SalemNews.com : Blogs : Salem News Blogs

The selection of state Sen. Richard Tisei, R-Wakefield, as a running mate is proof positive that Charlie Baker thinks he can win next year’s race for governor.
Tisei, fiscally conservative but liberal on many social issues including gay rights and abortion, is the kind of candidate the GOP needs in order to make a serious run at statewide office. Voters have demonstrated time and again they want nothing to do with the party’s daffy right wing that seems to be in control in so many other parts of the country.
Baker and Tisei will make a good team, though one has to hope the minority party can find candidates with a serious chance of retaining the Senate seats being vacated by the lieutenant governor aspirant and U.S. Senate candidate Scott Brown.
By focusing on fiscal issues rather than conservative dogma, Baker and his running mate should be able to mount a credible challenge to incumbent Deval Patrick whose best hope at the moment is that State Treasurer Tim Cahill, running as an independent, will be able to draw enough anti-administration votes to leave the incumbent with a plurality next November.

Veteran Ward 4 Councilor Bob Driscoll isn’t the only person breathing a sigh of relief this morning after Saturday’s recount confirmed his narrow victory in the Nov. 3 election.
Other winners include City Clerk Tim Spanos, whose original tally changed by only a single vote in Driscoll’s favor; Mayor Michael Bonfanti, for whom Driscoll has been a reliable ally including in last week’s 8-3 vote in favor of Peabody’s joining the new megavoke district; and, of course, the voters of Peabody.
The Ward 4 results demonstrate that every votes does, indeed, count. Moreover, the race brought a new face to the tired political scene in Peabody, that of challenger Jeff Grayson who conducted himself with a lot of class both during the campaign and at Saturday’s recount at City Hall. Expect to see and hear more of him in the months and years ahead.
Meanwhile, some in Peabody are still scratching their heads over the make-up of the dissenting side in that vote on the vocational school. Councilor at large Ted Bettencourt, who is thought to have mayoral aspirations, joined two of the council’s notorious nabobs of negativity, Ward 3’s Rico Mello and Ward 6’s Barry Sinewitz in opposing the move. Bettencourt said he was concerned about the finances of the deal; but perhaps he also didn’t want to have to listen to fellow attorney Beverley Dunne, who voted against it on the School Committee, telling him all week at work how no Peabody student should have the opportunity to attend the new school if it won’t accept all who want to go there.