Today Is Election Day In Massachusetts

Whoever wins the Democratic primary in MA-05 today will be Congress' next member-- and they walk right into the dysfunctional mess in DC. Only one candidate is prepared to walk into that mess and take a significant role and that's Carl Sciortino. No way to be sure who's going to win today. The EMILY's List candidate, Katherine Clark wrote herself a check for a quarter million dollars to buy the seat and EMILY's List continues to pour massive amounts of money into the race-- another $58,666 just last week from their shady Women Vote SuperPAC that ran the misleading ads suggesting that Elizabeth Warren endorsed their horribly flawed pro-domestic spying candidate. Warren, of course, refused to do any such thing. In fact, all the congressional progressives who have endorsed in this race-- Alan Grayson, Raul Grijalva, Mark Takano, Jared Polis and Keith Ellison-- have endorsed Sciortino. Sunday night Grayson sent out a finally message to his Massachusetts supporters urging them to get out and vote for Carl.

I always thought that defending Social Security and Medicare was a good thing. But apparently, the corporate media doesn't agree with me. So the corporate media has dumped all over Congressional candidate Carl Sciortino-- for defending Social Security and Medicare.



Earlier this year, as you may recall, there was a lot of nattering about cutting Social Security benefits by messing with the cost-of-living adjustment (COLA). I didn't like that. My philosophy is simple: If it ain't broke, don't break it. So I authored the Grayson-Takano letter, pledging to vote against any and every cut in Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid benefits. Almost 50 of my House colleagues joined me. We posted the same pledge at No-Cuts.com, and that helped us to deliver almost 3,000,000 petition signatures to the White House and to the House Speaker against earned benefit cuts.



Call me naïve, but I think that it's very important to let the voters know where every candidate stands. So I have encouraged Congressional candidates across the country to take the pledge, and promise to vote against earned benefit cuts.

Carl Sciortino is running to replace now-Senator Ed Markey in the U.S. House of Representatives. He did just that. Carl Sciortino promised to protect Social Security and Medicare from benefit cuts.


That pledge should have earned Sciortino applause. Instead, it earned him a nasty smack from the Boston Globe. By way of background, the Boston Globe is now owned by a Wall Street commodities and futures trader (but then again, what isn't?). Needless to say, Wall Street wants to privatize Social Security, and voucherize Medicare. So this week, the Boston Globe condemned Sciortino's staunch support for Social Security and Medicare, citing it as evidence that Sciortino lacks "maturity." (Excuse me, but isn't it precisely the "mature" ones among us who are most dependent on Social Security and Medicare?)

The Boston Globe chose to endorse a different candidate in Carl's race, on the theory that her stated willingness to cut Social Security and Medicare supposedly marked her as the "mature" candidate, even though this might be "disappointing to liberals." (Irony alert: the other candidate actually had pledged to a liberal group that she would not cut Social Security and Medicare, just before pledging to the Boston Globe that she would. So it appears that pandering and prevarication are the best marks of "maturity.")

The good voters of Massachusetts are about to choose between Carl Sciortino, a fierce defender of Social Security and Medicare, and another candidate who stands for I-don't-know-what. Shortly, one of these two candidates will be serving in the U.S. House of Representatives, and voting on our Social Security and our Medicare.



I think that we had better support Carl Sciortino. Right now. Because our future is at stake.



Last call. Tuesday is Election Day in Carl's district.


 The race is all about turn-out now, of course, and Carl has an outstanding field team. Blue America's giant electronic billboard is now flashing a "Vote today" message, along with messages about being a proud liberal, a proponent of equal pay for women and someone willing to stand up to the NRA. We'll update this post tonight when the votes are counted.