Posts Tagged ‘ massachusetts senate ’

News from Around the Web

October 13, 2010

Krystal Ball

It’s good to be back. Here’s what we missed while we were away.

The Paycheck Fairness Act is expected to be taken up by the Senate after the November election break and now there’s new data on the wage gap and weight. A new study from the University of Florida suggests the wage gap is smaller for thin women and larger for larger women. According to the study, women who weigh 25 pounds over “average” weight, earn approximately $13,847 less than an average-weight woman. The worst part of the findings: men earn an additional $8,347 when they gain 25 pounds in a year. Ladies, no matter what the scale says, please call your Senators (1-877-667-6650) and urge them to pass the Paycheck Fairness Act. Women deserve fair pay, no matter what the scale says. If men can pack on the pounds and the promotions, so can we.

Meanwhile, another important piece of legislation for women is moving ahead in the state of New York. The paid sick leave bill would require businesses to provide employees up to 72 hours of paid sick leave each year. Business with fewer than 20 workers would be required to offer employees no more than 40 hours of paid sick leave. This bill would help ease the stress of pregnant workers trying to schedule doctor’s appointments, of working parents who need time to care for sick children and for workers who need to care for elderly parents. Mayor Bloomberg, however, is talking about vetoing the bill.

Also in New York, a court-appointed juvenile counselor who pled guilty to raping a teenage girl and sexually assaulting two others was sentenced to ten years probation and no jail time. The rape victim was in the counselor’s custody inside the court building, when the rape took place. After, he escorted her to a court appearance. The girl was sentenced to 12 months in prison for filing a false police report.

Back to politics, California Democratic gubernatorial candidate Jerry Brown was caught on tape referring to his Republican opponent Meg Whitman as a whore. Brown apologized to Whitman saying, ““That does not represent anything other than things that happen in a campaign.” Actually it does. It represents the very damaging ways women are referenced everyday. What many deem as harmless comments collectively harm the role of women in society. But until terms like whore are called out by a political opponent, they often go unchecked in every day discussions.

And finally, Krystal Ball, Democratic candidate for Congress in Virginia, is facing scrutiny after old photos of her and her ex at a holiday party were posted online. Ball, however, is holding her ground. Yes, she says the photos are embarrassing but she believes sexist and political motives are behind their surfacing. And she is urging other women not to let stupid moments caught on camera keep them from running for office. After all, a spread in Cosmo didn’t stop Scott Brown from advancing to the Senate.

Ball’s unapologetic response to her past and her candidacy in the Huffington Post is a great read. Check it out here.

Footwear and the Midterm Elections

August 28, 2010

By Hello Ladies

Kate Spade "Halle" wedge

Sometimes, I know I like something, but I don’t know why. I could be enjoying a cabernet sauvignon, for example, and then someone with a better palate than mine says, “This is so deep and rich. So many tannins. Do you taste the chocolate?” And bingo! It all becomes clear.

And so it is with politics. For years I thought my interest stemmed from a sense of civic duty, a desire to make the world a better place, from wanting to hold my legislators accountable, demand justice, transparency and equality. But recently it’s become clear to me. I am interested in politics because I love shoes.

Shoes, you see, matter a great deal in politics. The voters in Colorado understand this. They just gave the GOP primary nod to Senate hopeful Ken Buck, the man who said he deserved the vote because he doesn’t wear high heels. He will face Senator Michael Bennet in the general election. Bennet is too frequently photographed from the waist up and so I need to learn more about his footwear. Florsheim? Cole Haan? Gucci? Time will tell.

Senator Michael Bennet

And Bennet should not take this scrutiny lightly. After all, you remember what happened in the Massachusetts Senate race, don’t you? After easily winning the primary, Attorney General Martha Coakley foolishly underestimated her “age-inappropriate Mary Jane shoes” and lost the general election to Scott Brown, who most likely learned the importance of shoes from Helen Gurley Brown.

Congressman Stephen Lynch gets it. He won’t make the same mistakes Coakley did. Not him. Lynch is paying close attention to the message Massachusetts voters sent in January. And that’s why he is touting his footwear as a reason to vote for him, not challenger Mac D’Alessandro. Fashion forecast for fall: red is the new black and work boots are the new barn jacket.

The New York Times gets it. Last week some women were upset about a story in the Times featuring Congress hopeful Reshma Saujani which dedicated half a sentence to her political goals and 13 paragraphs to her shoes. While I think the story should have appeared in the Style section and a separate, more substantive piece on Saujani is owed New York voters, I did find the article informative. Reading it I learned that the 3 inch high, $300 Kate Spade Halle wedge is the footwear of choice for women in politics. Wearing these shoes you can canvass neighborhoods, run to catch a flight and have “drinks at a new hotel lounge with tech entrepreneurs hungry to see their kind in politics.”

I am going to buy a pair. And then I am going to run for office. I may not be a shoo-in to win but I will certainly be a shoe-in.

Mac D’Alessandro: We Don’t Need More Democrats; We Need Better Democrats UPDATED

August 25, 2010

By Hello Ladies

Time magazine predicts healthcare is no longer the number one issue on midterm voters’ minds. “Voters are far more concerned about the stalled economy or soaring budget deficits,” writes Time. But here in Massachusetts, the state that elected the 41st vote, healthcare is still dominating the discussion in at least one race leading up to the September 14 state primary. What little discussion taking place, that is.

Incumbent Stephen Lynch is facing a challenge in the ninth Congressional District from Mac D’Alessandro, the former New England Political Director for the Services Employees International Union. Lynch, you will recall, voted no on healthcare reform because he says the bill “stripped out all the significant reform.” D’Alessandro disagrees. “He should tell that to the people in the district whose children have pre-existing conditions,” he says. D’Alessandro says he got in the race because “The thought of (Lynch) going unchallenged gave validity to his healthcare vote.”

Winning in September won’t be easy for D’Alessandro. He entered the race late with little name recognition and far fewer funds and insider connections than Lynch. But he is running a smooth grassroots campaign and he easily wins over many of the people he meets on the campaign trail. D’Alessandro, you see, is not afraid to take a stance. I met with D’Alessandro last week, and while our discussion focused primarily on women’s rights, he had plenty to say on healthcare, Iraq, immigration reform, private industry, the environment and the economy.

On disenfranchised women voters who feel let down by the Democratic Party, he says, “It’s not just women. Lots of progressives do. That’s why we don’t need more Democrats in office. We need better Democrats.”

On the glass ceiling, he says, “It’s titanium coated and some of it is still so ingrained in our culture. I noticed especially with healthcare that a lot of people aren’t even aware of the insidious nature of some of the insurance industry’s practices.”

On choice, he states on his website, “A woman’s right to choose must always be protected.” And he is clearly against the Stupak amendment, something Lynch supported with an early healthcare vote in Congress last fall.

You can read his position on the other issues on his campaign website. You cannot do that at Lynch’s site. With less than three weeks to go until the election, Lynch’s issues page merely says, “Coming soon.”

Stephen Lynch's blank Issues Page

So even if one could argue Lynch is not afraid to take a stance; that going against the Democrats on healthcare – in Kennedy country no less – was certainly a bold move, you have to wonder why he won’t defend, discuss or debate his vote.

On August 5, D’Alessandro invited Lynch to a series of debates. As of today, no debates have been scheduled. D’Alessandro’s team was told by Lynch’s campaign that the Congressman has assembled a debate negotiation team, but that team hasn’t been able to put anything on the calendar. If that isn’t a telling example of how Washington doesn’t work, than what is?

The voters in Massachusetts Ninth Congressional District deserve information, transparency and discourse. But Lynch isn’t cooperating. I have never found a candidate with whom I agree 100 percent and D’Alessandro is no exception. But assuming we align on the issues that matter most to me, I will always support the candidate who is willing to both talk, and listen, to their constituents. That is why, “I am a Mac.”

Reminder: today is the last day to vote in the September primary.

UPDATE: Mac D’Alessandro announced on September 2 he has received the endorsements of three leading pro-choice, pro-women’s health organizations — NARAL Pro-Choice America PAC, the National Organization for Women PAC, and the Planned Parenthood Action Fund.

Six Things We Need to Do to Send a Woman to the White House

July 9, 2010

By Hello Ladies

Last week I posted a question at SkinnyScoop: Do you think a woman will be elected president in your lifetime? Most of the respondents (81 percent) said yes. No one answered definitely not. I sure hope the respondents are right, but getting there won’t be easy.

One respondent at SkinnyScoop wrote, “We are ready and there are more of us than them, we just need to get out and vote ladies.” It seems simple. But it’s not. The sad truth is we haven’t moved past the misogyny and sexism we witnessed during Hillary Clinton’s candidacy. Senate hopeful Martha Coakley didn’t do herself any favors when she made some bad campaign decisions last winter but the press didn’t do her many favors either. And the Republicans don’t seem to treat their women much better, as Newsweek recently pointed out.

I remember during Clinton’s presidential run people groaning about the word misogyny. “I’m so sick of feminists talking about misogyny,” friends and coworkers would tell me when I was discussing things Tucker Carlson, Chris Matthews, Glen Beck and Keith Olbermann had said on television the night before. I challenge those same people to come up with a better explanation for Playboy’s recent article (which has been removed from its site) “The Top 10 Conservative Women We Love to Hate” complete with hatef**k ratings for each woman.

The fact is the media can be a brutal place for women in politics and we are far from achieving any kind of critical mass. Women make up only 17 percent of Congress today and only six states have women serving as governor. So, if we are going to put a woman in the White House ladies, we have work to do. Here are six things you can do to make it happen.

1. Contribute. It takes a lot of money to get elected. Just recently, two promising women candidates ended races citing lack of support from their party, the Democrats. Ohio Secretary of State Jennifer Brunner lost the primary to Lt. Gov. Lee Fisher and Connie Saltonstall quit the race to replace Michigan’s Congressman Bart Stupak. Saltonstall said she didn’t think she could raise the necessary funds to run without her party’s support.

2. Volunteer. It also takes a lot of people power to run a campaign. Get involved. Too often I hear mother’s in my community tell me they just don’t have the time to get involved because their children need them at home. I tell them my children need me out fighting for the things I believe will secure their future. Your kids will be fine if you spend a few hours at the phone bank. Trust me.

3. Support qualified women candidates. Period. As Gloria Feldt says, “… when there are two candidates–one male and one female–who are both well-qualified and represent my positions major issues I care about, I will support the woman until such time as women have our fair 50% share of the elected official slots. Then and only then will gender not matter.”

4. Start local. Get involved in your local politics and help groom future women leaders.

5. Run. Better yet, why don’t you run for office? Check out She Should Run or attend a Whitehouse Project event for more information and access to support.

6. Vote.

And in other news, congratulations to Mary Jo McMenamin who won a Yogi Max from Yogibo for answering our question at The SkinnyScoop.

Are Women to Blame?

June 16, 2010

By Hello Ladies

I have recently found a new slew of articles supporting the popular idea that women are to blame –for everything.

Politico ran an article earlier this week citing research from American University’s Women & Politics Institute that shows only 13.5 percent of the lawmaker guests on the Sunday morning talk shows are women. (We referenced a similar statistic several months ago.) According to Politico, the show producers say part of the reason they feature so few women is “the shows must be topical.” Women represent slightly more than half of the country’s population. I would have thought women lawmakers could discuss topical issues.

But according to the article the producers also say, “Some congressional women — Nancy Pelosi chief among them — do not help the cause by making themselves so difficult to book. Most producers say they try to recruit female lawmakers nearly every weekend but receive a steady stream of rejection slips.”

Pelosi’s spokeswomen, in her defense, is quoted in the piece as saying the speaker’s travel schedule makes it difficult for her to appear but there are plenty of other women who would make good guests. Those other women, however, at least according to one producer quoted in the story, “have other things to do.”

You see, its women’s fault, and especially Nancy Pelosi’s fault, that they aren’t appearing as guests. Women, have other things to do.

Women are also blamed for the fact 90 percent of venture funding flows to men, even though data from the Center for Women’s Business Research cites 41 percent of private companies in the U.S. are women-owned.

I read a number of articles and blog posts this week on the topic and even though they all pointed out the challenges women face in the venture capital world:

- women are stereotyped as less likely to do what it takes to make a business succeed and more likely to seek work/life balance

- funders tend to fund in their image (white males from top schools)

- it’s tough for women to break into male-dominated networks and build relationships with the men who have access to the money,

the commenters dismissed these points and blamed women. “Women don’t get funded because they don’t ask,” was a common retort.

You can see that same idea play out in discussions about women in the workplace. The “blame women” theme is not new. It has been a popular one in discussions about why women are still missing from boardrooms in any significant way. Headlines like this one from MSNBC, “Study: Women create ‘their own glass ceilings’” go right at it. The articles cites a study from the University of New Mexico Anderson School of Management, that shows women managers are three times more likely to underrate their bosses’ opinions of them while men overrate how their bosses view them.

Interpreting this data as women constructing the glass ceiling is quite a leap, but it’s a leap that many make when discussing the wage gap too. That women still earn, on average, just .77 cents for every dollar a man doing comparable work earns, is frequently attributed to women’s poor negotiation skills, women’s choice of shifts they work, women’s desire to have families.

While it may be popular and convenient to blame women for the gender gaps in the media, at work, and everywhere else they exist, it’s also lazy and irresponsible. Lazy because anecdotes and excuses avoid the systemic issues that need to be addressed in the American workplace such as attracting and retaining a diverse workforce, removing gender bias from performance reviews, establishing networks and mentoring programs for women, and work/life programs to support working parents. Irresponsible because there is plenty of data – from Catalyst, Ernst & Young, McKinsey & Company, Pepperdine and Columbia Universities for example - all showing a correlation between women in management and strong corporate performance. And in today’s shaky economic times, we should all be pulling for healthy corporations.

On a more personal level, women need to be aware of how the excuse mentality affects their individual careers. For me, it shows up in a number of different ways. Last year during the special election to fill Ted Kennedy’s Senate seat, I wrote an op-ed on why women should support a smart, women candidate. While I didn’t name names, Martha Coakley was the only women in the race. The editor at my local paper told me he liked the piece but he couldn’t run something that clearly endorsed one candidate over the others. I responded I would be happy to rewrite the piece to endorse all of the women in the race. When I pitched the business editor of a major metro daily newspaper on a story about the challenges caregivers face at work, he told me he had already covered women that month.

Several years ago, I worked at a company where the CEO had a policy that the vice president title was only given to those of us who managed teams. I was the only female VP on the management team. The other three women held the title director. Two of them didn’t manage staff and one of them managed one employee. There were three male VPs, not on the management team but in the organization, who had no direct reports. The CEO’s excuse: a better title gave them credibility and helped them do their jobs.

One of my female employees was doing an outstanding job, taking on increasing responsibility, training other employees and aggressively cutting business expenses. I scheduled a meeting with the CEO to discuss her career path and growth plan. He cut the meeting short telling me there was no growth plan for employees without bachelor degrees. She had dropped out of college. A few months later, I learned that the VP of Sales, a man promoted into the position by the CEO and reporting directly to him, never went to college.

In this situation I was smart enough not to storm the CEO’s office or the HR department demanding explanations for these inequities, but I found it helpful to be clued in to the realities of the situation and the stories the CEO spun to maintain the status quo. That way before I met with him to discuss raises, promotions and new assignments I could anticipate any roadblocks and try to work around them. And, I could eventually decide to leave the company.

Pay attention to the number of men vs. women among the talking heads on television and the bylines on the opinion pages of the newspaper. Listen for the handy excuses you hear at work. It’s not easy to change the status quo but it’s not impossible either. Add your comments online, write letters to the editor and prepare like hell before your next performance review. Ladies, despite what you may read or hear, everything is not your fault.

Woman in Politics: Harmony Wu

May 25, 2010

By Hello Ladies

Harmony Wu

Since we’re always urging women to get involved politically, we thought it would be informative to share insights from a woman who is. Last week I sat down with Harmony Wu, a political activist in Needham, Massachusetts to find out what motivates her to do what she does.

I first heard of Wu when I worked on the Martha Coakley for U.S. Senate campaign. Volunteers at the phone bank I managed would come in every night and say, “You need to meet Harmony. You should really meet Harmony.”

Fast forward to the healthcare vote and our induction of Congressman Stephen Lynch into the Ignorant Male Legislator’s club. We posted a job opening for someone to take his place in the Ninth Congressional district; someone who would represent the district and lead with courage and integrity. Later that same day, we heard Harmony Wu was considering a run for the seat.

After some serious consideration, Wu decided not to run, posting this statement on her website:

Over the last two weeks, I have met with numerous people to address the many aspects of a potential campaign against Mr. Lynch. The ability to maintain my family life during the campaign and as a member of Congress has always been an important factor for me, as it has been for so many women seeking and serving in office. In my case, it prevents me from launching what would be a vigorous campaign and if elected, committing to a life that would require far too much time away from family at this moment in our lives. In the end, this is the decisive factor for me.

I admit I was slightly disappointed that Wu cited family life not just as a factor in her decision, but as a factor for other women considering political life. I understand family first. I do. And in her shoes I may have reached the same decision. I just don’t want to see all women painted with the same broad brush stroke. I don’t buy into the idea that maintaining and preserving the family unit is a woman’s job. I believe it is a parent’s job and should be based on the individual, not the gender. Just like running for office should be an individual decision, not a gender decision.

Fast forward again. I finally met Harmony Wu and she opened up about her decision-making process. And what she had to say about the prospects for women in politics is a fair and unsurprising commentary from someone who took a close look.

Wu wasn’t always politically active. But observing the Bush administration inspired her to get involved in the last presidential election. “I swore I would do everything in my power to do more,” she says and after the primary she volunteered for the Obama campaign with Organizing for America.

After the presidential election, Wu worked on a local Selectman’s campaign but wasn’t active on a day-to-day-basis. “Then Ted Kenendy passed away,” she says. And things in Massachusetts changed. Wu went from the Senate race to the race to fill Scott Brown’s State Senator seat. Both candidate’s she supported lost, but she wasn’t deterred.

In fact her energy and organizing skills attracted attention and Wu was drafted to run against Lynch. “I spent a lot of time exploring, talking to people. There was a lot of support and people telling me, ‘We’ll do what we can.’ But there were also people saying I wasn’t an insider, I had no experience and asking me if I could raise money.”

Wu says her ability to raise money was always the first question asked of her, although for her, the number one question was could she do the job. In the end, she determined that job, one that requires constant fundraising, was not for her.

I asked Wu if, based on what she saw up close, a woman could get elected in Massachusetts? “You know there’s a woman thing, but also a regular person thing,” she says. “Unless you’re on a path to be Guy Smiley from the day you’re born, it’s tough to break in. There’s a gate, a barrier. The lifestyle is different. It’s not family friendly.

“It’s the professionalizing of politics. You have to be in it — in training. It’s been made so unattractive. Massachusetts politics… it’s a tough club.”

Still, Wu believes there’s a “huge pent up desire” to see a woman elected, at least in the more progressive communities. And she is by no means backing down. She isn’t running for Congress but she is supporting Mac D’Alessandro in his primary bid against Lynch, tearing up the Twitter on the #mapoli hashtag and organizing her neighbors at Yes We Can Needham. Wu won’t hold an elected office any time soon, but she will hold those in office accountable. And if you’re a progressive woman looking to run, Wu’s probably got your back.

REMINDER: We are giving away a print from Carolyn Draws. Leave a comment and we’ll enter you in our contest.

Missing: Women in Politics

May 21, 2010

By Hello Ladies

Check out the latest data from the Inter-Parliamentary Union (IPU) on the number of women in government worldwide. Just 18.9 percent of all elected leaders in both upper and lower parliamentary branches combined (House and Senate for example) are women. That’s correct, less than twenty percent of the world leaders (where data is available) are women.

The IPU’s mission is to establish representative democracy across the globe. One of its main areas of focus is women in politics. In 1997, the IPU Council adopted a Universal Declaration on Democracy which states, “The achievement of democracy presupposes a genuine partnership between men and women in the conduct of the affairs of society in which they work in equality and complementarity, drawing mutual enrichment from their differences.”

The IPU has also stated, “The concept of democracy will only assume true and dynamic significance when political policies and national legislation are decided upon jointly by men and women with equitable regard for the interests and aptitudes of both halves of the population.”

Yet here we are in 2010 with a worse than 80/20 split of men and women in leadership. And the United States is no role model. Our percentages in the House and Senate are below the worldwide average and we rank 74 on a list of countries classified by descending order of the percentage of women in the lower or single House. We rank behind Rwanda (number 1), Sweden (number 2), Norway, Cuba, Afghanistan, Pakistan, China and others. In 2009, we ranked 72. That is not progress.

What can we do about it?

The IPU published a Plan of Action “To Correct Present Imbalances in the Participation of Men and Women in Political Life”. When I read the plan, I was reminded of a conversation I had last year with one of my Selectman in the town where I live. He was up for reelection at the time. He told me the reason our town established a Sustainability Initiative was because an environmental activist had run against this Selectman in a previous election in order to raise awareness about environmental issues.

“So maybe I should run against you in this round to raise awareness for the gender imbalance in town politics.”

“What are you talking about?” he said “We have a woman on the board.” He wasn’t being flip. He was serious. There is one woman on a five person board so in his mind there is no problem even though that hardly gets us to critical mass (at least 33 percent representation) and the rest of the town boards are woefully unbalanced in favor of men.

Former Speaker of the House and classic Boston politician Tip O’Neill once said,”All politics is local.” In that phrase lies the answer to what can we do.

Start local. Most of us won’t ever get an invitation to the UN to discuss this issue, but we all have access to our local town hall. Pay attention to your town or city’s politics and ask the tough questions. Support women candidates with time and or money. Ask a woman to run for office, or better yet, why don’t you run? She Should Run is a great resource for women considering a run. That’s how the political machine works: start at the bottom and make your way up.

And visit us again Monday. I recently met with Harmony Wu, a small force of nature on the Massachusetts Democratic scene, and I will share my interview with her here.

Stop the Rape Culture (TRIGGER WARNING)

January 25, 2010

By Hello Ladies

(TRIGGER WARNING) A woman was raped last week in Toledo, Ohio on the side of busy street in broad daylight. A high school student approached her as she was walking down the street and threatened her with a pair of scissors. Cars drove by and several beeped. One witness called 911 but no one stopped. According to the local police, some witnesses thought the act was consensual and some may not have comprehended what they were seeing. How could they have? This is not supposed to happen in a civilized society.

Late last year, we were shocked and frightened by the gang rape of a high school girl outside a school dance in Richmond, California. Now we are sickened by a rapist brazen enough to attack out in the open in broad daylight.

(Trigger warning) Over at Shakesville, there is an excellent piece on rape culture – what it is and what contributes to it. I’ve linked to it before. Again, if you can read it, I recommend it.

I thought I was done writing about the Senate election in Massachusetts, but as I reread Melissa McEwan’s piece at Shakesville, I couldn’t help but reflect on our new Senator-elect.

During the last weekend of the campaign, someone at a rally for Scott Brown yelled out a suggestion for Brown’s opponent Attorney General Martha Coakley, “Shove a curling iron up her butt,” yelled the unseen man. You can watch the video here. Brown asserts he did not hear the comment. But he certainly heard about it after the fact and he never expressed any outrage. That is rape culture.

A rape takes place every two minutes in this country. One in three women will be sexually assaulted in her lifetime. Who is going to reverse this trend? Certainly not the politician who sees no need to decry public outbursts suggesting sodomy. Victims should not be held accountable for stopping rape. Rapists, public safety officials and our elected leaders must be held accountable.

And since I plan to stop writing about the election, I want to get this off my chest too. Senator-elect, women are not property.

Why the Hate?

January 21, 2010

By Hello Ladies

For the last three months I volunteered my time to the Martha Coakley for Senate campaign. I held signs, made calls, (yes, that was me calling incessantly), canvassed, recruited, tweeted and blogged. Following her loss, I feel much better than I expected I would. Maybe it’s because I know I did all I could to get my candidate elected. Maybe it’s because it feels good to speak up for that which you believe. Maybe it’s because I have seen bigger political disappointments (like the Supreme Court naming George Bush president over Al Gore and then the country electing Bush to a second term). Or maybe it’s because I know, if we were still standing after those eight years, we will still be standing at the end of Senator Brown’s term.

I am not going to engage in post-election quarterbacking. So many others have that covered. But I do want to share what I witnessed on the campaign trail. These experiences were as, if not more, upsetting than the final outcome.

Leading up to the primary, when our group of local volunteers stood out in the cold, holding signs on street corners, most drivers passing by either demonstrated their support with a honk or a thumb’s up, or they ignored us. When we called to ask voters if they would support Martha Coakely, they answered yes, hung up, or responded with a quick, “I’m for Capuano, or Khazei, or Pagliuca.”

After the primary, when we made calls, we started hearing, “I would never vote for her,” or, “No way I’m voting for Coakley.” When we stood out on corners, some drivers would roll down their car windows and yell. “Go Scott Brown,” or “Coakley sucks.”

The #masen Twitter feed, which had been rather sleepy but mostly civil leading up to the primary, was suddenly flooded with #teaparty tweets, some of which contained crude, tasteless comments about Chappaquiddick and Mary Jo Kopechne.

The morning of the election, while holding a sign with two other women outside a polling location (which is also my child’s elementary school,) a man, in a truck, slowed down, rolled down his window, and yelled to us, “Martha Coakley is a fucking beast.”

At the end of a long day, I was waiting to get results at another polling location. A man, older than me, came in to check the numbers for Scott Brown. We introduced ourselves and he asked me if I actually liked my candidate, or was I just following party lines. I happen to be an Independent. He was talking to me when I excused myself to read a text from my husband. “Sweetheart,” he said. “You should be at home with him.” Then he proceeded to tell me I was a Socialist and I wouldn’t be happy until I turned the country into Sweden. Sweden, according to this man, is a country of “lard asses” who are lazy and don’t produce anything. Usually I try not to use one data point to describe an entire country. But I asked this man if he had ever been to Sweden. He had not. I have. In fact, I went to tour a manufacturing facility, and was impressed by the innovation I saw there.

Just as I was wondering what Sweden had to do with the Massachusetts special election, he brought the conversation back to Coakley.

“She is stupid,” he said.

“Actually, I think she is quite smart,” I responded.

“Stupid, stupid, stupid.”

“I disagree.”

“She doesn’t even know who Curt Schilling is.”
“I don’t care if my Senator can name the 2002 starting lineup for the Red Sox,” I said.

“She is STUPID.”

At that point the polling warden came over to share the results with us. I took out my notebook and pen and wrote them down. My Brown counterpart looked around for something to write on and then said, “You are going to write them down for me too, aren’t you?”

“No.”

“You’re not?” He seemed surprised.

“No.”

You really won’t help me?” He seemed shocked.

“No. I came prepared with a paper and pen. You did not. Who’s stupid now?”

It was that exchange, and the man swearing at me from his truck, that had me more depressed than the final results. So much rudeness. So much hate. And that, is what prevailed in this election.