At a Minimum, A Progressive Ought to Be On Time.
By Jim Conley • Dec 17th, 2007 • Email This Post to a Friend •
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It seems that Brookline PAX met last night to discuss “strategy” on the Arthur Conquest matter. Typical PAX, addressing the issue a week after the Brookline Selectmen vote to deny Conquest an appeal of his complaint into police mis-conduct from the May 24th Brawl at Town Hall.
Maybe they’re gearing up for Nancy Daly’s “White People’s Symposium on Race Relations.”
Remember this when PAX sends you a slate of “progressive candidates” during May’s local election.
Oh, and is it possible to do a recall of former PAX Chair and current Brookline Selectman Jesse Mermell from her seat on the board? I’ll bet a lot of people voted for Mermell thinking that she believed in civil rights, the separation of church and state, as a well as a host of other progressive principles.
Turns, out she’s nothing but Bobby Allen’s mini-me.
Update: Apparently, Brookline PAX will issue a statement urging the board of selectmen to reconsider their denial of Conquest’s appeal.
What’s next? A resolution reaffirming the separation of church and state in the matter of $6 million to the Boston Archdiocese for the St. Aidan’s housing project? What was once a proud progressive organization in Brookline is now a laughingstock.
Here’s the problem with the selectmen reconsidering Conquest’s appeal - the three knuckleheads (Allen, Mermell and Daly) on that review board say that they made their decision based on the facts. Those facts haven’t changed, and reopening the case would suggest a motive other than a dispassionate review of the report made by police.
This proves, once again, that a board of selectmen is the worst possible panel to review police mis-conduct. Not just because there’s a chance that they’ll cave to political pressure and reverse a vote. But because a group like PAX thinks they might.
Jim Conley is publisher of On Brookline.
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I wonder how many at this PAX strategy meeting might have said or thought: “Why, some of my best friends are _________.”
Following the celebration of the Festival of Lights over the holidays, perhaps in January PAX can sponsor the Festival of Rights in conjunction with the celebration MLK, Jr. Day.
At the close of this PAX strategy meeting did those in attendance sing: “We Shall Come Over”? Better late than “Never Again”?
Well prior to this past May’s election for the open Selectman seat, I had noted that over the years I have lived in Brookline (1973) the once strong role of PAX in local politics was becoming more accommodating as the development (read real estate) community was taking charge, sort of like the Reagan Revolution. Then, with the election coming up earlier this year, i sensed the “marriage” that took place with Bobby Allen’s management of Jesse Mermell’s campaign as a final co-opting of what was left of PAX’s principles. By the way, this “marriage” may have come about NOT because Allen changed his priniciples (whatever, if any, they may have been), but because Allen may have feared a challenge from a young Jesse down the road. (Keep in mind that Allen was not a big vote getter in his last campaign.) Perhaps the PAX elite felt that this was the only way that PAX’s candidate could prevail.
What happened to PAX had been happening to the Democrats nationally since the 2000 election. Now that the tide started to turn with the 2006 congressional elections, the Democrats semed to be energized for 2008. But there are segments of the Democratic party concerned with how the party may be perceived as weak on national security issues, who are prepared NOT to assert Democratic principles. Why should the Democrats give up on their principles? Hopefully they won’t.
Now back to PAX. Go back to your principles, not just in words but in deeds. Fight the good fight for principles. Come back. Come over, so we can overcome, now.