Media Nation

The tanks roll in from Chicago, and Los Angeles Times publisher Jeffrey Johnson is out. Will editor Dean Baquet now be sent to re-education camp?

If Deval Patrick proves incapable of defending himself, he’s got Blue Mass. Group to do it for him. Still, there’s so much rank hypocrisy surrounding the mini-crisis in which he finds himself that I’ve got to point out a few of the seamier examples. First, read the round-up by Boston Globe reporter Andrea Estes. Now consider:

1. Kerry Healey’s new ad. Watch it here. If this isn’t an attempt at “Willie Horton II,” I don’t know what is. Attempting to trash a lawyer for ethically defending a client is just vile. Attempting to trash a lawyer who was merely trying to spare his client the death penalty is beyond vile.

2. The LaGuer connection. Patrick appears to have dissembled on how much help he’d given to convicted rapist Benjamin LaGuer, and now Patrick is paying the price. He should. But it can’t be emphasized enough the extent to which LaGuer’s supposedly wrongful conviction was a cause célèbre in this state until 2002, when DNA tests proved beyond any reasonable doubt that he was, in fact, guilty.

Particularly laughable is a column in the Boston Herald today by Virginia Buckingham, who writes: “When I got a couple of letters from convicted rapist Ben LaGuer at the Herald, I filed them — in the circular file. I’m sure I’m not the only one.” What Buckingham fails to say is that she went to work at the Herald in 2003, a year after LaGuer failed the DNA test.

You’ll have to take my word for it, but I always believed LaGuer was guilty. Still, I knew plenty of smart people who thought otherwise. And, guilty or not, there are questions to this day as to whether he received a fair trial.

Globe columnist Adrian Walker writes, “In 1998, many thoughtful people had serious doubts about LaGuer’s conviction. Some still do. It is ridiculous to equate examining questions in a case with being procriminal. Yet that’s just the leap that’s being made in this campaign.” No kidding.

3. Do as I say (I). Michele McPhee reports in today’s Herald that the Department of Correction, under Romney and Healey, approved a light-duty clean-up assignment for Terrill Walker, convicted in the notorious murder of Boston police officer John Schroeder in 1973. Maybe it was the right thing to do, but what do you suppose Healey would say if Patrick could somehow be linked to such a decision?

4. Do as I say (II). Ditto for Healey’s running mate, Reed Hillman, who once sought a pardon for a man who’d been convicted of drunken driving three times as well as of assault on a police officer. Can you imagine what a big issue this would be if anyone had ever actually heard of Hillman?

Patrick’s got a huge lead, and maybe he’s going to coast into the governor’s office as long as he doesn’t make some monumental blunder. Still, he’s got some vulnerabilities — his election would eliminate any Republican check on the Democratic majority, and he hasn’t exactly been reassuring on whether he’d raise taxes. Healey’s been going at him hard on those issues, and she should.

But the soft-on-crime angle is an insult to the public’s intelligence.

More: Jon Keller has a good post and video commentary on Patrick’s fumbling response to Healey’s attacks.

Still more: Matt Margolis is pretty convincing in arguing that there’s less to the Herald’s Terrill Walker story than meets the eye. I should have read it more carefully.

As I did with the first gubernatorial debate, I listened (transcript here) on my way to work this morning and did not see it. Obviously the visuals are important, but I’ll trade that for being able to do more than one thing at a time. (And thanks to WBUR Radio, 90.9 FM, for providing a nice, clear online feed.)

Besides, it’s not as though the exchanges were all that gripping. Kerry Healey’s performance struck me as improved: She managed to get off a few shots at Deval Patrick, especially on taxes and the potential dangers of one-party government, without getting bogged down by Christy Mihos.

Patrick, once again, was OK — good enough, perhaps, to sit on his commanding lead. But even though he was a little more fiesty in going after Healey, one thing hadn’t changed: He was largely able to float above the fray, letting Mihos pound away at Healey.

Green-Rainbow Party candidate Grace Ross acquitted herself well, but she’s got two problems. Four years ago, Green Party candidate Jill Stein won over a number of progressives who were not exactly enamored of the insider Democratic candidate, Shannon O’Brien. This time, Patrick seems to have nailed down the progressive wing for the Democrats.

The other problem is that voters want to hear candidates tell stories about themselves, to connect with their lives. Yet Ross has kept her status as an out lesbian under wraps in the two debates, even though she was tossed a softball on same-sex marriage last night. “Come on Grace, represent,” writes Laura Kiritsy in Bay Windows. (Thanks to Adam Reilly for the link.) Apparently Ross is more comfortable as an issues wonk.

Finally, a word about last night’s moderator, television newsman James Maddigan. There’s an old saying that no one pays to see the umpire. I know the moderator’s job can be difficult. But his incessant interruptions, cutting people off for going over their time limit even when they were obviously seconds away from wrapping up, were an annoying distraction.

No doubt the rules were set by the campaigns, not by Maddigan. But what would best serve the public is a single moderator whose job is not to enforce time limits, but who uses his or her judgment to go with the flow, to poke and prod when needed, and to make sure everyone gets roughly equal treatment.

Is there any chance of that happening in the remaining debates?

This could be nothing more than the enthusiasm of Deval Patrick’s Net-savvy supporters, but — as of this moment — nearly 59 percent of the more than 4,000 people responding to a Boston.com survey say that Patrick won last night’s debate.

Slightly more than 30 percent awarded it to Kerry Healey, while Christy Mihos and Grace Ross both came in at less than 6 percent.

How foolish is state Sen. Steven Baddour? Baddour is one of four Democratic legislators who’ve demanded that Lt. Gov. Kerry Healey, a Republican, stop showing a commercial that makes it look like they’ve endorsed her campaign for governor.

“It’s been twisted to appear as though I am endorsing Kerry Healey, when in fact nothing could be further from the truth,” Baddour was quoted as saying in the Boston Globe yesterday.

Today the Boston Herald’s Kimberly Atkins, citing unnamed sources, reports that Baddour “secretly pledged to help Healey’s GOP campaign for governor after the Democratic primary.” Atkins follows up on her blog:

When I arrived at my office this morning, I had no less than three voicemail massages from people claiming to have heard Sen. Steven Baddour say at various times over the summer and fall that he planned to back Kerry Healey for governor if Deval Patrick won the Democratic primary.

Baddour has guaranteed himself the worst of both worlds: outcast status no matter who wins. Good going, Senator.

Count yourself lucky this morning if you’re not a TimesSelect customer — you don’t have to read Ted Koppel’s column on Iran and ask yourself, What was that all about?

Koppel is a great interviewer, but his overall skill set may be more limited than anyone had realized. Because, in a rambling piece in which he cites Vito Corleone as his authority (it’s got something to do with not seeking vengeance for Sonny’s death so that he can protect Michael), Koppel argues for (a) letting Iran develop nuclear weapons while (b) subsequently holding Iran responsible for any nuclear-tinged terrorism anywhere. Koppel writes:

But this should also be made clear to Tehran: If a dirty bomb explodes in Milwaukee, or some other nuclear device detonates in Baltimore or Wichita, if Israel or Egypt or Saudi Arabia should fall victim to a nuclear “accident,” Iran should understand that the United States government will not search around for the perpetrator. The return address will be predetermined, and it will be somewhere in Iran.

Now, it seems self-evident that Koppel is wrong about (a). It could be that we can’t stop Iran from developing nukes without paying an unacceptable price — but it would be incredibly irresponsible not to try.

But (b)? You’ve got to be kidding. Koppel is quite plainly saying that we should invade Iran in retaliation for a nuclear incident somewhere in the world regardless of the evidence. Thus does he manage to get it wrong on both prevention and punishment. Quite a feat.

If Roger Clemens was/is using steroids, he’s got to be one of the few professional athletes who hasn’t paid a price — no exploding tendons, no deteriorating joints, no weirdly unexplainable injuries. Which leads me to believe he’s clean.

And say a word of thanks for Pedro Martínez’s time in a Red Sox uniform. When he was healthy, he was the best pitcher in Sox history. But unless he can come back from rotator-cuff surgery, it looks like he’s through.

Emulating its corporate big brother, the Boston Globe has unveiled a new online look, listing every story in the paper on its home page. More prominence is given to an image of the front page as well.

It’s clean and attractive. So what’s to complain about? This: virtually no photos. The Globe has never given photographs the same prominence on its Web site that it does in the paper, with the exception of special projects like this. The Globe’s alter ego, Boston.com, is loaded with photos. But the pictures have pretty much disappeared from the daily online edition.

One of the pleasures of reading the Times on the Web is the excellence of the photojournalism. The Globe’s got some fine photographers. Can we please see their work online?

More: John Daley likes the new look as well. Strangely, he says nothing about the photo shortage, even though he’s a terrific photographer himself. (Click here and check out the right-hand rail.)

Media Nation’s purpose for being is not to track the career of WRKO talk-show host Scott Allen Miller. But following last week’s dust-up between the two of us (I wrongly accused him of claiming that Boston taxpayers had picked up the bill for refurbishing the Kenmore Square Citgo sign; he wrongly claimed that taxpayers were getting stuck with the electric bill), it’s only fair that I point out his role in a minor but interesting state political story.

If you read today’s Boston Globe, you’ll learn (if you hadn’t already seen it elsewhere) that Deval Patrick has a disconcerting habit of not voting in local elections in Milton, where he lives. Globe reporter Andrea Estes credits the Boston Herald with having broken the story yesterday. Dave Wedge’s Herald story from yesterday notes that Patrick’s voting record had “sparked criticism” from Miller.

In fact, Miller was the first to dig up evidence of Patrick’s lackadaisical attitude toward voting, reporting on his blog that he’d obtained Patrick’s voting records after filing a request under the state’s public-records law (click here and here).

A big deal? No. But not a bad little hit on a candidate who’s built his entire appeal around the notion of re-engagement with civic life.

Update: Citizen Kane notes that Miller is highly selective when it comes to non-voting by gubernatorial candidates. Rosebud.

Here’s a possible solution to balancing the desire (OK, my desire) for a one-on-one debate between Deval Patrick and Kerry Healey with the reality that two other candidates are on the ballot: a series of one-on-ones featuring everybody.

If it were up to me, I’d pair them like this: Grace Ross versus Christy Mihos; Mihos versus Healey; Ross versus Patrick; and then, finally, Patrick versus Healey.

Mihos’ major critique is with the Romney-Healey administration’s management of the Big Dig, so it makes sense that Mihos gets to take Healey on directly. As for Patrick, it would be interesting to see what his progressive supporters would think of his performance if he’s challenged by a genuine lefty.

My preference would be four one-hour debates. But I’d settle for a prime-time, two-hour extravaganza, with a half-hour for each segment.

What about it, folks?