Purple Massachusetts? Not so Fast

Adam Bass

Adam Bass is an aspiring reporter and broadcaster from Massachusetts. He graduated from Wheaton College in Norton MA. Bass was general manager, and head of the political news coverage department of WCCS Wheaton College, where he did extensive coverage of the Massachusetts Senate Primary Race and The Massachusetts 4th congressional district primary race, as well as reporting on other National and local news. He now works as an intern for Newton News at NewTV where he has covered the 2021 municipal elections, hosts and produces The Cod Cabin where he and three of his colleagues podcast about Massachusetts politics and news, and has been working part time at WCRN 830 AM in Worcester Mass.

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3 Responses

  1. Kazzy says:

    MA has always had a weird political tinge. It’s the home of Kennedy, the birthplace of the Revolution, and as such the residents often really proudly identify with a liberal, Democratic lineage.

    And yet… there is some pretty strong social conservatism, or at least was. You had Irish and Italian immigrants and their offspring, bringing pretty conservative Catholic ideas, a somewhat insular immigrant experience, and some strong blue collar values. There are the (literal) Puritanical roots of the area, that you saw vestiges of in things like the outlawing of tattoo parlors until 2001 and the prohibition on Sunday alcohol sales until (I think?) 2003 or so.

    I think this is changing as we hit the 3rd or 4th or 5th generation of those original immigrant families and as Boston and some of its suburbs have gentrified.

    And then, of course, there is Western MA which is just WTF.Report

  2. Saul Degraw says:

    There are certain evergreen political stories that seem to crop up every two to four years and political reporters can never seem to resist them despite always being untrue and always assuming a lot of facts not in evidence:

    1. “Will be this the year Jews break for Republicans?” has occurred in speculation in nearly every single Presidential election of my life. 2020 might be the only exception. It never happens. With the exception of 1920 and 1980 (when Debs received 38 percent of the Jewish vote), the Democratic candidate has always received over 50 percent of the Jewish vote.
    For the most part, the Jewish vote has gone Democratic by over 70 percent since 1928. The three exceptions being Carter in 1980 (45 percent to Reagans 39 percent with Anderson receiving 15 percent), 1988 (64 percent for Dukakis), and 2012 (69 percent for Obama). Yet the media always wonders if this will be the year Jews break for the GOP and it never happens.
    This happened the most in the Bush II years when Gore received 79 percent of the Jewish vote and Kerry received 76 percent of the Jewish vote.

    2. Will this solidly blue state turn purple/red? It is never the other way around. You never see the media warning Georgia Republicans about needing to moderate despite the clear victories of Warnock and Ossoff and the fact that Warnock is proving to be formidable on the campaign trail in 2024. The same with Texas where Abbot is still likely to win reelection but Beto is performing well above average for a Democrat in a state-wide election in Texas. The media was all a flutter that Gavin Newsom might get recalled and he crushed his opposition. The School Board and DA recalls are supposed to be warning signs for the left in San Francisco. The mayoral race in LA the same even though Karen Bass was the top vote receiver after the mail in ballots were fully counted.

    Massachusetts has a small history of electing Republican governors but the current Republican governor is more popular with Democrats than his fellow party members and the MA Republicans decided to nominate a candidate who is full MAGAtReport

  3. Jaybird says:

    The thing that I see as the early indicator is not the whole red/blue thing but the thing where the guy who has been County Dogcatcher for 18 years suddenly finds himself with a challenger at the primary who starts asking questions about whether our Dogcatchers should better reflect the county’s values.

    And, like, get a good solid Democrat in there who is more to the left of the old (probably racist) Dogcatcher or a good solid Democrat in there who knows better than to tweet about the importance of defunding the police when we’re in a place where we need to *FUND* the police.

    And we’ll get a new, solidly blue, Dogcatcher to replace the old one.

    No purple needed.Report