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geefloyd46

(1,939 posts)
Mon Jul 30, 2012, 07:15 PM Jul 2012

Part two of What Wall Street's money will buy: Scott Brown's latest surrogate Ray Flynn

At 58, the old warrior is saddling up to run for governor, apparently for the worst of reasons: having failed to secure a high-paying, high-profile private sector job (he was even snubbed for the athletic director's post at Northeastern University), he can't think of anything better to do.

Even before last Friday, his chances of actually winning the governor's office had been rated as slim. And now he's been whacked out by his old friends at the Boston Globe, a paper that endorsed him twice, that provided him not just with ideological support but also with drinking buddies during those long nights at Doyle's and J.J. Foley's.

The story, by Walter Robinson, Kate Zernike, and David Marcus -- headlined FLYNN AT THE VATICAN: HIS MAYORAL STYLE DIDN'T CUT IT -- was devastating. Much of the post-publication buzz has focused on revelations concerning Flynn's drinking; but about two-thirds of the piece was devoted to establishing that, during his final year as ambassador, he virtually ceased working. Numerous sources were quoted, both by name and anonymously, to the effect that Flynn became increasingly out of touch and isolated, rarely coming to the embassy office and spending vast amounts of time in Rome's Irish pubs.
Although the questions about Flynn's once-inspiring work ethic were surely new, his drinking is the oldest of stories among political and media insiders. The difference is that editors today -- whether at the Globe or any other news organization -- are far less inclined than they were in the past to keep such knowledge to themselves. This shift is especially telling at the Globe, which, until recent years, had a reputation for protecting its favorites, allowing national media to break stories about Senator Ted Kennedy's debauchery or to poke holes in former governor Michael Dukakis's record.

Flynn's reaction has been to deny everything, and to accuse the Globe of coming after him because he's working-class, Irish, and Catholic. It is a ridiculous allegation, of course. Boston has been run by Irish Catholics for most of this century. The editor of the Globe, Matt Storin, is an Irish Catholic with a modest middle-class background. But such class-warfare demogaguery has always been one of Flynn's stocks in trade. He hoists like a shield his concern for "working-class families," a phrase that pops up in his lexicon with the same approximate frequency that it does in Marx's Das Kapital.

A demagogue needs a villain, and Flynn, for the moment, has settled on Globe publisher Ben Taylor, whom the ex-mayor has variously referred to during the past week as a polo-watching, penthouse-dwelling, chablis-sipping, brie-nibbling elitist.

Full article: http://bostonphoenix.com/archive/features/97/10/09/GLOBE_VS_RAY_FLYNN.html

Full coverage: http://laborspains.blogspot.com/2012/07/what-else-will-wall-streets-millions.html

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Part two of What Wall Street's money will buy: Scott Brown's latest surrogate Ray Flynn (Original Post) geefloyd46 Jul 2012 OP
Did they catch him sober? TheCowsCameHome Jul 2012 #1
Death knell for Brown. What was he thinking???!!! Raven Jul 2012 #2
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