Let's Sign Manny! (not that one)

I was very pleased to see that Rochester NY Superintendent Manuel Rivera was recently nominated as New York State Superintendent of the Year and was one of four finalists for National Superintendent of the Year. Manny is a member of the Brandeis Class of 1974 that produced former District Attorney Ralph Martin, Playboy CEO Christie Hefner and a former Menino staffer with occasional progressive tendencies.

Anyway, Manny was a floormate of mine freshman year and the best crosscountry runner in New England that I can remember. He was even forgiving when my first article as sportswriter for the Brandeis Justice was edited in a way that listed the lowest finishers, but not the leaders (some of his teammates, however, were not ....).

Unfortunately, this Manny, like our local Manny, has a long-term contract. Unlike Mr. Ramirez vis a vis Boston, Mr. Rivera seems to be happy in Rochester. But Manny, if things change, Boston could surely use ya! Here's hoping the School Superintendent Search Committee can find someone just as good.

Happy holidays all!

HL

Bye Bye, Mitt

Finally, Mittie admits he's not running for reelection. This is one of those dog-bites-man stories, as Romney has spent the last year running away from Massachusetts, both by spending as much time as possible out of the state, and by bashing Massachusetts on every single one of those trips. The trick is to avoid letting him take credit for any healthcare bill the legislature passes.

The CPPAX party at the Midway last night rocked; okay, that may be an exaggeration, but by 11 pm the place was actually rocking. It was a lot of fun early on, nonetheless. Good pizza from next door.

The primary topic of conversation at last week's monthly meeting was the Democratic Convention caucuses, with Cos, Jesse Gordon, Mel & Tina Pointdexter of the Democratic State Committee, and Reuben Kantor from the Deval Patrick campaign leading the discussion. We did a straw poll and nearly everyone was in Deval's camp; a few were undecided.

The day before yesterday I was over at the Deval Patrick HQ for Boston caucus organizers; some other good DFA Boston stalwarts, like Sarah Messina, Howard Leibowitz, and Frances Burke, as well as several other familiar faces were there, including the super-talented Charles Heightchew and Janet Lin. The latter is late of Sam Yoon's successful campaign; the former had a brief stint at the Mass Dem Party before joining Deval to head up the web operations.

Speaking of Sam, he'll be coming to our January meeting, which should be a lot of fun.

Return of the Worried Democrats

One of the popular media myths that drives me insane is that of the "worried Democrats". The New York Times, and its reporter Adam Nagourney in particular, is especially bad.

But others jump in, such as the Washington Post, with Democrats Fear Backlash at Polls for Antiwar Remarks (with the subhead "Series of strong Iraq comments by party leaders have some worried the rhetorical blasts could harm election bids next year").

Yes, we Democrats need to keep our message more consistent, but if you read the actual article, you find lots of disagreement with Pelosi, Dean, and Murtha among other Democrats, but no fear, worry, or cringing, as the writers claim.

We may be pugnacious, but we're not pusillanimous.