The Death of A Thousand Cuts

When the ancient Chinese wanted to torture an enemy, they used a contraption called the Wire Jacket. It looked like small-mesh chicken wire, and was wrapped around the hapless victim. The victim would then be subjected to the Death by A Thousand Cuts – one by one, the raised flesh in the wire jacket would be slashed with a razor, causing each bump of flesh to spurt and bleed individually until the victim died – often, after more than a hundred cuts.

The Governorship is proving to be a wire jacket for Deval Patrick.

First, the criticism of the progressive-supper inauguration – complete with fortune cookies that said ‘Together We Can’ from the Kowloon donors (perhaps with lucky numbers on the back for the budget?). State House traditionalists gave the one of the first razor cuts.

Yet even before he was sworn in, Deval Patrick was calling legislators and urging them to ignore the ruling of the supreme Judicial court and abrogate their oath by using a procedural vote to avoid voting at the Constitutional Convention. Arlene Issakson gave that warm-up cut.

Announcing that all the budget cuts made by Romney would be restored – even gazebos and statues. The Governor’s budget advice team made that razor cut.

Then, the Cadillac after Romney’s frugal and unheated (according to Deval) Ford, after Deval ostentatiously spend the campaign in a hybrid, pledging to make the State vehicle fleet greener – except for himself. The Herald gave that cut.

Voiding Governor Romney’s agreement with the ICE and the Federal Government to allow the State Police to detain illegal immigrants when arrested on other charges, with the excuse that they are too busy. Couple that with the State Police having the time to drive his new Caddy to Washington, D.C. for a Governor’s Meeting and now the raid on a New Bedford sweatshop resulting in the arrest of 300 illegal immigrants that have been released on bail, not detained because the Governor voided the agreement. His social service transition team handed Deval that razor cut.

The two helicopter rides in a weekend, when Romney used it once in four years. Howie Carr with a fresh new razor.

The drapes and furniture when Romney took home the office trapping that the Legislature refused to allow him to purchase. The Glob this time with the razor.

The $72,000 per year scheduler for the wife’s part-time involvement. Deval inflicted that one himself.

The sneering apology for the Caddy, drapes and scheduler, implying that the Boston Media had way too much time on their hands to question him about such trivial matters, when he was on such a higher plane (or helicopter). Andy Hiller wielded the razor that time.

Then a bill which the Glob reports "is designed to reverse a recent Supreme Judicial Court ruling that could require extensive review of permits for developments on landlocked, filled tidelands that do not abut the water." Benefiting a Cambridge development called NorthPort, this razor cut was delivered by Daniel O'Connell, the new Housing and Development Secretary and Greg Bialecki, who is now advising Patrick on real estate permitting, as they wave their recused hands in the air while accepting the potential benefit.

The budget release which explained that virtually none of the expensive campaign promises would be honored – only 250 cops instead of 1,000; $750,000 for state parks instead of $10 million; the local aid enhancement which proved to be giving the towns the power to tax themselves more. Leslie Kirwan can take that slash.

Then after trying to replace Congression Medal of Honor recipient Tom Kelley with the unprepossessing Rep. Verga as head of Veterans Services, until the protests of Veterans Agents statewide stymied that plan, Deval contented himself with demoting Tom Kelly from Cabinet status as head of Veterans Affairs despite 2003 special legislation elevating that position. Perhaps a razor swipe from elements of the Legislature?

And now, Frank Phillips, razor in hand, gleefully reports the telephone call. At the request of large campaign donor Americorps/ACC, involved in shady mortgage dealing and foreclosing upon Deval’s constituents, a call was made to Robert Rubin of Citicorp, which is trying to expand into Massachusetts and is regulated by the state, to vouch for ACC’s good track record. Deval claims he made the call as a private citizen, a capacity which he will not enjoy until 2010. Citicorps came across with the money for ACC.

Perhaps the complaint filed with the State Ethics Commission will prove a ‘killing cut’, made when the razor slashes across several bumps of flesh at once. The specifics of the complaint and which laws may be broken can be viewed HERE.

If Deval Patrick wants to become the governor that everyone thought he could be, and not just the tabula rasa of the campaign upon which varied and incompatible interest groups projected their own images of what or who he was, he needs to stop the cutting now.