jdrinboston
Active Member
- Joined
- Oct 10, 2011
- Messages
- 670
- Reaction score
- 557
People don’t trash Patrick anywhere near as much and the anti republican bias is very clear and strong both here and in the state. Not saying this as some R apologist. I’m saying this as someone always concerned at simple explanations that are driven by biases and feelings rather than sober facts. And no offense, but it’s absurd to suggest that there isn’t a political element to the ire against Baker. That may be understandable but that only clouds the way toward a solution. To fix the T, the problem has to be identified and fully unearthed which means a full acceptance of the responsibility for and collusion in the catastrophic disintegration of the T over the last 30 years, which is squarely on nearly every politician in this state. Doesn’t matter who did what even worse than someone else. The entire government shares the blame and nothing will change substantively until the entire government is held responsible and the entire government works to fix the problem.
This response may come across as overly flippant, so I apologize for the tone, but I feel like there is a political reality here that is going un-discussed or unacknowledged. The single biggest reason why we can't seem to get the T fixed is that there is little to no chance any politician - statewide or local - will ever be voted out of office based on the condition of the T. And I believe our elected officials are well aware of that. So much so, Maura Healey didn't even mention transit during her victory speech last November, though she certainly mentioned roads and bridges.
Simply speaking, on a statewide level, you aren't going to find a coalition of 50% +1 votes from across the state who will vote out a governor because the T is broken. The probability is even less when the governor is a Democrat and their Republican opponent is likely to be skeptical of transit anyway.
On the local level, will a majority of voters in Petersham, Charlton, Carver, Hadley, or Dracut vote out their state rep or Senator because the T is broken? Will a majority of voters in Quincy vote against Ron Mariano because the Red Line is crawling through Quincy Center? They certainly haven't to this point? And as a Winthrop resident, I can tell you nobody here would have ever voted against Bob DeLeo because the Blue Line commute became a slog. I'm not even sure I would and I consider myself a transit advocate. Why would I vote to put a halt to the gravy train of state earmarks to my little town in favor of some back bench rep who will be lucky to get a small office next to the janitors closet?
And if you live in Cambridge or Somerville, who would you vote against to send the message to fix the T? Mike Connolly? One of the legislature's biggest transit advocates?
Again, apologies if this comes across overly flippant or nihilistic. Perhaps crossing over the 40 threshold a few years back around the start of Covid beat my optimistic side into submission. But I just don't see how the T or transit writ large gets put on a path toward really being fixed absent a group of powerful politicians willing to take it on because it's the right thing to do morally, even if the politics dictate they don't have to.