Salvatore DiMasi

Latest Articles

Can Beacon Hill do better?

Gambling and education take center stage
With DiMasi gone, the idea of casino gambling is again alive.
By EDITORIAL | September 23, 2009

Stonewalled: what a riot!

Letters to the Boston editor, June 26, 2009
I was excited to read the “Trail of Tunes” feature about outdoor music festivals in the Phoenix Summer Guide.
By BOSTON PHOENIX LETTERS | June 24, 2009

How House progressives have let you down — and why they'll do it again
Is the Massachusetts House of Representatives beyond all hope? Under Democratic leadership, the song has pretty much remained the same for the last decade and a half: an insular and out-of-touch legislature is lost in its own constricted and often petty perspectives.
By DAVID S. BERNSTEIN | June 19, 2009

Weakened watchdogs

If the Globe shrinks, will Beacon Hill run amok?
The ongoing crisis at the Boston Globe shouldn't be troubling just to devotees of the sports pages and "Coupling." Citizens who prize strong coverage of the Massachusetts State House ought to be fretting over the paper's fate, too. With its four-person State House contingent, the Globe has a stronger presence under the Golden Dome than any other major Boston media outlet.
By ADAM REILLY | June 19, 2009

Massholes

A timeline of modern-day state house corruption
Scandal and accusations of corruption are nothing new to Massachusetts state government. Hutchinson was accused of enforcing the much-despised Stamp Act and Tea Act in part because his brother-in-law was stamp master, and two of his sons were designated tea consignees.
By DAVID S. BERNSTEIN | June 17, 2009

Roast pork

As our state's bumbling, craven, and inept elected officials stumble toward summer, we get a few good laughs out of their promises for reform
Back in January, Governor Deval Patrick declared a "season of significant government reform" on Beacon Hill.
By DAVID S. BERNSTEIN | May 27, 2009

Despot for attention

Plus, vote for Passoni
Former vice-president Dick Cheney has taken his torture tour all over the place in the past few weeks, waging an ongoing campaign to defend what the Bush administration called "enhanced interrogation."
By EDITORIAL | May 13, 2009

All quiet on the Times Co. front

The Globe crisis leaves New York speechless. Plus, Morrissey Boulevard's problematic political fan club
When I heard this past Friday that the New York Times Company had delivered a radical ultimatum to the Boston Globe 's 13 unions I called Globe spokesman Bob Powers to check it out. He wasn't talking.
By ADAM REILLY | April 09, 2009

Tone deaf

Can Gov. Deval hear the thunder of jeers?
March has not been kind to Deval Patrick.
By DAVID S. BERNSTEIN | March 25, 2009

Black power

Letters to the Boston editor, March 20, 2009
Brooding about whether Barack Obama would have become president if he had been a more “traditionally black candidate,” i.e., a descendant of slaves, is a self-indulgence that trivializes the enormity of what has occurred.
By BOSTON PHOENIX LETTERS | March 19, 2009

Youth infusion

The surprisingly diverse leaders of team DeLeo. Plus, do environmentalists have reason to worry?
In DeLeo's restructuring, white, non-Hispanic men older than 45 fell from power in droves.
By DAVID S. BERNSTEIN | February 19, 2009

Money talks

Can Beacon Hill reform itself when the State Senate President and the new House Speaker rake in so much lobbyist cash?
To hear our state legislators talk lately, Beacon Hill is all about reforming the sketchy, poorly governed relationships between lawmakers and lobbyists.
By DAVID S. BERNSTEIN | February 06, 2009

Rescuing the Globe

10 ways to bail out Boston's sinking paper of record. Plus, spinning Bill Kristol's brief time at the Times .
If you work at the Boston Globe , and have any bright ideas on how to stop that paper's downward spiral, management is all ears. At least, that's the party line.
By ADAM REILLY | February 02, 2009

The pain hits home

Boston faces a sobering year
With unsuccessful wars running in Afghanistan and Iraq, and the worst economic crisis in almost 80 years likely to get worse long before it gets better, Barack Obama will face challenges of historic proportions when he becomes the nation's 44th president next week.
By EDITORIAL | January 14, 2009

All in the family

Henry Louis Gates Jr.’s New Yorker advertorial. Plus, Chuck turner goes all Chuck Norris.
The December 1 New Yorker featured a five-page story by Henry Louis Gates Jr. on his efforts to use DNA testing to clarify his ancestry.
By ADAM REILLY | December 08, 2008

The Chuck Turner conspiracy?

Unheard Voices
Sure, some news outlets have competently covered City Councilor Chuck Turner's recent arrest for allegedly accepting a cash bribe in exchange for a liquor license — and then lying about it.
By CHRIS FARAONE | November 28, 2008

A moral dilemma

State and local politics is paralyzed by fear
We need serious action and strong leadership — and a public trust that is unlikely to be given.
By EDITORIAL | November 26, 2008

The enthusiasm gap

This election, with Obama having stoked pennant fever in Denver, it is the Dems who have cornered the excitement market
The selection of gun-shooting, anti-abortion, creationist, doctrinaire conservative Alaska Governor Sarah Palin as John McCain’s vice-presidential nominee has finally got the GOP’s conservative base excited.
By DAVID S. BERNSTEIN | September 03, 2008

Voting right

Why Beacon Hill should adopt same-day voting and join the national popular-vote movement. Plus, that Obama cover.
The Massachusetts Legislature is expected to vote in the next several days on two proposals that would make democracy, well, more democratic.
By EDITORIAL | July 16, 2008

Open book?

Sal DiMasi is an embattled politician. His wife is an aspiring talk-show host. Welcome to New England Cable News’ ethics problem.
On any given day, New England Cable News features more smart, substantive politics coverage than any other Boston television station.
By ADAM REILLY | May 21, 2008

Sunshine needed

Political transparency is key if DiMasi is to transcend his crisis
Sal DiMasi has a track record of great accomplishment as Speaker of the House, with victories that include health-care reform, gay-marriage protection, and an economic-development package that offers unprecedented support for the arts, to cite just three examples.
By EDITORIAL | May 14, 2008

Hardball

How Herald publisher Pat Purcell could pitch inside — and brush back the Globe
Once upon a time, two daily newspapers battled in Boston.
By ADAM REILLY | May 08, 2008

So to speak

Letters to the Bostone editor, May 2, 2008
The article attacking House Speaker Sal DiMasi by David S. Bernstein was offensive character assassination based on ethnic stereotyping and cute political correctness.
By BOSTON PHOENIX LETTERS | April 30, 2008

Trouble 'round the bend?

MBTA workers have been without a contract for two years. Arbitration will settle the matter soon, but could stir an angry hornets’ nest for 2010.
Perhaps because it hasn’t exploded into a public shutdown of services (as happened a few years ago in New York), arguably the most important fact about the MBTA has escaped public notice: most of its workers have been without a contract for nearly two years.
By DAVID S. BERNSTEIN | April 30, 2008

Communication breakdown

How did Deval Patrick's greatest strength become a dangerous weakness?
You campaign in poetry, Mario Cuomo famously claimed, but you govern in prose. Don’t buy the dichotomy.
By ADAM REILLY | April 24, 2008

DiMasi’s sheep

How Stepford politics rule Beacon Hill
DiMasi’s overwhelming victory in the recent casino vote — in which only 34 of 140 Democrats voted against his plan to banish the bill for further study — was actually, as meager as it was, an unusual show of dissent.
By DAVID S. BERNSTEIN | April 09, 2008

Four-star rebuttal

Letters to the Boston editor, April 4, 2008
I wonder if Peary realizes just how detrimental his dismissive panning of this movie could be?
By BOSTON PHOENIX LETTERS | April 02, 2008

No side bets

The governor’s gaming legislation crapped out, but are casinos still alive in a compromise? Plus, a school-budget crisis could start a political firestorm.
Opponents of legalized gaming in Massachusetts are celebrating the death this past week of Governor Deval Patrick’s bill to license casinos, which was crushed by a seemingly decisive margin of more than two-to-one.
By DAVID S. BERNSTEIN | March 26, 2008

Whither the GOP?

With Democrats in total control of state government, the Massachusetts GOP should be a rising voice of dissent. Instead, it seems more impotent than ever.
Ask people to name the leading voice of opposition on Beacon Hill these days, and you’re likely to be told House Speaker Sal DiMasi.
By DAVID S. BERNSTEIN | March 19, 2008

Cash carousel

Many things changed this year on Beacon Hill, but not the power of the almighty dollar
Even though the dollar has taken an international whupping of late, there remains at least one place where the love of the greenback remains strong: Beacon Hill.
By DAVID S. BERNSTEIN | January 30, 2008

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