Keep politicians out of your pockets

The top of the ticket for the Massachusetts GOP this year is beyond hopeless. But if you work for a living and pay taxes, you still need to get out and try to salvage some of the down-ballot races from the impending electoral carnage.

It’s strange how similarly 2022 seems to be shaping up to 1972 – a huge year for Republicans, except in one state, and guess what, it looks like it’s going to be the same state holding out this year as it was a half-century ago.

But enough doom and gloom. Let’s get down to what can still be salvaged, starting with referendum questions 1 and 4. Vote no and no.

Question 1 would establish a graduated state income tax. You are told, endlessly, by all the Beautiful People, that the tax hike from 5% to 9% would affect only “millionaires” and that the money would be “earmarked” for so-called education and infrastructure. Wink wink, nudge nudge.

It’s all BS, and you know it from how many millions the welfare-industrial complex is spending to enact this multi-billion-dollar grift.

They’ve already been defeated five times at the ballot box, but now they think the electorate is sufficiently dumbed down to cut their own throat. Sadly, they may be correct.

The hackerama certainly doesn’t need any more money – they’re already required to return $3 billion to working people. The state’s rainy-day fund is stuffed with $7 billion. And even the Globe is pointing out that revenue cannot be earmarked except by the Legislature.

By the way, that’s the same Legislature that’s scheming to prevent that $3 billion in excess funds from going back to the people who actually earned the money, because the hacks want to instead squander your cash on the drug-addled, shiftless non-working classes.

Speaking of which, there’s Question 4 – drivers’ licenses for illegal aliens. What could possibly go wrong? Do I have to draw you a diagram?

Beyond the referenda, there is one winnable statewide race – for auditor. Anthony Amore is the GOP candidate, and the political death cult that is the MassGOP state committee, led by Jim “Jones” Lyons, despises Amore.

What more do you need to know? Vote Amore.

On the Cape, both the GOP district attorney and the sheriff are retiring. Barnstable County’s going wobbly, which is all the more reason to vote for Rep. Tim Whelan for sheriff, and for Dan Higgins as district attorney for the Cape and the Islands.

We need more sane people in elective office, especially law enforcement.

Bristol County Sheriff Tom Hodgson has been a rock for the working classes these last few doleful years, which is why the hackerama is throwing everything at him but the kitchen sink. The Democrats have a hack’s hack, Mayor Paul Heroux of Attleboro, running against him. Do the right thing.

Tim Cruz is the district attorney of Plymouth County. I don’t think he’s in trouble, but he’s running against a lunatic who’s basically the Ricardo Arroyo of Plymouth County. How do you suppose not prosecuting most crimes in Brockton would work out?

Again, the recurring question: what could possibly go wrong? You cannot take any chances, especially in these local prosecutors’ races.

There aren’t many competitive legislative fights, which is pathetic. The Republicans now control only about 30 of the 200 seats in the General Court, and could even end losing a few more Nov. 8.

Rep. Shawn Dooley of Norfolk is running for the Senate seat now held by uber-moonbat Becca Rausch of Needham. It’s traditionally a GOP district and it’s winnable, if Dooley can withstand the looming landslides in the statewide races at the top of the ballot.

Dooley is giving up his House seat, and running to succeed him is Marcus Vaughn. He’s qualified, and he’s also black – the sad-sack House GOP leadership on Beacon Hill needs an infusion of fresh blood almost as badly as the Jonestown cult on the state committee does.

How about Chris Coute, a city councilor in Taunton? He’s an ally of Mayor Shaunna O’Connell, a non-Kool Aid drinking GOP officeholder who will be one of the surviving Republicans picking up the pieces after Nov. 8.

Evan Gendreau is running a good race in the 3rd Bristol District, which includes all of Westport and parts of other communities down in the Bayou.

Other candidates seeking open House seats that went Republican in 2020 include Tracy Post, who’s running in Rep. Tim Whelan’s mid-Cape district, and Andy Shepherd, who’s trying to succeed Sheila Harrington in the Groton-Pepperell-Townsend-Lunenberg district.

Harrington grabbed a hack clerk magistrate’s job earlier this year.

Sen. Barry Finegold is one of those career Democrat hacks who gave up his House seat to run and lose for higher office and then crawled back to the legislature. Now he’s telling people he’s got his hands full with Sal DeFranco, an ex-Navy SEAL who owns coffee shops.

If you can, try to help Finegold’s nightmare come true in 20 days.

A couple of incumbent state reps have tough fights. Rep. Dave DeCoste of Norwell is always on the right side for the taxpayers. Rep. Lenny Mirra of Georgetown is a little squishier, but still a far better alternative than any Democrat.

Bottom line: whoever the Republican is running for the Legislature, he or she is almost certainly preferable to the Democrat, if only to prevent the state from becoming even more of a one-party disaster than it already is.

There’s an old saying in politics. You can’t beat somebody with nobody. Even if that somebody is Maura Healey. But it’s too late to do anything about the Republicans’ abject surrender of the governorship.

Look on the bright side – the GOP took almost as bad a beating for governor in 1986 as they’re about to take next month. But four years later, in 1990, the Republicans swept, well, not everything, but as much as they’ve ever swept in the last 100 years.

First and foremost, though, vote No on Questions 1 and 4.