Gomez, a 47 year-old businessman from Cohasset, is the latest entrant to have the unmitigated gall to challenge one-party domination of the Massachusetts congressional delegation. He’s running against Ed Markey, a 37-year congressman and, according to his TV ads, inventor of the smart phone.

Gabriel Gomez has amassed significant wealth as a successful capitalist, which is apparently a bad thing in Massachusetts, at least if the successful businessman is a Republican. Being a member of the one percent wasn’t seen as a problem for Sen. Elizabeth Warren or for former senator John Kerry. What do you suppose the difference was?

Unlike Scott Brown, Gomez never posed for Cosmopolitan, so his enemies have had to work harder to find ways to dust him up. One of the angles they’ve been pushing is the $281,500 historic preservation tax deduction Gomez took on his Cohasset home in 2005. They claim he wasn’t entitled to take it and have labeled it a “scam.”

As scandals go, a legal “historic preservation tax deduction” doesn’t exactly roll off the tongue. Besides, if anybody really cared, Gomez’s opponents – the same folks who were silent in 2010 when John Kerry tried to avoid $500,000 in Massachusetts taxes on his yacht – wouldn’t have to push it quite so hard.

The tax deduction is just one of the ways that his opponents have tried to paint Gomez as a stereotypically selfish, cold-hearted Republican. In fact, Gomez is so mean-spirited that he married a former Peace Corps volunteer whom he met when she was working at a school for special needs children in the West Indies.

Much has been made of Gomez as a former Navy SEAL. But seldom mentioned is Ed Markey’s military service. Markey served in the United States Army Reserve from 1968 to 1973. Remember when George W. Bush was running for president and some of the same people now enthusiastically supporting Markey called Bush a draft dodger for serving in the Air National Guard from 1968 to 1974? I’ll go out on a limb and say the different treatment isn’t related to the branches they served in.

Despite his opponents’ efforts to paint him as a right-winger, Gomez, like Scott Brown before him, isn’t any reasonable person’s idea of an ultraconservative. Even some purist Republicans are turning up their noses at Gomez as just another RINO and threatening to stay home on June 25.

Now that’s a strategy even a Democrat could get behind.

[This column originally appeared in the May 16, 2013 Wakefield Daily Item.]

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One of us was going to have to pull into the tall grass along the side to let the other pass. Having no idea if I was on private property, I wondered if this could be the land owner who might not appreciate my presence.

As the truck approached, I could make a white-haired older man in the passenger seat and a younger man driving. When the elder man rolled down his window, I hastened to explain that I was an American from Boston and that my mother was a Blaney. My grandfather, John Blaney, had grown up in Portglenone before leaving for Boston in 1900. I added that the owner of the village butcher shop had sent me here, telling me that all of the Blaneys once lived at the end of this lane.

“Aye,” the man in the truck said, “They did.”

I told him that all I wanted to do was to see and perhaps take a photo of the land where my grandfather had lived so long ago.

“Well, you can’t go up there,” the man replied. “Not now. You’ll be stuck in the mud for a week. Phone me on Sunday afternoon and I’ll take you there in the truck.”

I wrote down his phone number as he recited it through the rain drops.

“Who shall I ask for when I call?” I asked.

“Patrick Blaney,” he said.

It was only Wednesday, so I headed back to my room at the Beechfield Guest House, the bed & breakfast establishment in Ballymena where I had registered that morning. I went out to dinner, then returned to my room and stretched out top of on the bed, excited about the prospect that in a few days I’d be laying eyes on the land where my grandfather had lived his youth.

I had never known John Blaney, who died two years before I was born. I knew that he had grown up poor and Catholic in Northern Ireland. After his father, Henry Blaney died in 1899, Henry’s widow, Alice O’Neill Blaney sold the farm and headed for America with her two youngest sons, 18 year-old John and his younger brother William. Several of John’s older siblings had years earlier departed for Boston, eager for a better life than what faced them as poor Catholic farmers in a Protestant country.

Years after arriving in Boston, John Blaney married Rose O’Hara, also a Catholic from Northern Ireland. The couple had five children, including my mother, Rita. While I hadn’t known my grandfather, I did know my grandmother, who came to live with our family in Wakefield in her last years.

Lying on the bed at the Beechfield Guest House on Wednesday evening, I wondered how I would fill the time until Sunday when I was supposed to contact Patrick Blaney. I had arrived in Ireland about a week earlier for a three week vacation with no itinerary and no lodging reservations. My plan was to tour the country by car, booking rooms each night along the way. My one specific goal was, at some point on the trip, to visit Northern Ireland and the area where my grandparents had come from.

At about 9:30 p.m. there was a knock on my door. It was the owner of the guest house.

“Are you Mark?” she asked. “There’s a friend of yours downstairs.”

I told her it must be a mistake. No one in the world knew where I was staying.

“Well, she says she’s a friend of yours,” the owner said.

I told her I’d go right down.

When I reached the bottom of the staircase, there was a fair-skinned woman in her twenties with long auburn hair.

“Are you Mark?” she asked. “I’m Claire Blaney. I believe you were talking to my daddy down on the lane today.”

I tried to process what was happening. “How on earth did you find me?” I asked.

“There aren’t that many guest houses in Ballymena,” Claire explained. “We went to each one and asked if they had an American guest named Mark.” She said that her brother Pat, who had been the driver of the truck on the lane, had also remembered the make of my rental car and a partial license plate number, which helped them in their search.

“Would you like to meet the others?” Claire asked. “They’re out in the car.” I went out to the car and met Claire’s brother Pat and sister Una. They explained that when their father came home that day and reported the he had met “a Blaney from Boston” earlier that day, they were appalled that he hadn’t brought me home right then and there. So they decided to track me down. Now they wanted me to come back with them to the house in nearby Ahoghill for tea and to meet the rest of the family.

When we arrived at the house we sat and talked with Patrick, the man from the lane, his wife Trea and their grown children Pat, Colm, Una, Dympna and Claire. It turned out that Patrick, a cattle dealer, owned the land at the end of the lane and used it as pasture for his cows. To my amazement, the family knew the names of all of my grandfather’s siblings who had left for Boston a century earlier.

They insisted that I stay at their house for the remainder of my time in Ireland. The next day, I checked out of the Beechfield Guest House and drove back the Blaney’s home, where I stayed for the next week.

Members of the family took time off from work to show me the sights, like the Giant’s Causeway and the Glens of Antrim. We went to hear traditional Irish music at a pub at which, I was assured, they poured “the finest Guinness in all of Ireland.”

On Sunday, they took me back to lane where I had first met Patrick, and they pointed out the hill where my great-grandfather’s house had stood in 1882 when my grandfather was born.

Located in the basement of an old school building, Acme Theatre just may be the perfect venue to recreate Don Dubrow’s basement-level junk shop where all the action of American Buffalo takes place. The euphemistically named “Don’s Resale” is an organized clutter of reclaimed items. Lamps, stereos, trophies, bird cages, hats, typewriters, globes and discards of every description cram the shelves of three walls. Parked in one corner is a supermarket shopping cart overflowing with footwear. In the center of the stage is a glass case that holds jewelry, coins and other such valuables.

Sitting at a stage left card table in the opening scene, shop owner Don (played by James Barton) is gently but firmly berating young Bobby (Jordan DiGloria), who apologizes for messing up a job he has been assigned to do by Don. Soon Walter “Teach” Cole (Bill Stambaugh) bursts in and catches some of Don and Bobby’s conversation in between his own angry ranting about some perceived slight that just occurred at a nearby coffee shop. After Don sends Bobby out on an errand, Teach pressures Don into telling him what’s going on between him and Bobby.

Don tells Teach about a guy who came into the store a week earlier and spotted an old buffalo nickel in the case. The customer asks Don how much he wants for the nickel. Don realizes he has no idea what it’s worth so he plays it cagey. “You tell me,” he responds. When the customer offers $50 for the coin, Don concludes it must be worth even more and demands $95, before selling it for $90. A few days later, the customer returns and leaves his card in case Don comes across any other “articles of interest.” Don now thinks he’s been had, concluding that the nickel must have been worth many times what he sold it for. So he has had Bobby stake out the customer’s house in preparation for a break-in in to steal the coin back.

When Teach hears this, he suggests that the target may have lots more worth stealing. He not only wants in on the action, he tries to convince Don to cut Bobby out of the job, saying he’s too unreliable. (Bobby may have a drug problem. He’s always asking Don for money for unspecified purposes.) Don, who feels a paternalistic responsibility toward Bobby, is reluctant to cut him out.

American Buffalo is a about dishonor among thieves. All three characters view themselves as businessmen of a sort, and their ambition is exceeded only by their amorality. Between Don and Teach, Don is the more even-keeled, and he actually does run a business. He rationalizes plans to steal the coin back by convincing himself that he’s been ripped off. Teach is a like aggressive salesman with anger issues and an inflated sense of his own smarts and abilities. Bobby is just a kid trying to get his own needs met any way he can.

Ultimately, American Buffalo a study in loyalty, ambition and trust in a world where nothing is on the level and every interaction is a deal.

Bill Stambaugh has appeared in many productions directed by Willis and may have been born to play Teach Cole. He has the kind of stage presence and the facial expressiveness needed to fill out Teach’s tightly-wound, borderline psychotic character.

As Donny, Barton skillfully plays a man so beaten down by life that he’s willing to do almost anything to get ahead, while still clinging to a threadbare remnant of human decency.

Impressive newcomer Jordan DiGloria more than holds his own with the two more experienced actors. His Bobby is a likeable if naïve kid who finds himself in the crossfire between adults who are hardly role models.

Award winning director Nancy Curran Willis has once again mounted a community theater production that rivals most professional productions. Her casting, as usual, is pitch perfect. I will have a hard time imagining anyone else in the characters of Don, Teach and Bobby.

Whether you’re near Maynard or have to drive a ways as I did, don’t miss Acme Theater’s production of American Buffalo.

American Buffalo runs through March 23 at Acme Theater, 61 Summer Street, Maynard MA. Performances Fridays & Saturdays at 8 pm, and Sunday 3/17 at 3 pm. For tickets, phone the box office at 978-823-0003.

In a talk on Feb. 20, 2013 to a large crowd in the Heritage Room at the Americal Civic Center, local historian John Wall helped to flesh out the portrait of the 19th century business tycoon.

“There was not much that he didn’t have his fingers in,” Wall said. People associate Cyrus Wakefield with rattan furniture manufacturing. And while dealing in rattan supply and distribution was a key element of Wakefield’s success, Wall explained, it was only one of many businesses in which he prospered. In fact, according to Wall, it was only in the last few years of Wakefield’s life that his company on Water Street began actually manufacturing furniture.

Wall said that what little is known about Cyrus’s childhood comes from Lilley Eaton’s biography of Wakefield. But Wall cautioned that at least with respect to Wakefield’s early years, Eaton’s sketch amounts to hagiography written in the self-aggrandizing rags-to-riches style of the day.

Born in 1811 on a farm in Roxbury, New Hampshire, Wakefield desired to strike out on his own at an early age. In an effort instill in him an appreciation of home life, Wall said, Wakefield’s family arranged a series of jobs for young Cyrus in and around the village, including one in a shop cleaning cotton and another milking cows for a Calvinist minister.

None of these jobs ever lasted more than a few days, according to Wall, and Cyrus’s family finally acquiesced to his determination to escape home and sent him to work as a clerk for a grocer in Boston. The grocer, Wall said, encouraged Wakefield’s entrepreneurial spirit and soon the young man was supplementing his income by buying and selling discarded boxes and packaging from the city’s docks.

Eventually, Wakefield’s scavenging led him to gathering the reedy material used on ships as dunnage – packing material to protect a ship’s cargo from damage due to shifting during transport. This flexible weedy material was harvested in the Far East and stuffed into empty spaces on cargo ships bound for Boston and other western ports. The weeds were known as “rattan” and Wakefield began selling the material he picked from the docks to chair makers who wove the material into chair seats.

Soon Wakefield moved up the pecking order and became a “jobber,” someone who took the material scavenged by others to resell it, Wall explained. Wakefield now had a little money to invest. But things really took off for Wakefield, according to Wall, in the 1840’s after he married Eliza Bancroft, the daughter of wealthy sea captain and shipping magnate Henry Bancroft.

With his in-laws’ business contacts in China, a principal source of rattan, Wakefield was able to expand his business. According to Wall, Wakefield modeled himself after the successful tycoons of the day, like Andrew Carnegie and Cornelius Vanderbilt, by attempting to corner markets and build monopolies.

Before long, Wakefield began doing business in other commodities in addition to rattan, like spices, coffee and tea, Wall said. He also began buying and selling real estate.

Cyrus Wakefield moved his rattan business to South Reading in 1851, Wall said, on the present site of Shaw’s Supermarket. He moved here with his wife in 1855, building a home on the spot currently occupied by the new CVS store. He began buying land and property in Wakefield, Wall added, at one point owning much of the downtown area as well as real estate along Water Street. By about 1864, he had built his new mansion after draining the swampy site where the Galvin Middle School now sits.

Cyrus Wakefield, Wall explained, “bought everything he could and sold it for a profit.” The railroad first came through the town of South Reading in the 1840s and by 1855 Cyrus sat on the board of the Boston & Maine Railroad and was its largest stock holder.

“By the early 1860’s Wakefield had made a killing in the rattan market,” Wall said. He made and sold the core material that was used in everything from furniture to mats to hoop skirts.

By the end of 1865, he had been working in many charitable ways to benefit the town,” Wall noted, culminating with his giving the town $30,000 for a new town hall. Within days of that donation, according to Wall, the town of South Reading renamed itself “Wakefield.” Cyrus was so moved by the gesture, Wall said, that he gave another $90,000, which allowed the town to build the elaborate grand old Town Hall that stood from 1868 to 1958 on the corner of Main and Water streets, on the current site of the municipal parking lot.

In his day, Wall pointed out, Cyrus Wakefield was the principal real estate developer in town, was one of the incorporators of The Wakefield Savings Bank, served as a director of the Citizens’ Gas & Light Company, organized the Quannapowitt Water Company, was a member of the school board and organized local lectures of a scientific nature, Wall said.

On top of all that, Wall added, his Boston warehouses brought in all sorts of commodities from around the world.

“What it came down to,” Wall said, “was that he put the coffee on your table, he gave you clean water to make the coffee, he gave you gas and light to warm your house and brighten rooms in the winter time, he provided ice to keep things cool in the summer time and he provided numerous scholarships to the students of Wakefield.”

Someone in the audience asked Wall if, in addition to being a successful businessman, Cyrus Wakefield was liked as a person.

“He was liked by his employees and treated them fairly,” Wall said, adding that Wakefield provided homes for his senior staff, and provided jobs for many immigrant workers. Wall said that he could find no criticism in any written work of Cyrus Wakefield as a manager or as a person.

Last night’s talk was one of a series of free lectures celebrating the 100th anniversary of the Americal Civic Center. The next lecture will be held on in the Heritage Room on Wednesday, March 20 when the speaker will be Barry M. Stentiford who has written a new history of the Richardson Light Guard.

[This story originally appeared in the Feb. 21, 2013 Wakefield Daily Item.]

For the benefit of those under 50, the Ed Sullivan Show was a TV staple. It was a variety show that families could watch together on Sunday nights. It was before the days when Sunday night football games featured half-time performers costumed as common night-walkers and winning quarterbacks dropping F-bombs on national TV. Back in 1964, four guys playing musical instruments in suits and ties with their hair combed over their foreheads was enough to stir controversy.

In 1964, boys in Wakefield Junior High School were sent to the principal’s office and given detention for wearing their hair Beatles style. Today, middle school girls go to class flashing more cleavage than Beyonce. Role models have consequences.

How the media world has changed since 1964. There were only three channels to choose from (four if you count WGBH Channel 2) on the old black and white TV, and you had to get up and walk to the TV to change the channel.

Now, we have hundreds of cable channels on our widescreen, high definition televisions. And we don’t even need a TV to watch television programs. We can watch them on our PCs, laptops, and phones.

Speaking of phones, a growing number of people no longer have land line phones, relying entirely on their mobile phones. Even though we have cell phones, some of us still can’t part with our home phones any more than we could part with our refrigerators or our stoves. A home without a land line phone just wouldn’t feel right.

Area codes and exchanges once told you something about the location of the phone’s owner. Now they are random and meaningless. Still, when I finally got a cell phone I remember being relieved that I was assigned a “617” area code because it felt like a “real” telephone number and harkened back to the days before interlopers like “978” and “781” crashed onto the scene.

We can no longer have shared cultural events like the Beatles’ first appearance on American TV because before such a phenomenon as the Beatles ever got to a national TV network, their videos would have been shared on YouTube and Facebook, tweeted and retweeted on Twitter, and watched by millions of people separately and at different times on their computers and smart phones.

But hey, the world changes and we all change with it. We no longer get milk and bread delivered to our homes by Spear Dairy and Cushman’s Bakery. Dogs no longer run free and we don’t burn our rubbish in back yard incinerators anymore.

And I guess a cell phone with a “CRystal 9” exchange is completely out of the question.

[This column originally appeared in the Feb. 8, 2013 Wakefield Daily Item.]

Photo of Beatles record cover by Pineapples101.

Painting of dog “Jack” by Bob Sardella.

I’m taking a different approach. Since nothing good happened in 2012, I’m off the hook for a “Best” list. And a “Worst” list would be a depressing way to start the New Year.

I’ve decided to take a more proactive approach and create a few lists that will, for me at least, assure that 2013 is a better year than 2012. In the spirit of creeping nanny-statism, I’m going to start by banning things.

Since I work in the world of words, I’ve decided to declare a “War on Words,” or at least words that I deem to be of no further use.

Without delay, I present the List of Words and Terms Banned in 2013: “fiscal,” “cliff,” “millionaires and billionaires,” “hammered,” “middle class” and “level playing field.”

I further declare a ban on the use of “literally,” “virtually,” “totally” and “seriously?”

I am also efforting to prioritize a ban on the words “efforting” and “prioritize.”

“Bodega” “bodacious” and “bromance” are hereby barred. And “bistro” makes four.

Had enough yet? I’m just getting warmed up. I decree that the following words and terms may not be spoken or written in 2013: “trending,” “polling,” “branding,” “outlier,” “margin of error” and “expert opinion.”

And for good measure, throw out “tipping point, “PowerPoint” and “point being.”

And I won’t abide any word bearing the prefix “Franken-” or the suffix “–mageddon.” Examples: “Frankenstorm” and “snowmageddon.”

Am I finished? Not even close. “Shared sacrifice,” “fair share,” “proportionality” and any word paired with “comprehensive” are hereby proscribed.

As are anything “green” “smart” “alternative” or “renewable.”

I will also ban “military style,” “Gangnam Style” and “style points.”

“Thanks in advance,” “don’t ask,” “must-have,” “oh snap” and “quality time” are hereafter off limits.

“Man up,” “marry up” and “uptick” are forbidden in 2013.

And spare me “awesome,” “stoked,” “psyched” and “sweet!”

I’m also opting out of locavore, “co-op” and “opt out.”

In addition, I’m barring “bipartisan,” “binders” and “big oil” from the lexicon.

And, last, but far from least, let me not hear the word “stakeholder” in 2013 – or ever.

That’s only the beginning. There are over a million words in the English language, and it’s estimated that a new word is added every 98 minutes. This pace is unsustainable. We must start cutting if we are to avoid the Verbal Cliff.

Besides, you all talk way too much anyway.

[This column originally appeared in the January 3, 2013 Wakefield Daily Item.]

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I won’t talk about any “War on Christmas,” which is probably about as worthy of serious consideration as the “War on Women” attributed to Republicans in the last election. (Still, I have little doubt that those who most vociferously deny the existence of a War on Christmas would rejoice in the holiday’s demise.)

Every year, it seems, some school cancels a Christmas concert, some official refers to a “Holiday tree” or we’re treated to some similar idiotic gesture guaranteed to fuel the War on Christmas fears.

Even the term “Happy Holidays” is seen as a manifestation of anti-Christmas sentiment. I don’t think it began that way. I always saw it as a way to group the celebrations of Hanukkah, Christmas and New Year’s.

Still, there’s no doubt that some folks utter “Happy Holidays” not as an inclusive greeting but as a way to deny any recognition to Christianity as the dominant faith of Western culture, which is of course the root of all oppression.

Who really objects to the greeting “Merry Christmas?” Generally, it isn’t members of non-Christian religions. Many Jews send out Christmas cards as well as Hanukkah greetings and enjoy the secular manifestations of Christmas as the national holiday that it is.

No, to the extent that there’s any war on Christmas, it isn’t coming from religious people. It’s coming from unhinged secularists who see Christmas as intertwined with a modern Western civilization built on imperialism and exploitation, from the Crusades to Christopher Columbus to George W. Bush.

In other words, it’s a tiny minority of cranks hardly worth getting worked up about – similar to the Occupy movement.

That’s not to say that our increasingly secular culture isn’t worrisome. It has brought with it a moral foundation that is shaky where it exists at all. In a culture of ethical relativism, where all “values” are accorded equal moral worth, that which is unspeakably and unfathomably heinous can take root and grow. Such instances have emerged in the last two weeks, including right here in Wakefield.

Sure, there have always been and always will be disturbed individuals in our midst. But when a society decides that value judgments are the same as intolerance, it cripples its own ability and willingness to react in some cases until it’s too late. And when that message is re-enforced in a 24-hour a day media culture of TV, radio, movies, our computers and even our phones, it’s bound to embolden those whose innate moral compasses are already pointing them in the wrong direction.

What’s happening with marijuana is another example. No one is saying that it should be treated the same as heroin or cocaine. But pot use became rampant among baby boomers who believed that it was merely harmless. Now, we’ve just told kids in Massachusetts that marijuana is medicine. Talk about crippling our own ability to intervene.

Those who argue that heroin, cocaine and even alcohol all have a history of medical use are making my point about moral equivalency. You can’t judge one thing because other things were misjudged before it? Because one harmful intoxicant is legal, we have to allow another?

Whether you celebrate Christmas as a sacred religious observance, as a national holiday or both, it remains a reminder of the traditional values that have held society together, even as we watch them slip slowly, incrementally away.

In the meantime, Season’s Greetings, Happy Holidays, Merry Christmas and Happy New Year.

[This column originally appeared in the Wakefield Daily Item.]

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“Reason’s Greetings” photo by Mark Nockelby.
Marijuana photo by Tomas de Aquino.

Cuisinart is survived by one cousin, Mr. Coffee, and many No. 2 filters. Funeral services will be private. Interment will be at a land-fill to be determined. Memorial gift cards may be purchased at Dunkin Donuts.

Tuesday’s election was a victory for those who believe in diversity in all things except ideas. The same people who whine incessantly about the lack of moderate Republicans in office pulled out all the stops to make sure that two moderate Republicans would not represent Massachusetts in Congress. In fact, they made sure that no Republicans will be representing Massachusetts in Congress.

The ideological purification of the Massachusetts Congressional Delegation is once again complete. No Republicans need apply, no matter how moderate or bipartisan. It must be a great relief to know that things are now back to normal.

Meanwhile, some Massachusetts moderates are starting to reconsider their “No” votes on physician assisted suicide and medical marijuana.

Let’s review some of the other lessons learned on Tuesday.

• Having family ties to a criminal enterprise: no problem. Having an “R” next to your name: unforgivable.
• Being pro-choice and openly gay is only to be celebrated if you’re a Democrat. If you’re Republican, it makes you a Tea Partier.
• Being rated the second most bipartisan member of the US Senate by several nonpartisan agencies makes you a right-winger.
• Spending the first half of your life defending female family members from abusive males makes you “anti-women.”

If you think moderate Republicans have it tough, it’s even worse for moderate Democrats in Massachusetts. Just ask Mary-Ellen Manning, the longtime moderate Democrat Governor’s Councilor with a reputation for being tough on both Republican and Democrat judicial appointments. She found herself redistricted into a district that included Lowell, that hotbed of moderate-conservative thinking. When she decided to run for State Senate in 2012, she never made it out of the Democratic primary. Manning has since changed her registration to “unenrolled.”

The opposition to Brown and Tisei argued that were not truly moderate. But like anything else in life, your perspective depends on where you’re standing. If you’re an uncompromising progressive, pretty much everybody fits your definition of a right-winger. But actual right-wingers do not view either Brown or Tisei as anything close to conservative.

Scott Brown reminds me of old-line Democrats like my father, who proudly voted for guys like Jack Kennedy. But like the Greatest Generation, those old-line Democrats are rapidly disappearing along with a party that once welcomed a broad range of viewpoints. I can say with confidence that my father would not recognize the Democratic Party of Elizabeth Warren and John Tierney.

In the irony of ironies, pundits are now saying that the lesson of the election is that Republicans must learn to be more bipartisan. How’d that work out for Brown and Tisei?

It will be interesting to see what happens now. As a member of the “hammered” middle class, I’ll be eager to watch my fortunes soar under the candidates elected on Tuesday. I’ll be watching to see what happens to those unemployment figures and the national debt as the “millionaires and billionaires” pay their “fair share.”

Tuesday was a victory for extreme partisanship and a defeat for ideological diversity. But for those who supported Richard Tisei there is some small consolation. The next time somebody calls you a right-winger you can remind them that you voted for the gay, pro-choice candidate for Congress.

Sorry there isn’t better news, but there isn’t.

Cheers.

[This column originally appeared in the October 9, 2012 Wakefield Daily Item.]

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Why should anyone have to justify supporting moderate, middle-of-the-road candidates? Aren’t we taught from a young age that moderation is preferable to extremes? And yet we now have voices on our TVs and radios trying to tell us that we should apologize for favoring these moderate candidates.

One of the principal arguments offered by those opposed to Brown and Tisei is that even if these two are themselves moderate, their election could throw control of the House and Senate to the Republicans.

I may be quaint and old-fashioned, but I tend to cling to lessons I was taught in my Wakefield High School social studies classes – that government works best when the two parties act as checks and balances on each other. Even if Tisei is elected and Brown re-elected, the Massachusetts Congressional delegation will still have an overwhelming 10-2 Democrat to Republican composition.

And yet some of the same people who at other times decry the partisan gridlock in Washington are now working overtime to send two more extreme partisans into the fray. To me it’s simple logic. The way to promote moderation is to elect moderates.

Of course, there are those who will say that Tisei and Brown are not truly moderate, citing “studies” that prove it. But when you look closely, these studies are often done by partisan publications or organizations with a bias. I prefer to go with the study done by the nonpartisan Congressional Quarterly. In Brown’s case, for example, CQ found that he was the second most bipartisan senator – a rating that Brown himself has cited often on the campaign trail.

Brown’s opponents claim that he only became bipartisan after Elizabeth Warren entered the race. But the CQ study covered the year 2011. Warren didn’t declare her candidacy until September of that year and was not chosen as the Democratic nominee until June of 2012.

Two weekends ago, I covered a rally in Melrose, Massachusetts for Scott Brown and Richard Tisei at which Sen. John McCain spoke. I arrived early and found a huge number of Brown and Tisei sign-holders lining Main Street in front of the Soldiers & Sailors Memorial Hall.

I also noticed that there was an ever-growing contingent of Warren sign-holders gathering a half a block away and inching their way into the areas filled with Brown and Tisei supporters. Did the Warren supporters have a right to be there? Absolutely. But isn’t their habit of stalking Brown campaign events just a little unseemly if not a tad obnoxious? Don’t they have their own rallies to attend?

The Boston Globe’s recent endorsement of Republican Richard Tisei for Congress in the Sixth District race was unexpected and newsworthy.

But the Globe’s endorsement of Warren was no surprise and merely re-affirmed her as the candidate of the establishment, while Scott Brown can still lay claim to independent outsider status, fighting against business as usual.

It will all be over at 8 p.m. Tuesday night. Until then, the forces of extreme partisanship will be doing their best to convince us that voting for moderates like Scott Brown and Richard Tisei is something to be ashamed of.

I’m not buying it.

There’s no shame in going with the more independent candidates. There’s no shame in favoring bipartisan moderates over extreme partisans. And there’s no shame in voting for the hometown guys, Scott Brown and Richard Tisei.

[This column originally appeared in the November 1, 2012 Wakefield Daily Item.]

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