What's wrong with Massachusetts? Most liberal state in the union....

[LynneSin]

...and they have a brain dead village idiot as their governor. Thank goodness for their house & senate which have veto-proofed this bill!

http://www.salon.com/wire/ap/archive.html?wire=D8BIKM781.html
Mass. Governor Vetoes Contraception Bill

By THEO EMERY Associated Press Writer

July 25,2005 | BOSTON -- Gov. Mitt Romney will veto a bill expanding access to emergency contraception, a move likely to please anti-abortion activists crucial to the Republican's possible 2008 presidential run.

Romney told House and Senate leaders in a letter of his decision, saying that he had "promised the people of Massachusetts that as Governor I would not change the laws of the Commonwealth as they relate to abortion."

The veto could end up being overturned by lawmakers because the bill passed with veto-proof margins in both the House and Senate.

[Smarmie Doofus]

1. Really good Q., actually. Perhaps someone versed in....

the politics of the commonwealth can briefly 'splain how the apparently brain-dead son of the famously "brainwashed" George Romney came by such an unlikely honor and responsibility... governor of the Bay State.

[TayTay]

3. He has good hair

And the fact that the MA Dems were consumed with infighting last time and we had a weak nominee for Govnah. The MA Dem Party is attempting a thing that hasn't been seen round here in years and years in hopes that it will give us a Dem Govnah next time: unity. (It's worth a shot anyway.)

We are the most liberal state in the nation? That's freaking scary. I don't think we are all that liberal a state, actually.

[BamaLefty]

2. It's Okay

The great people of MA won't be giving him a second chance! :)

[Todd B]

8. Thank God!

I'm counting the days until 2006 - I didn't get to vote for Governor last time, but you can be damn sure I'll be voting this time.

Kind of odd that he vetos this bill when he ran as a pro-choice moderate, huh? Is that a flip flop (not that I'm surprised when it comes to Romney)? I mean we're still waiting for all those jobs that he said he'd bring to Massachusetts if he was elected Governor.

Coming back from New Hampshire to veto one bill and going right back? Is he taking lessons from Shrub?!

[hyphenate]

4. There was supposed to be a press conference

today about this, but since Romney didn't do what he said he would, it's been cancelled.

Can you believe that? The asshole made a promise during his campaign to follow through and now he vetoes it. I sure as hell hope he's outta here before too long.

[Justice]

5. Myth that MA is liberal

More voters are registered unenrolled than registered as Democrats.

Romney drove in from his vacation in NH to veto the bill, and then drove back. He left all the other bills to his Lt Governor.

This was all about show.

[izzie]

7. Odd you say that. My family are all in the GOP and live in Mass

but they also think the govt. should stay out of the church and bed room stuff.And the govt. should watch what it is spending money on, like wars are a no. no. I guess they are called old time Republicans.

[BamaLefty]

14. True

But liberal outweighs conservative--- and Dems outweigh Repubs by a large margin. Plus, the self described moderates of Massachusetts are left leaning.

[Bill McBlueState]

16. true about unenrolled

But I bet a lot of the unenrolled voters are unenrolled because they think the Democrats are too conservative.

The weakness of evangelical religion in Massachusetts and across the northeast almost automatically makes the region more progressive than the rest of the country, regardless of people's political afiliations.

[GCP]

6. He just wanted street-cred for the fundies when he runs for president

He knew they would veto it from the get-go.
He's scum and I'll be glad when he's gone.

[LynneSin]

9. This will give him real 'street cred' - BOOT THE ASSHOLE OUT IN 2006

Nothing spreads the title of LOSER more than losing your re-election bid! Hopefully we can dash the 2008 presidental dreams of another bad repuke governor, Elhrich of Maryland, in 2006 too.

At least Bill Frist had the decency to retire from the senate than risk losing in his re-election bid and thus making him pretty unelectable in 2006

[spooky3]

13. from "street cred" to "street CRUD!"

[ISUGRADIA]

17. Romney's unlikely as it is to run in 2006

Most pol observers expect him to not run in 06 and gofor president in 08.

[HockeyMom]

10. Pataki is going to the same thing,

and for the same reasons; looking to run for national office and wants to appease the religious right.

I hope both in Massachusetts and in New York there is enough votes to overrule them.

[iwantmycountryback]

12. I hope there's enough votes as well

If Pataki does veto, the Assembly could probably override it but the Senate will be difficult.

And slightly off-topic, Pataki should just end the charade and make it official that he is not running for re-election. Everybody knows that's what he's going to do so he should just come out and say it.

[Evergreen Emerald]

11. Romney is scary

I remember him from the congressional hearing regarding the Constitutional amendment to ban gay marriage. He is a closed-minded-neo-conservative who has the favor of those in power. He is worse than Bush because he is just as wacko--but smarter. He is one of the scariest of the neo-cons.

[Lexingtonian]

15. precisely because Democrats are so dominant

it has taken the state Party a painfully long time to do the job that 1994 did on a lot of Democratic state parties, getting all the conservatives and DINOs and corrupted hacks and time server opportunists that made up most of the post-1968 Party cleared out.

Romney and the Republicans who preceded him, Weld and Cellucci (and Swift), had races against second tier candidates who got the Democratic nomination in good part for being liked by insiders and what they'd done for the Party, toeing the line, etc. All these Republicans won by focussing voter attention on the people who really ran the state (the governors only did to a small degree), the Legislature leaders who were the old ethnic and conservative Democrats with the whole pre-1994 normal game of patronage, hackery, etc.- Billie Bulger and Tom Finneran.

The state's first tier Democrats, the House Reps and Senators, saw no point in running for the governor job during the Bulger and Finneran years. Mike Dukakis was a clear example of it being pointless to be a Democratic governor- you were going to have to fight this crowd or become their hostage. Better for a Republican or Democratic second rater to waste the best years of his/her career with that.

Now that Bulger and Finneran are gone, replaced by people who are far more savvy and up to the times with what is acceptable in the money and power games, and quick to do what their voters want and like, the whole rationale for Republican governors to fight the Legislature's misplaced priorities has vanished. Romney has been utterly powerless and irrelevant since Finneran resigned last September.

It's a one party state again. Well, maybe Kerry Healey will beat Tom Reilly next year by running to his left on social policy and being more photogenic. I think she has a pretty good positioning, arguing between the lines that there's no need for Reilly- the Legislature is doing all the real work of governance and the governor's office is realistically a job that is well filled by a sunny woman more or less a mix of wall flower and business relocation salesperson for the state.