Massachusetts Gubernatorial Candidates at the 2014 Mass Municipal Association Annual Meeting

The closing event of the Mass Municipal Association annual meeting was a review of gubernatorial candidates. The moderator asked questions that had been derived from the audience. Each candidate was given the opportunity to make a brief opening statement and then asked a series of questions related to unfunded mandates, whether to tie unrestricted aid to increases in state revenues, the deficit in local transportation budgets, and contributions to retiree health care.

Joseph Avellone (D) is a former doctor and health-insurance executive. His primary focus was in controlling health-care costs and he leaned heavily on his previous experience as a Selectman. I would never have guessed he was a Democrat based on anything he said and kept thinking, "If it walks like a Republican and sounds like a Republican…"

Charlie Baker (R) is a Republican. He's another former health-insurance executive who served as a policy wonk in a previous Republican administration. He seemed comfortable and tried to project an air of competence: "I'm good at it! I have a track record with that". He, too, reminded the audience several times of his chops as a former Selectman. Some people thought he seemed arrogant, but I could see voters liking him.

Don Berwick (D) seemed both the most wonkish and most visionary to me. He is the former head of Medicare/Medicaid under Obama and similarly focused on the need to control health care. He advocated for single-payer and infrastructure renovation and increased revenues to pay for it. I liked him, so he'll probably get forced to drop out before the primary, perhaps due to some errant scream or something.

Martha Coakley (D) underwhelmed me again. She seems flat and unpersuasive. She was practically the only one who mentioned education, but she talked about it in platitudes: children need the best education we can provide for the state to be competitive. I'm pretty convinced that the way the Democrats lose the election is to put Martha up against Charlie Baker. Just like when she ran against Scott Brown, I don't see her building the necessary excitement or enthusiasm to win.

Evan Falchuk is running as an independent, having created his own party. He was more credible than I expected. He talked about making fundamental changes in how state government works, for example creating multi-year funding initiatives. That sounds like a wonksh, technical detail, but it is a fundamental limitation in how state government works. If you knew funding would be reliable, you could take out a loan and do a big project in 2 years, instead of spread out over 10 -- and gain huge efficiencies. Keep dreaming.

Mark Fisher (R) is an unabashed tea-party member. He started out sounding vaguely reasonable ("I want to bring common sense to Beacon Hill"), but then wandered off into crazy land. He talked very calmly about zero-funding communities that voted in favor of sanctuary laws for illegal immigrants. Or that wages should be entirely a function of the "free market", as if the government doesn't use monetary policy to influence the unemployment rate or something. Sheesh. I don't see him as a credible candidate, but he might shift Baker far enough to the right to do him some damage.

Steve Grossman is a former state treasurer and a classical politician, horse-trading one thing or another. I found his leaps of "logic" to be largely incomprehensible: Tax the internet to fund transportation! Aid, aid, aid, lottery! Perhaps to insiders, that kind of logic makes perfect sense, but I found it jarring and orthogonal to my plane of reality.

Juliette Kayyem has a background in homeland security. She's relatively young and this is her first shot at an executive position. She's been somewhat unconventional: she's been using twitter to reach Democratic activists and has some fresh ideas. I definitely want to know more about her. I'm not sure she's ready this time around, but I think she'll move the race in directions it needs to go.

I'm hopeful to see some interesting candidates. I've been disappointed that the Democrats in Massachusetts seem only too willing to give the nod to the candidate with the strongest ties to the Democratic machinery: they picked Shannon O'Brien rather than Robert Reich for example -- which is how we ended up with Mitt Romney as governor. Let me say that again: we had Mitt Romney as governor. I always hope that the Democrats will pick the most interesting, dynamic, exciting candidate with the best ideas. But it rarely happens. Still, there's always a chance.