38 votes.
The results were the same for the other two contested races as the three candidates for Lieutenant Governor, Deb Goldberg, Andrea Silbert and Tim Murray all qualified as did William Galvin and John Boniface in the Secretary of State race.
I had been elected as part of a Deval Patrick slate in the caucuses, however as the day grew nearer I had planned to switch allegiances and vote for Gabrieli to help insure that he would get on the ballot. I completely changed my mind after hearing the convention speeches of all three candidates. It wasn't so much that Reilly or Gabrieli was bad on the podium as much as it was that Deval Patrick was head and shoulders above all the speechmakers in his content as well as how he was received by the delegates. Patrick can move people with words.
My thinking up to this point was that Deval Patrick was mostly a convention aberration. This meaning that he would be popular amongst the largely far left leaning convention delegates but in the party primary would not have enough go power with the moderates to defeat the odds on favorite, Thomas Reilly nor could he defeat Kerry Healey in the general election.
Nothing could be further from the truth. Deval Patrick is the real thing. He has genuine charisma, an unshakable optimism, and a record of achievement that he can present to the Massachusetts voter.
The convention had already been won by Patrick by virtue of the caucus results so that the sign holding and cheering was preprogrammed. Having already agreed in advance to sell him out I was not one of the starry eyed delegates there for the purpose of cheering him on. Never the less I found myself caught up in his enthusiasm as well as his message and was thoroughly impressed with what he had achieved at the grass roots level with his organization. So when ballot time came around I felt as though I owed Patrick my allegiance and did in fact cast my vote for him.
By virtue of the presentations in the Lieutenant Governors race I would say it is going to be a tight one between Tim Murray and Andrea Silbert. I voted for Murray on the basis of his experience as the mayor of Worcester however Silbert has very impressive credentials out side of government.
The big question mark of course is money. Can Patrick off set the huge difference in resources between himself and both Reilly and Gabrieli?
If I were a betting man (which I used to be) I would say that the primary may result in a Democratic ticket of Patrick and Murray. The demographics would be very good with the Worcester based Murray and the energy and enthusiasm generated by each campaigns workers might be enough to put a Democrat back in the corner office after a 16 year hiatus.
