Just in time for the Monday blogs. Globe:
US Senate candidate Stephen Pagliuca intensified pressure yesterday on Democratic rivals Martha Coakley and Michael E. Capuano to drop their opposition to any final national health care bill that contains a provision limiting federal funding for abortion.
"They will scuttle this bill on a wedge issue,'' Pagliuca said in his sharpest comments of the campaign during a phone interview. "I'm prochoice, but at the end of the day, if it is a choice of [abortion limits] being in the bill, and of being able to get 36 million Americans covered, I vote for coverage.''
Smart politics by the Pagliuca campaign that should serve it well. There was no need for either Coakley or Capuano to stake out such extreme positions on a hypothetical issue. Having done so, they are rightly criticized as ideologues more interested in single-issue politics than the best overall public policy.
The inability of either the Coakley or Capuano campaigns to respond effectively to this penetrating criticism is sadly evident later in the same article:
"Mike Capuano is the only candidate who voted for the health care reform bill and kept alive the possibility of real health care reform,'' said his spokeswoman, Alison Mills.
What kind of a response is that? Capuano is the only member of Congress among the candidates, so he is the only one who can cast a vote on anything right now. One might as well criticize Coakley for not casting any votes in the House since Capuano was elected.
Alex Zaroulis, a Coakley spokeswoman, said, "Steve Pagliuca is just wrong on this issue. It is troubling that he continues to insist on this false choice. We can and will pass meaningful health care reform without taking a step back on women's rights.''
Another non-sequitor. If Coakley is so sure Stupitts is not going to be an issue, why make it an important part of one's current campaign pitch. One might as well take an absolutist position on the wisdom of Belichik's decision to go for it on 4th and two and make that a central part of one's candidacy. That also is unlikely to be in the final health care reform bill (although perhaps it should be: that call was very bad for my health, and probably for yours too).
Pagliuca and Khazei are the only Democratic Senate candidates who appear to be committed to the principle that a final vote on health care reform should be decided by a reality-based assessment of what is best for the citizens of Massachusetts given the facts on the ground at the time a decision is required. |
