Wed column ping
Tryst of fate: Aide makes out fine in run for rep
By Howie Carr | Wednesday, September 12, 2012 | http://www.bostonherald.com | Columnists
How much has changed for Diana DiZoglio — last year, she was the “Mystery Woman” of the State House, found at 4 a.m. in the darkened House chambers with a freshman rep two years her junior.
Now, DiZoglio is the Democratic nominee for a seat in the House, having upset an incumbent solon in the primary last week. What a great riches-to-rags-to-riches story, right Diana?
“I would love to talk to you,” the former Mystery Woman told me Monday. “I would be happy to talk to you. Let me get back to you. Thank you for your interest.”
And that was the last I heard from her. Called her back yesterday, over and over again, but she’d apparently stopped picking up her phone.
What’s the problem, Diana? You and that younger state rep, Mark Cusack, were both cleared by House Speaker Bobby DeLeo of any “inappropriate behavior.”
At the time, DiZoglio was the aide to Rep. Paul Adams, a freshman Republican rep now running for the state Senate.
That didn’t last long after her late-night escapades. Last fall, the Wellesley College graduate wrote an article for the Valley Patriot about her “life-ruining experience,” describing how she lost her job and her car and had been cleaning toilets to survive.
“I am tired,” she wrote, “I am broke, and for months I have been trying my best to not completely lose it.”
Eventually she decided to run against Rep. Dave Torrisi of North Andover, a machine hack who was first elected in 1998. He’s 43, and this description of him in the Eagle Tribune says it all: “He is an attorney, although so far he hasn’t practiced law.”
Every year, one or two of these overconfident hacks get knocked off in the primaries. This time it was Torrisi’s turn — and Sal LaMattina’s in Boston.
DiZoglio had learned well from her old boss, Paul Adams, who went door to door in 2010 in his winning campaign. She spent the summer walking the district, eventually knocking on 4,400 doors. And now she’s one step away from a Beacon Hill reunion with Rep. Mark Cusack. He did not return a call yesterday.
In case you were wondering, Diana is not bad looking, and she probably looks better after losing 18 pounds during her summer walking tour of the 14th Essex.
But she has one final obstacle to overcome, Republican candidate Karin Rhoton.
“My husband tells me I’m pretty attractive, too,” Rhoton says.
Article URL: http://www.bostonherald.com/news/columnists/view.bg?articleid=1061159717
fri column ping to follow
Bos. Phoenix stands up for “rights” of murderer who wants taxpayer funded sex change:”Bos Phoenix:”Not surprisingly, incumbent Republican Senator Scott Brown denounced the decision as an outrageous waste of taxpayers’ dollars. That is consistent with his actions as a state senator, when he moved to preempt any state funding for prisoner sex reassignment.
But when Brown’s challenger, Democrat Elizabeth Warren, echoed his position, we were horrified. That Warren could find herself on the wrong side of this issue shows how muddled and uninformed public opinion is — and implies that the professor has a dismal understanding of identity politics in general.”
Hack state rep tries to get rival arrested
By Howie Carr | Friday, September 14, 2012 | http://www.bostonherald.com | Columnists
The hack du jour is state Rep. Denise Andrews (D-Orange). She may be the most desperate politician in Massachusetts this year.
She is so desperate that she accused her GOP opponent of buying cocaine — and didn’t have some coatholder make the allegation anonymously, but did it herself, in person, to the chief of police in her rival’s hometown of Athol.
Rep. Andrews then doubled down, telling the chief that one of his cops had gone to her opponent’s home and taken the cocaine away from her and brought it back to the station house.
Turns out, the cop she accused wasn’t on duty that day. And Andrews’ rival wasn’t even in Athol that day. Denise Andrews told the chief her source was another Athol cop who said the drug dealer who sold the coke had called the police station after the transaction.
That happens a lot, right? A coke dealer makes a sale and then dimes out a paying customer for no reason. But of course, that didn’t really happen either. The chief checked the phone logs and there were no such dime drops on the day in question, just like there was no cocaine logged into the drug locker that day.
Other than all of the above, Rep. Andrews’ story totally stood up. Just like U.S. Sen. Harry Reid’s fact-free accusations against Mitt Romney last month.
The Athol chief handled everything strictly by the book, as well he should have. The GOP candidate, Susannah Whipps Lee, is the chairman of the Board of Selectmen in Athol. The chief asked her to come in to the police station.
“I was shocked when the chief told me somebody had accused me of buying cocaine,” Lee said the other night. “I was even more shocked when he told me that these completely fabricated and scurrilous allegations were made by my opponent.”
Attempts were made to reach Rep. Andrews. But she was apparently not available yesterday.
But Andrews did issue a statement defending her actions, sort of. She claimed she got the information from a “concerned constituent.”
“The constituent’s concern was that if this was in fact true, there was a gross injustice occurring.”
Lee responded: “The gross injustice is her filing a false report against both a citizen and a police officer. It’s dirty politics and bullying — bullying to muscle me out. I think it’s fabricated, I think it’s all made up.”
Of course, Andrews could prove she didn’t concoct the story out of thin air by identifying the “cop” who gave her the bogus information. But she’s citing hack-concerned constituent privilege, saying she will not “divulge that constituent’s name to any person or agency without the permission of the constituent.”
After she spoke to the chief, Lee says, “I went through the humiliation of getting a drug test at my local hospital, just to prove I was clean.”
Harry Reid must be proud. He’s started a real trend among his fellow Democrats here.