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Political Circuit: The art of the chair

E-mail|Link|Comments () September 11, 2009 03:10 PM

Globe Staff Photo/Yoon S. Byun

The candidates at Thursday night's debate.

Boston Mayor Thomas M. Menino's opponents are beginning to sound like students in a freshman art seminar as they deconstruct the symbolism in the mayor’s latest television ad, which shows his empty desk and chair magically transported to various locations throughout the city.

City Councilor Michael F. Flaherty Jr. said during Thursday night's debate that when he contemplates the barren furniture in the ad, he sees a symbol of all the students who had dropped out of school since the mayor took office in 1993.

“I think of that desk as 24,000 empty desks out there --- kids that don’t have a future, kids that are no longer employable or in some cases are incarcerated or are raising children who are now going to the Boston Public Schools themselves,” Flaherty said.

Councilor Sam Yoon advanced a more abstract theory, saying the furniture signified Menino himself, and his longevity in office.

“The chair? The picture of the chair?” Yoon said during the debate. “Mr. Mayor, you’ve been sitting in that chair for 16 years. It’s almost like you’ve become the chair. And when you become the chair, it’s like the system is you.”

The ad, brought to you by Hill, Holiday, features no people, not even the mayor or his typical advertising cast of frolicking children and beaming voters. Instead, it shows the mayor’s wooden desk and his plush leather chair on green parkland in West Roxbury, at the Institute of Contemporary Art in South Boston, and other locales.

“It’s not an empty desk,” said Nick Martin, a Menino campaign spokesman, offering his own interpretation. “The desk symbolizes the mayor’s presence in the neighborhoods."

Hmm. Maybe someone at the Massachusetts College of Art and Design can settle this once and for all.

-- MICHAEL LEVENSON

Did I mention how much I love labor?

State Senator Scott Brown has made no secret of his interest in Edward M. Kennedy's Senate seat. As a result, he's making no secret of his love for organized labor.

From his vantage point on the Legislature's Joint Committee on Election Laws, the Wrentham Republican on Thursday began by challenging calls by the state's leading Democrats to change state law to allow Governor Deval Patrick to appoint an interim senator while voters pick Kennedy's successor.

But then about three hours into the hearing, Brown changed his tone when he had to face AFL-CIO heavyweight Robert Haynes, among those pushing for the change in law.

"As you know, I always respect you and your group. And your endorsement in the last election, it meant a lot to me," Brown gushed after Haynes's testimony at the high-profile hearing. "I appreciate it."

In case the audience had missed the first toot of Haynes's horn, Brown sounded another.

"As you know, I got endorsed last time, and I have a lot of union members who call me on a regular basis, and your members have one of the best healthcare plans in the country," Brown said.

After paying additional compliments to the state of Massachusetts -- for its remarkable hospitals, doctors, insurance companies, and rate of insured residents -- Brown asked Haynes about health care.

Haynes, not missing the opportunity to flex his muscle, said he hoped Congress would get the health care debate right -- "like I hope you get this debate right about changing the election law."

-- STEPHANIE EBBERT

Martha Coakley walks with animals

Attorney General Martha Coakley's office has never lacked for media releases. Her press aides routinely let us know about settlements, enforcement actions, and tons of other stuff that evidently falls under her jurisdiction as the state's chief law enforcement officer.

But that flood of news out of the attorney general's office now takes on a new significance, with Coakley having announced that she will be a candidate in the special election to succeed Kennedy. Did you know that Coakley loves dogs? That she's built a new, state-of-the-art computer forensics lab? That she's squeezing every last dollar back from the Big Dig?

Well, now you do.

Her office just announced that she will be walking, along with her Labrador Retrievers Jackson and Beauregard, in the 29th Annual MSPCA-Angell Walk for Animals at the Common on Sunday. (Coakley will walk with the “Team Fur Fergus,” comprised of other office staff, in memory of Fergus, the cat of a staffer who died in a recent fire.)

Coakley's office is also offering a press tour Tuesday of a new lab in her Cyber Crime Division. "Members of the press will be able to see some of the new technology and techniques investigators will use to investigate cyber crimes throughout the state," the release states, touting Coakley's Cyber Crime Initiative, which allows investigators to mine computers, cell phones, laptops, PDAs, and GPS devices.

Among other recent pronouncements, Coakley's aides proudly touted the fact that she extracted an additional $900,000 from a Big Dig insurer.

The intended takeaway: An effective attorney general today, an effective senator tomorrow.

-- SCOTT HELMAN