Get your popcorn ready. It should be a brawl, probably one of the highest rated and most anticipated Monday night matchups in decades, kickoff at 9.
Of course you know we’re talking about the Hillary Clinton-Donald Trump mano a mano showdown, the first face-off between the one-time acquaintances in the six-week sprint to the November 8 election. Issues and expectations aside, it is must-see TV and, despite Trump’s grousing about going up against Monday Night Football, will be one of the few political events to upstage a prime time football game. It is the Super Bowl of presidential politics with observers and media outlets around the country treating it with similar hype.
Certainly some wonks will tune in for the substance, and many voters say they’re tired of the mud-tossing, but few think policy discussions will be what draws an estimated 100 million viewers to the 90-minute clash. In this extraordinary election year, nearly everyone will be tuning in for the WWF atmosphere featuring a reality TV star versus one of the most famous and disliked pols in modern history.
Observers were all aTwitter about the potential for a skin-crawling moment of awkwardness when it looked like former Bill Clinton paramour Gennifer Flowers would be front and center as a guest of Trump’s. Trump tweeted he might invite her to counter Clinton’s invitation to a front row seat for Dallas Mavericks owner and Trump nemesis Mark Cuban. Flowers tweeted her acceptance but Trump officials backed off, saying she was never formally invited.
The expectations aren’t particularly high for Trump while they’re stratospheric for the seasoned Clinton. But it’s not issues that will define the tussle, though current events will reveal a divide that both will have to overcome. The latest police shootings and heightened focus on racial tensions in the country will surely surface and will go a long way in defining which candidate can grab the middle in a race-riven country.
But while the bar is low for Trump, he’s also becoming the increasing focus of fact-checking, or at least different media outlets’ views of fact-checking. In advance of the debate, the Clinton camp issued a challenge to news outlets to fact-check Trump in real time, a subtle bit of pressure on moderators to let no statement go unchallenged.
But it wasn’t really necessary. A number of outlets offered a week or more of fact-checking The Donald and, unsurprisingly, the results did little to counter the notion he shoots loose from the lip.
The New York Times is using the currency of the event to flex its influence muscles, running its endorsement of Clinton on Sunday followed by a crack-back block of an editorial on Monday declaring Trump “the worst nominee put forward by a major party in modern American history.”
“Voters attracted by the force of the Trump personality should pause and take note of the precise qualities he exudes as an audaciously different politician: bluster, savage mockery of those who challenge him, degrading comments about women, mendacity, crude generalizations about nations and religions,” the Times writes.
The Boston Globe sent out an email to subscribers with a link to 10 stories to prep them for the debate, sort of a preseason primer.
For media and viewers alike, this is the Super Bowl, a championship heavyweight bout, a cage match to the death. What it is not is politics like we’ve ever seen. Sit back and enjoy the show.
JACK SULLIVAN
BEACON HILL
The State Ethics Commission says there’s no need for further investigation or disciplinary action for the two DCR officials suspended by Gov. Charlie Baker for throwing a Fourth of July party using state assets. (State House News Service)
MUNICIPAL MATTERS
A veteran and UMass Lowell student is helping reach out to veterans suffering from PTSD who may be suicidal as part of the “22 push-up challenge,” a national effort that is spotlighting the fact that 22 veterans commit suicide every day. (Lowell Sun)
Four people were killed early Sunday morning when a fire swept through their Greenfield home. (The Republican)
WASHINGTON/NATIONAL/INTERNATIONAL
After resisting calls to release videos of a police shooting of a black man in Charlotte, North Carolina, which triggered nearly a week of violent protests, the police chief finally made the tapes public but it caused more questions than gave answers. (New York Times)
A Maine restaurant owner’s stand against assault weapons draws fire. (Boston Globe)
ELECTIONS
A MetroWest Daily News editorial says studies that provide a rigorous test of the effect of urban charter schools make a compelling case for raising the cap.
Andover district school teachers put posters advocating a no vote on the cap-lift ballot question on school walls during a recent open house in violation of state ethics rules. (Eagle-Tribune)
Officials with the pro-marijuana group Yes on 4, in a meeting with the MetroWest Daily News editorial board, say they are set to launch an extensive TV ad and mailer campaign with an influx of cash from the socially progressive PAC New Action. More than $100,000 in donations to the pro-legalization effort have come from existing marijuana-related businesses. (Boston Herald)
Gov. Charlie Baker’s campaign committee coughed up nearly $56,000 from his 2014 campaign to the state — the most ever from one election — to cover illegal donations made to his account. (Boston Herald)
Springfield City Councilor Bud Williams, the Democratic nominee for a state rep seat, says it was an oversight that led him to omit several properties his wife owns from required state ethics filings. (MassLive)
BUSINESS/ECONOMY
Jeffrey Sachs says we need to think big and long-term about infrastructure planning and spending for a post-automobile era. (Boston Globe)
A Herald editorial says Wells Fargo CEO John Stumpf must go.
New data show millions of workers in the United States are finally climbing out of poverty thanks to higher wages. (New York Times)
More than half of nonprofit board chairs say they did nothing to prepare for their role, according to a new survey. (Chronicle of Philanthropy)
UTEC, which works to connect court-involved and at-risk youth with job opportunities, has been awarded $700,000 in federal funding to expand its mattress-recycling operation and add 28 new jobs. (Lowell Sun)
Mayor Marty Walsh says he’s willing to help try to broker a deal between a local contracting company and Boston area janitors, who have voted to authorize a strike if they can’t reach agreement on a new contract. (Boston Herald)
EDUCATION
Boston schools superintendent Tommy Chang says the system should consider scrapping most middle schools and adopting a 7-12 grade figuration for schools, which would mirror the structure of the city’s three exam schools. (Boston Globe) CommonWealth examined this idea in depth in 2007, when Boston was poised to welcome a new superintendent (who bowed out at the 11th hour) who advocated such a grade scheme.
HEALTH/HEALTH CARE
The Baker administration and housekeeping staff and other low-paid workers at nursing homes are at odds over whether a new state law that will boost wages for “direct care” workers at such facilities covers them or only more highly trained nursing staff. (Boston Globe)
The announcement by Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg and his wife Priscilla Chan that they will commit $3 billion from their foundation to eradicating and controlling disease is sure to have ripple effects in the Boston biomedical research world. (Boston Globe)
Obesity is preventing health care professionals from looking past the fat and treating patients for other illnesses because of attitudes, improper equipment, and long-held practices. (New York Times)
TRANSPORTATION
Massachusetts’ aging highway infrastructure ranks near the bottom nationally in cost-effectiveness and performance but the state has the country’s lowest fatality rate. (State House News)
CRIMINAL JUSTICE/COURTS
A Weymouth police officer shot a woman brandishing a knife. (Patriot Ledger)
Seven people were injured in a late-night brawl over the weekend outside a Boston Theater District nightclub. (Boston Herald)
A Millbury man was released from the House of Correction and sentenced to house arrest but he’s living in his car in the driveway because his home was condemned and boarded up while he was incarcerated. (Telegram and Gazette)
PASSINGS
Arnold Palmer, one of the greatest golfers of all time who made the game popular among the masses but who may be familiar to younger generations for the drink named after him, died Sunday at the age of 87. (New York Times)
The MetroWest Daily News editorial cited a report by the “respected Brookings Institution” in its support for charter schools. That so-called report used Ballotpedia as the source for Question 2 instead of the Massachusetts Secretary of State’s website. Usually, reputable researchers go to the actual source. Ballotpedia has little credibility especially on charter schools. That raises a red flag. But if you’re pro-charter schools then try to hang your hat on “In marked contrast, we find that the effects of charters in the suburbs and rural areas of Massachusetts are not positive. Our lottery estimates indicate that students at these charter schools do the same or worse than their peers at traditional public schools.” If charter schools are great…truly great…wouldn’t they be great everywhere?
The MetroWest Daily News editorial goes on to advocate for more charter schools because based on findings from the Brookings report but that report relied in large part on another report, “Charter School Demand and Effectiveness: A Boston Update,” done by a “team of researchers from MIT’s School Effectiveness and Inequality Initiative,” was commissioned by pro-charter schools The Boston Foundation with financial assistance from the pro-charter schools NewSchools Venture Fund. The Boston Foundation report was a joke. It didn’t look at charter schools forced to close during the period studied for being “poor academic performers” and other charter schools that “failed to provide adequate records” for the analysis. So how valid were the results if underperforming charter schools and some self-excluded charters weren’t included? VOTE NO on Question 2.
The Brookings “report” actually states: “Ohio (where presidential candidate Donald Trump recently made a visit to a charter school)…” Here’s the rest of that story from The Toledo Blade, “The Ohio Department of Education report card for 2014-15 gave the Cleveland Arts and Social Sciences Academy a D for ”performance index” and an F for ”indicators met.” VOTE NO on Question 2.
What’s going on with the charter schools in Boston with current applications to the state for more seats to expand enrollment?
Boston Collegiate Charter School – Level 2 Not meeting gap narrowing goals Low assessment participation (Less than 95%)
Bridge Boston Charter School – Insufficient Data
City on a Hill Charter Public School Dudley Square in Boston – Insufficient Data
City on a Hill Charter Public School Circuit Street in Boston – Level 1 Meeting gap narrowing goals
Boston Preparatory Charter Public School – Level 2 Not meeting gap narrowing goals
Helen Y. Davis Leadership Academy Charter Public School – Level 1 Meeting gap narrowing goals
KIPP Academy Boston Public Charter School – Insufficient data
To recap, of the seven Boston charter schools seeking authorization for more seats, two are Level 1, two are Level 2, and three have Insufficient Data. Wouldn’t you expect, in a year when this state has a ballot question for an unlimited expansion of the numbers of charter schools, the news media would at least look at the performance of Boston charters currently seeking more seats? Do we need an unlimited expansion of charter schools like that?
VOTE NO on Question 2.
http://www.getcharterfactsma.org see also SaveOurPublicSchoolsMA.com