Carroll: A Debate Unbecoming A Senator

BOSTON — Monday night’s Senate debate was — I dunno — unseemly.

For starters, it was sponsored by the Edward Kennedy Institute for the United States Senate, the big (taxpayer) bucks center whose sole purpose is to lionize the Lion of the Senate. So it felt less like a debate than an audition.

Add to that, Peter Meade — the founding president and CEO of the institute — served as moderator of the debate. Inconveniently, Meade has “contributed to two of the (Senate) hopefuls’ campaigns in the past,” as the Boston Herald reported. So one man’s Meade is another man’s poison.

And to top it all off, every major TV station in Boston (with the unremarkable exception of Fox 25) streamed the debate live and unfiltered.

Regardless. Some ads ‘n’ ends from whatever that was on Boston television Monday night:

• Celtics co-owner and Senate race ATM Steve Pagliuca ran one of his ubiquitous TV spots on WCVB 60 seconds before the debate started. The very definition of all those dollars and no sense.
• Two best drinking games: “Like Sen. Kennedy” and “I agree with Michael”
• Mike (The Butcher) Capuano mentioned pork more often than the Other White Meat campaign.
• Do these candidates think they’re running for governor of the United States? All their “I’ll do (this)” and “I’ll make (that) happen” is the biggest fairy tale this side of Cinderella. You’re running for a spot in the World’s Greatest Deliberative Body, people. You don’t make things happen in the U.S. Senate. Things happen to you.
• As for the Kontent of the debate, here’s a representative sample: “You can’t make bad deals (in Senate wrangling). You have to make good deals.” Hey, sign me up for envelope-licking duty.
• Martha (I Have a Sister Overseas) Coakley at one point recommended robbing banks to solve our economic problems (it’s too late in the evening to provide context). Forget the U.S. Senate — should she even be Massachusetts AG?
• Alan (My Father Is a Doctor. From Iran) Khazei was the only candidate who went for the Kennedy trifecta, comparing himself variously to JFK, RFK, and Ted K. Sorry, Alan. Not working.
• Did Peter Meade really end the debate saying, “God bless you and God bless the United States of America”?

Good God.