“What do you have to lose?”
That’s what I would say at the Massachusetts GOP convention in Worcester tomorrow if I were one of the three candidates for governor.
That would be my pitch not just to the delegates, but to the voters of the Commonwealth as the election nears.
“What do you have to lose?”
That was Donald Trump’s pitch to black audiences back in 2016. Basically, he was telling them, look how terrible things are for you under the Democrats. How can it get any worse?
Why not take a chance? Why not try to change your luck?
I recorded a brief statement to be played at the start of tomorrow’s convention, and now I wish I’d remembered to use that old Trump line, because it does sum up the current situation Massachusetts finds itself in.
Like every Democrat, Gov. Maura Healey wants to make everything in this campaign about Trump. In her elite social circles, everyone has Trump Derangement Syndrome (TDS).
Among Maura and her twee crew of trust-funded blow-in drifters, you must have Stage 4 TDS, at least if you want to be In with the In Crowd. Terminal TDS is not optional, it’s a requirement.
But the fact is, Democrats are not getting the job done, not anywhere but most assuredly not in Massachusetts.
Granted, a poll came out last week in regime-controlled media and supposedly Healey is ahead by, what, 30 points. This was in the same failing newspaper that fluffs for all Democrats all the time, that once predicted Martha Coakley would beat Scott Brown like a drum.
More recently, just last month, that sheet’s sports shills declared, as usual, that this year’s Red Sox team was the best ever, definitely going to the playoffs, no doubt about it whatsoever!
How’s that prediction working out for them?
But things are so bad in Massachusetts that not even the Globe can cover up everything anymore. The other day, they ran this headline:
“Dominican national charged in MassHealth fraud, identity theft scheme, prosecutors say.”
Dominican national? That’s what he is, of course, but official Globe policy is to never mention… the truth. He was “living in Brockton.” That makes him a “Brockton man.”
Maybe things are changing a little. Yesterday the New Hampshire attorney general put out a press release about a 47-year-old man “arrested for unemployment fraud.”
Just a routine press release, right? But it suddenly occurred to me that I don’t think I have read about any Democrat in Massachusetts ever arresting anyone for “unemployment fraud.” Have you?
Democrats don’t arrest Democrats – professional courtesy. Same with the Haitian food stamp grifter on Blue Hill Avenue, or the two Stoneham cops who stole $40 million from MassSaves and not one single Democrat batted an eye.
All law enforcement is left to the feds –those evil Republicans. Democrats can’t be bothered protecting Americans, only illegal alien criminals.
Massachusetts voters, do you like paying for all this?
Vote Republican – what have you got to lose?
Tomorrow’s GOP convention is at the DCU Center, the site of one of Trump’s most famous moments in his first campaign.
It was November 2015, and Trump was railing about food stamps when suddenly an obese Democrat stood up and began screaming at the candidate. Trump pointed at him.
“That guy’s got a serious weight problem. Go home! Start exercising.”
Then Trump stopped talking as security grabbed the fatty and hustled him out of the hall. The speech was being carried on assorted cable TV channels, and Trump waited until the Democrat was gone before he began speaking again.
“You know, it’s amazing,” he said. “I mentioned food stamps and that guy who’s seriously overweight went crazy!”
The arena erupted in applause. Everyone had been thinking exactly the same thing, but they never expected any politician to state the obvious.
Nothing so memorable will said at the convention tomorrow, but all three candidates have a chance to stand out at least a little.
In California, one of the Republican candidates for governor is the sheriff of Riverside County. He’s got a campaign slogan that would work for any Massachusetts Republican.
“Vote (fill in the name) – Because I don’t want to move.”
It’s another way to connect directly to the voters. Every taxpayer is familiar with the scandals of LaMar Cook, Healey’s two cancelled natural-gas pipelines, the $4 billion Healey hotel catastrophe, the defiance of the electorate’s will on the legislative audit, etc. etc.
Make it personal, candidates. Ask the delegates: Do you know somebody who has fled Maura’s Massachusetts Miasma? How about your kids? Can they afford to stay here? Will they follow their jobs when their companies flee to America?
Maybe you wildly overspent to buy a house in a nice suburb because it has a good school system. But now local Democrats are clamoring to build public housing next to the T station in order to flood the town with illegal aliens to destroy both your public schools and your safe streets.
There’s only so much a governor can do, with a Democrat super majority in the legislature and an unbelievably corrupt hack state judiciary backing them up in return for endless pay raises.
You think you’re angry about the stonewalling on the legislative audit? Wait until the voters pass the state income tax cut in November – from 5 to 4 percent – and the hacks refuse to enforce that one (as they’ve done before).
The GOP candidates for governor are fine tuning their speeches today, I’m sure. After all, they each paid the Mass GOP $50,000 for the right to speak to the convention delegates tomorrow.
But they need that zinger, that one-liner that’ll light up social media Sunday. Or at least not be totally ignored by the time they’re back home.
So candidates, my advice is to keep your pitch as basic as possible. Tell them why they should vote Republican, and put it in terms simple enough to be understood by anyone unfortunate enough to be living in Massachusetts right now:
“What have you got to lose?”