Robert David Sullivan 2

Politics not his strong suit?

The Globe's Adrian Walker thinks he knows exactly when things started to go downhill for Gov. Deval Patrick:

It isn’t hard to pinpoint the day Patrick lost control of his image. It was the infamous afternoon in 2008 that the Legislature voted down casino gambling and the governor was nowhere to be found to talk about it. He was in New York selling a book deal, and giving rise to the idea that he really isn’t that into this job.

It's an intriguing notion. Is Patrick's governing style (or lack thereof) a bigger liability than his policies? If so, he didn't help himself last month by admitting that he considered not seeking a second term because of the "wear and tear" he's gone through on Beacon Hill.

Ironically, he might never have become governor in the first place if his chief rival for the Democratic nomination in 2006, Tom Reilly, hadn't voiced a similar kind of squeamishness about what really makes things run on Beacon Hill, infamously saying, "Politics are not my strong suit."

Will Jill join the anti-tax brigade?

The announcement that Jill Stein will run for governor on the Green Party ticket is generally seen as another headache for Deval Patrick, who can't afford to lose any votes to his left in this fall's election. Stein, who got 3 percent of the vote and respectful press coverage when she ran for governor in 2002, is probably the strongest possible candidate for her shrub-like political party, and she's likely to get votes from people who aren't happy with Patrick's performance but who would never vote Republican.

Still, likely Republican nominee Charlie Baker would be wise to keep an eye on Stein. Her geographic base is in the more affluent parts of MetroWest Boston, which is precisely where Baker needs to peel some votes away from Patrick (much in the way that Mitt Romney made gains in this region). As long as she stays under 5 percent, her vote probably comes out of Patrick's hide; anything more, and things could get dicey for the GOP.

There's also the fact that Stein may end up as a strange bedfellow with Baker, his fellow Republican candidate Christy Mihos, and independent Tim Cahill on the issue of the state's sales tax. All three of those candidates want to repeal last year's sales tax hike from 5.0 to 6.25 percent (Mihos wants to push it down to 3 percent), and Stein said last summer that she was also against the sales tax hike -- on the grounds that it was regressive and that a graduated income tax was the better way to go.

It's not clear whether Stein will make a sales tax rollback a priority of her campaign (as the GOP nominee and Cahill surely will), but it would be interesting to see Patrick stand alone in defending last year's tax hike (and, indirectly, the Legislature that passed it). Would he look like the voice of fiscal sanity, or would he stand out for being more politically tone-deaf than the lefty Greens?

Patrick gets the ultimate insult on Martha's Vineyard

The Vineyard Gazette reports that a delegation from the island is miffed at how difficult it is to meet with the governor to discuss their concerns about the Cape Wind project. West Tisbury Selectman Richard Knabel blows off a little steam:

“I’ve learned from several sources that this governor is extremely inaccessible, even to legislators. They have a lot of difficulty getting in to see him even though he’s of their [Democratic] party.” Mr. Knabel continued:

“I talked to [former Islands’ state representative] Eric Turkington this morning and he said the feeling in the state house, while he was still there was that Governor Romney was actually better about seeing legislators and other people than Governor Patrick is.

To understand how this comparison must sting, remember that Gov. Patrick got 72% in West Tisbury in both the primary and general elections of 2006. Romney got 33% here when he was elected statewide in 2002.

Charlie Baker and the Green Party are on the same page

Republican gubernatorial candidate Charlie Baker wants to roll back the state's recently increased sales tax. More surprisingly, the state's Green-Rainbow Party is making the same pitch. The party's state committee has unanimously called for a total repeal of the sales tax hike. From yesterday's press release:

Jill Stein, former Green-Rainbow candidate for Governor, noted that “Over the past few years the Legislature has balanced the budget by turning to every regressive tax and fee in their toolkit. This is not only unfair, but it perpetuates a chronic budget crisis, with cut after cut to vital programs. We will never solve our revenue shortfalls by taxing people who are struggling to make ends meet. It’s time for the wealthy to support the state at the same overall rate as everyone else. Let’s start by repealing the sales tax hike and rejecting any tax hikes that increase the overall burden on low and moderate income people.”

The Greens prefer to raise revenue through a progressive income tax, but note that they want to cut the sales tax first -- even though it's highly unlikely that we'll move to a progressive income tax structure any time soon. (It would require a constitutional amendment.) This could be shrewd politics, since the Greens have never had significant support among low-income voters; the party's base, such as it is, has been in wealthy suburbs.

Don't bet on a three-way race, Deval

I side with Wayne Woodlief over Howie Carr on the question of whether a independent gubernatorial campaign by Tim Cahill helps or hurts incumbent Deval Patrick in next year's general election. If Cahill finishes third but gets a substantial number of votes, Patrick is probably toast.

It seems logical that multiple candidates can split up the anti-incumbent vote and allow an unpopular pol to stay in office, but that hasn't been the case at the national level. The strongest third-party presidential candidates of the past 50 years were all involved in elections that threw out the incumbent party. In 1968, George Wallace got 14 percent and the Democrats lost; in 1980, John Anderson got 7 percent and Jimmy Carter was unseated; and in 1992, Ross Perot polled 18 percent and George H.W. Bush was evicted. We haven't had many strong third-party candidates for governor in Massachusetts, but the last one (Christy Mihos in 2006) obviously hurt the GOP's attempt to hold onto the office.

My hunch is that third candidates run strongest among voters who lean toward the party in power: They're disappointed or underwhelmed with their party's candidate, but they're not willing to cross party lines. They don't necessarily like "throwing their vote away," but they don't agonize about it. As it happens, they have a general dislike for one major party but also dislike the individual in charge of the other party.

Will Cahill emulate Schwarzenegger or Finneran?

Independence Day weekend saw Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin skip out on her job, state Sen. Stanley Rosenberg come out of the closet, and state Treasurer Tim Cahill drop out of the Democratic Party. Cahill is assumed to be running for governor as an independent next year, hoping to capitalize on the current unpopularity of Gov. Deval Patrick, the state Legislature, and the tax increases they recently enacted.

Cahill is clearly running as a fiscal conservative, not only opposing the tax hikes but also saying in a Boston Globe interview that the state's three-year-old mandate for universal health care coverage isn't "doable." The next question is, what kind of fiscal conservative will he be?

Will he be an anti-Beacon Hill populist, ready to put a pox on all houses and political parties? Can he duplicate Ross Perot's success with dramatic charts, folksy sayings, and careful avoidance of social issues like abortion? Will he be a bit more dramatic and go for an Arnold Schwarzenegger approach, promising not to shuffle things around on Beacon Hill but instead "blow up boxes"?

Or will Cahill be more like former House Speaker Tom Finneran, proclaiming himself a fiscally responsible adult who can work with the Legislature and act as a check against the "loony left" in the Democratic Party, now associated with Gov. Patrick? Will he embrace his eight-year experience as a statewide official and argue that he can be a more effective governor than fellow anti-tax candidate Christy Mihos -- a "reformer with results," as one presidential candidate once put it?

I suspect that much depends on what possible Republican candidate Charles Baker decides to do. If he runs, the former official in the Weld and Cellucci administrations has to decide whether to run as another outsider (as Mitt Romney and Deval Patrick did) or as someone who knows how things work on Beacon Hill. Cahill seems to be hoping to intimidate Baker from running at all, but if he leans too far in one direction -- angry outsider or experienced administrator -- he might give Baker an opening to take the other role.

Patrick "boxed in" on his 2010 re-election strategy?

State House News Service's Jim O'Sullivan has a succinct forecast of gubernatorial politics over the next 18 months (subscription required for full story):

Gov. Deval Patrick's sharp words last week against the Legislature, and the very public venues he chose in which to voice them, convinced many legislators that the governor's re-election strategy increasingly revolves around casting them in familiar roles: tax-and-spend bogeymen responsible for a corrupt and bloated state government. With both Patrick and all 200 members of the Legislature up for re-election in November 2010, many legislators say that, coupled with the unpleasant policy choices forced by a wretched economy, they are resigned to 18 months of criticism from a Corner Office whose own poll numbers are problematic.

"Is he going to run against us? Yeah, probably," said Rep. Theodore Speliotis (D-Danvers), House chair of the Consumer Protection Committee. "Do I take it personal? No. I think he's really boxed in and he's got no choice."

O'Sullivan is probably correct, but his assessment makes the 2010 campaign seem like a dreary prospect -- and a big change from the upbeat "Together We Can" vibe of 2006.

Still, Patrick is unlikely to face any Democratic legislators as opponents; in contrast to many states, Massachusetts rarely rewards Senate and House leaders with nominations for statewide office. The question is whether Patrick can plausibly run a "damn the Legislature" campaign against someone like Charles Baker, Christy Mihos, or even Tim Cahill, none of whom have ever served in that body.

Stateline.org calls Gov. Patrick "safe" for re-election in 2010

In a very early -- if not premature -- forecast of next year's gubernatorial races, Stateline.org lists Massachusetts as one of nine states considered "safe" for the incumbent party. (New Hampshire is also "safe," while the GOP's hold on Rhode Island is "vulnerable.")

I doubt that Gov. Deval Patrick is taking his next campaign lightly, given the state's fiscal crisis, the ups and downs of his relationship with the Legislature, and, of course, the alleged lurch to the right in Massachusetts. Patrick may also remember that one academic study called him "the most powerful governor in America" only days after he took office -- but before many of his major policy initiatives stalled on Beacon Hill.

Still, our governor can always comfort himself with a little schadenfreade by reading about the next-door neighbor who was widely expected to overshadow Patrick during his first term.