A pinch of substance
REPUBLICAN Kerry Healey, confirming her underdog status, tried to revive her fortunes in last night's gubernatorial debate by emphasizing substantive differences with Deval Patrick, the Democrat and front-runner. But she was undercut by the intervention of Christy Mihos, the campaign's antic independent, and by the Romney-Healey administration's equivocal record on fiscal policy.
"Rolling back taxes is the key issue," she said, trying to use that Republican policy plank to make inroads among the independent voters and conservative Democrats who, polls indicate, are slipping toward Patrick. To make the point, she asked all the candidates to explain how they voted on the 2000 ballot question that called for an income tax rollback to 5 percent.
Before she could pin Patrick down, she had to endure Mihos's answer to the question. Of course he had voted "yes," he said, but then offered a lengthy explanation of his plan to stabilize property taxes while denouncing Romney and Healey for failing to get an income tax rollback through the Legislature.
The Mihos plan, which would freeze property taxes for existing homeowners but raise them for anyone buying a home, is unfair and unworkable. But mention of the property tax gives voters an occasion to wonder whether a lower income tax would mean less state aid to cities and towns, as happened when the income tax was partially rolled back to 5.3 percent. That's not a thought that generates support for Healey.
When Patrick's turn came, he ducked Healey's question on his 2000 vote, saying, "I have no idea." Then Grace Ross of the Green-Rainbow Party presented her plan to increase taxes on the rich. Patrick's views seemed moderate by comparison, and his refusal to answer the question got lost in the four-person exchange.
Elsewhere in the debate, Healey tried to emphasize her proposal on protecting victims of domestic violence and criticized Patrick's stand on offering in-state tuition rates to illegal immigrants. But Patrick, in statesmanlike fashion, praised Healey's ideas when he agreed with them and emphasized the complexities of the issue when he did not. Healey's jibe that insiders at the State House are looking forward to a Patrick victory did not provoke a rejoinder. It only reminded viewers that Patrick is far ahead in the latest opinion polls.
But if Healey was all substance at the Channel 4 debate, three hours earlier viewers of the Oprah Winfrey Show on Channel 5 had to endure Healey's reprehensible ad denouncing Patrick as an enabler of rapists. Healey is putting more positive ads on the air, but her campaign is still dragging its feet in the gutter.
