The Gift That Keeps On Giving

My God, even when Patrick’s right, he’s wrong!

Beacon Hill has had more than its fair share of scandals this year. But Flowergate? Cigargate?

Yesterday, after legislators agreed to approve pension reform, Governor Deval Patrick sent House Speaker Robert A. DeLeo a box of cigars and Senate President Therese Murray some flowers.

Nice, right? You can bet the cigars weren’t White Owls purchased at a nearby CVS, and the flowers weren’t carnations grabbed from a street vendor. One senator, not exactly schooled in the floral arts, described the elegant bouquet as “expensive ones, not like $20 or $50 ones, but designer ones.”

In fact, they were so nice, sitting in a fancy vase, that they became a topic of conversation when the Senate held a closed-door caucus to discuss ethics reform in Murray’s office, with the flowers on display nearby.

Well, nice but for one nagging fact: They probably violated state ethics rules, which ban gifts of $50 or more to a public official in return for an official action. They certainly violated a key tenet of the proposed ethics overhaul Patrick is trying to push through the Legislature: an outright ban on gifts of any kind to public officials.

Last night, when a reporter inquired about the gifts, officials and their various spokespeople kicked into damage control.

Patrick aides argued a technicality, that since the gifts were to the offices of the House speaker and Senate president and not to them individually, no ethics laws were violated.

UPDATE: More from Scot Lehigh, the Herald and the Globe.

SECOND UPDATE: From Robert Ambrogi, Jeff Jacoby, the Herald and the Globe.

Book ‘Em

No wonder Gov. Patrick can’t stand conservative talk radio hosts. Here’s Howie Carr:

Shhhhh – keep it under your hat, because nobody’s supposed to know. But Deval Patrick grabbed an extra $382,500 last year on top of his governor’s salary of $140,535.

And Deval didn’t even report the mega-score on his annual sworn statement of financial interests to the State Ethics Commission. Surely the governor plans to close such unconscionable loopholes in his “landmark” ethics reform package.

Deval pocketed a $450,000 book advance (minus a 15 percent cut to his literary agent). But nothing was reported because a book advance apparently isn’t covered under “employment and other associations with businesses.”

Actually, Deval’s advance is $1.35 million, pretty damn good for a first-time author who’s never been on “American Idol” or tested positive for steroids. Deval will get another third of the money – $450,000 – when his (or some ghostwriter’s) manuscript is accepted, and a final $450,000 when it’s published.

So the governor continues his moonlighting – or should I say moonbatlighting. Working title: “Up From Texaco.”

No doubt he’ll be working hard on the tome this weekend out at his mansion in Richmond, after he delivers his not-at-all-anticipated speech to the Democratic state convention in Springfield.

Attending today’s dreary convention is proof that Deval is running for re-election. More evidence: the fact that his operatives, when they’re not testifying before the Sal DiMasi grand jury, continue trying to put a rocket in the pocket of Tim Cahill.

UPDATE: More from Holly Robichaud, WBZ, Wendy Murphy, CNN, the Herald and the Globe.

SECOND UPDATE: More from the Herald and Globe.

THIRD UPDATE: More from Holly Robichaud, the Lawrence Eagle-Tribune, the Herald and Globe.

A Futile Search for Competence

The Boston Globe on the Patrick administration’s follies.

The corruption indictment of former House Speaker Salvatore F. DiMasi contains what critics are calling an unflattering behind-the-scenes look at Governor Deval Patrick’s administration, depicting its officials as bowing to political pressure to award a $13 million computer software contract that was allegedly rigged.

No Patrick officials have been implicated in criminal wrongdoing. Yet the scandal, one of the biggest to roil Beacon Hill in decades, has the potential to create political problems for the governor as he pushes forward on ethics law changes and lays the groundwork for a reelection campaign.

Yesterday, critics seized on the impression that the Patrick administration, which awarded one of two Cognos ULC contracts cited in the indictment, failed to respond to a series of red flags indicating that DiMasi and others were exerting heavy influence.

“What the speaker is accused of doing is absolutely wrong – and he should be held accountable – but it takes two to tango,” said House minority leader Bradley H. Jones Jr., a North Reading Republican. “Somebody in the administration knew it was important to the speaker, and somebody made the decision to go forward with it.”

DiMasi is accused by federal authorities of reaping $57,000 from the software company even as his associates pushed state officials to award contracts to the firm. Three friends were also indicted. No further indictments are expected.

“There was a lot of insider baseball going on, and you wonder how the contract got approved in the first place,” said Senate minority leader Richard R. Tisei, a Wakefield Republican. “Was awarding that contract in the best interest of the people in Massachusetts, or was it done to placate the speaker? That’s really the question.”

Yesterday Patrick’s office acknowledged that the administration could have acted sooner to scuttle the project. But administration officials said Patrick and his staff were unaware that DiMasi was pushing for a contract award to Cognos, and they denied any deal-making with the speaker.

“There have been absolutely no allegations by the investigators of misconduct of any kind by any senior Patrick administration official,” said spokesman Joe Landolfi. “We are confident that senior administration officials acted appropriately at all times.”

Landolfi declined to discuss specific allegations in the indictment, citing the ongoing federal investigation.

UPDATE: More from the AP, Michael Graham, Joan Vennochi, the Herald and WBUR.

David (R) vs. Goliath (D): Republicans Take Down DiMasi

Everyone loves to see the underdog win.

House Speaker Salvatore F. DiMasi is set to become the latest to leave the top post under a cloud of controversy, setting the stage for a bitter power struggle with his announcement last night that he is ending his 30-year political career, effective tomorrow.

DiMasi, reeling from ethics probes connected to his former campaign treasurer, ended months of speculation during which his subordinates have openly campaigned to replace him.

DiMasi, who also will give up his North End representative’s seat, follows Charles Flaherty and Thomas Finneran as the third consecutive House speaker to leave amid scandal. DiMasi has been under investigation for receiving a loan from a friend who was seeking support for a ticket-scalping bill.

With the departure of House Speaker Sal DiMasi–wow, three in a row, what an accomplishment–one can not underestimate the power the minority party had in making it possible. The Republican Party, a small spec of red in an ocean of blue, with its tiny slingshot, was able to put the wheels in motion (via ethics complaints and fact finding) to bring DiMasi down. If you’d to give credit where credit is due, thank the Massachusetts Republican Party.

Despite the truth behind DiMasi’s departure, he’s playing it off like he’s leaving is due to natural causes; as if in his mind, it’s just time to move on.

“I am excited on the one hand to move on to other challenges and new opportunities. I am sad to leave the House of Representatives,” DiMasi wrote. He has faced mounting pressure and revelations of potential impropriety. Despite widespread rumors he may be directly implicated, he has not been charged with any wrongdoing.

While this state is virtually under one party rule, the resignation of DiMasi and his predecessors is testament to the fact that absolute power corrupts absolutely, and we should be weary of any political party holding 90% of the legislative seats on Beacon Hill.

Let’s hope that DiMasi’s resignation signals a change in this state.

Senate President Lets Marzilli Keep Chairmanship, Stipend

Senator Bob Hedlund (R-Weymouth) asked Senate President Therese Murray to take away Senator James Marzilli’s chairmanship, citing that he is “clearly incapable of fulfulling his duties as chairman…I cannot think of a single argument why the taxpayers of Massachusetts should be paying for a chairmanship stipend to a senator who is incapable of fulfilling his duties and who has announced he does not plan to return to the Senate.”

Sounds reasonable, but Murray will do no such thing, and Marzilli will continue to take his $7,500 tax-payer funded stipend.

“The Senate has a process in place through its Committee on Ethics and Rules to discipline a senator if and when a legal matter is resolved,” said Murray spokesman David Falcone when asked about Hedlund’s letter yesterday.

The Senate Ethics Committee is investigating whether Marzilli (D-Arlington) should be removed from office but won’t make findings public until after the charges against him are settled in court.

Marzilli will have a tough time fulfilling his chairmanship duties from McLean Hospital, let alone his duties as a state senator. Seeing as Marzilli was caught trying to grab several woman and ask them for sex, it’s not going out on a limb to suggest that this is political backscratching.

Considering this is Senator Marzilli, maybe there is more than backscratching going on…