Just go the Boston Globe's site, boston.com, and search for Deval Patrick, and you will find articles like this one from March. Bear in mind that the Globe is just as liberal a paper as the NYT (which owns it), and that both Gov. Patrick and Speaker DiMasi are Democrats.
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Patrick's challenge now is to march forward, chin up
Political hit could bring lessons for budget, next push
By Frank Phillips
Globe Staff / March 21, 2008
Losing a political fight over casinos that left many in his liberal base disillusioned and his relationship with House Speaker Salvatore F. DiMasi in tatters, Governor Deval Patrick now faces the difficult task up of picking up the pieces and moving on, in search of victories elsewhere.
The House's rejection of a key part of his economic agenda yesterday was clearly the biggest legislative and political setback so far for the freshman governor in the second year of his four-year term.
In the short run, the struggle enhanced DiMasi's image as a powerful legislative leader who orchestrated the defeat, while leaving Patrick to downplay the damage and lick his wounds, out of state.
Patrick did not even stick around for yesterday's final House vote, which was set up Wednesday by a negative recommendation in committee. He took off for New York City yesterday morning on what aides would only say was personal business. When he returns, he will have to start figuring out how to close a budget gap of about $1.3 billion without the help of casino revenues.
Measuring the lasting impact of the defeat was difficult yesterday, analysts said. The governor attempted to minimize the damage this week by suggesting that the news media made too much of the casino proposal in the first place.
Still, some veteran analysts think Patrick could bounce back from the drubbing at the hands of the politically streetwise speaker if the governor learns some lessons about how to get along on Beacon Hill.
"He took a political risk, and he has paid a price," said Stephen P. Crosby, dean of the McCormack Graduate School of Policy Studies at the University of Massachusetts at Boston. "But it is not something anybody should whack the guy for. Hopefully, his skills have improved from the experience, and he has learned something, so that next time he will play his cards better."
"When push comes to shove, particularly on a close issue, it is tough to beat the speaker," Crosby said. "It's clear that Patrick was learning how to play the game."
Patrick came to office scornful of what he said was "politics as usual" on Beacon Hill. But the struggle over casinos highlighted his increasing reliance on campaign fund-raising from special interests, lobbying and bargaining with legislators for votes behind closed doors, and cutting deals with legislative leaders - all the elements of the business-as-usual system he professed to want to change during his 2006 campaign.
"He faces a lot of wily veterans in the House and Senate that have been up there for decades," said Warren Tolman, a former Democratic senator from Watertown. "The more you fight these battles the better you get."
One of Patrick's most immediate problems is that the casino initiative alienated a good chunk of his political base, particularly the progressive Democratic coalition that was at the core of his landslide election in 2006.
"I am saddened that he has greatly disillusioned his political base," said state Representative Jay Kaufman, a Lexington Democrat and early Patrick supporter who voted against the casino plan.
Patrick and his aides are now trying to move public attention beyond the defeat by his political nemesis DiMasi. Already, the governor has tried to downplay the setback by diminishing the importance that the casino plan had in his economic agenda, a sharp contrast to its portrayal as a major initiative that would provide thousands of new jobs and revenues.
"This got the amount of attention, with due respect to the media, that was out of proportion to its importance to us," Patrick told reporters Wednesday night as he all but conceded the defeat after a committee vote recommending against the proposal.
He cited other major proposals - some eclipsed by his plan to license three resort casinos - including his $1 billion initiative to boost the life sciences industry over 10 years; closing what he calls corporate income tax loopholes; encouraging development of clean-energy projects; transportation and environmental bond bills; and new competition in the Massachusetts auto insurance industry.
The state budget will also present new challenges, especially in what appears to be a deepening national recession. Patrick has been meeting with economic advisers and business leaders as he prepares to make a major policy speech on the economy, outlining his plans to help insulate the state from the downturn.
Some veteran State House figures suggest that, while the speaker may have won this battle, DiMasi may lose ground on Beacon Hill if legislators and the public disapprove of the arm-twisting and pressure tactics he used to defeat Patrick's casinos bill.
Administration insiders also are convinced that the governor's insistence on waging the fight for casinos has forced DiMasi to accept Patrick's other initiatives just to show that he can be a cooperative coleader at the State House. They point to House passage of Patrick's $1 billion, 10-year life sciences bill, DiMasi's agreeing to tighten corporate tax code language in exchange for a reduction in corporate tax rates, and the speaker's approval of an overhaul of the state's education governing boards that gives the governor broad powers to set policy.
Senator Mark C. Montigny, a New Bedford Democrat and a casino opponent, said that in the end both Patrick and DiMasi came out with their strength intact.
"In the long run, the governor is stronger," Montigny said. "He basically participated and led the way in the very messy process called democracy."
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