14-year incumbent faces challenger WHO HAS NEVER HELD PUBLIC OFFICE in Plymouth County treasurer race

 

ONCE UPON A TIME, MIDDLEBORO ELECTED A REPUBLICAN OVER AND OVER AND OVER AND OVER....YEAR AFTER YEAR ... EVEN THOUGH THAT REPUBLICAN NEVER MANAGED TO FIND BEACON HILL MORE THAN ONCE OR TWICE A YEAR. 

BECAUSE OF THE SUCCESS OF MIDDLEBORO REPUBLICANS' SUPPORT, THE REPUBLICAN EARNED A HEALTHY PENSION FOR WHICH MIDDLEBORO RECEIVED NO REPRESENTATION. 

WHEN MIDDLEBORO WAS MERCIFULLY SPLIT, TOM O'BRIEN STEPPED FORWARD TO REPRESENT A PORTION OF MIDDLEBORO AND OTHER COMMUNITIES AT A TIME WHEN THERE WERE CHALLENGES. 

TOM O'BRIEN ADDRESSED THE CHALLENGE OF THE OVERWHELMED AND OVERCROWDED  PLYMOUTH REGISTRY OF DEEDS AND COUNTY OFFICES, CREATING A STATE OF THE ART FACILITY WITH ONLINE ACCESS.

TOM O'BRIEN BOASTED 100% ATTENDANCE REPRESENTING HIS CONSTITUENTS. 

HIS CURRENT REPUBICAN OPPONENT HAS NEVER HELD OFFICE, LOST ELECTION FOR MAYOR AND OFFERS NO LOCAL PARTICIPATION IN ANY ORGANIZATIONS. 

IS THIS THE REPUBLICAN PATH TO SUCCESS?   IF SO, THE MASS GOP IS DESTROYING ITSELF WITH CANDIDATES SUCH AS THIS.

REGISTER AND VOTE! 

14-year incumbent faces challenger in Plymouth County treasurer race

By  Wheeler Cowperthwaite The Patriot Ledger

Posted Oct 5, 2020 

Democrat Thomas O’Brien, who has held the treasurer position since 2006, is facing a Republican challenger in the general election.

One incumbent Democrat and one challenging Republican are running in this year’s election for treasurer of Plymouth County, a position that rarely grabs headlines but manages vast sums of money as part of its duties.

Incumbent Thomas O’Brien, 56, of Plymouth, is running for reelection for the fourth time. He was first appointed as treasurer in 2006 and successfully ran for election in 2008.

Challenging him is Republican Carina Mompelas, 24, of Brockton, who previously ran for mayor in 2019.

Before running for treasurer, O’Brien was elected to the state House of Representatives for the 12th District, between 1996 and 2006.

O’Brien said as the chief financial officer for the county, which has an annual budget of $10 million, he helped develop a 10-year plan for the county. He was also tasked in 2014 with starting a fund, called Other Post Employment Benefits, also known as OPEB. The Governmental Accounting Standards Board required cities and towns to prefund their benefit obligations. O’Brien helped create a multiple employer trust to leverage the resources of towns in Plymouth and surrounding areas.

“The combined assets of a number of employers mean better returns, lower fees and better performance,” he said.

A total of 28 cities, towns and other entities are part of the county-run trust, he said.

One of O’Brien’s statutory roles is the administration of $1.12 billion in the Plymouth County Retirement Association, which covers a total of 11,663 people.

“We’ve more than doubled assets under my management,” he said.

Mompelas said she works as a financial analyst and has worked in finance for many years. She graduated from the University of Massachusetts Boston.

Mompelas said she wants to “restore ethics” in the treasurer’s office and said O’Brien has “failed to serve his constituents,” charging O’Brien with not doing enough during his tenure.

She said she wants more transparency within county government, starting with the filming and publishing of public meetings, a position advocated for by candidates in the county commission primary.

Mompelas said not enough people know what the county treasurer does because of a lack of outreach.

She said she sees the role of country treasurer is to make sure money “is flowing the right way, and keeping revenue up for the county.”

The county is like a franchise of the state government, she said.

Voters in Massachusetts have until Oct. 24 to register to vote in the Nov. 3 primary and until Oct. 28 to request a mail-in ballot. Early voting will take place from Oct. 16 to Oct. 30.

Mail-in ballots postmarked by Election Day and received by Nov. 6 will be counted. A town or city’s books will also remain open for 10 days for military and overseas ballots to arrive.

Registration can be done by mail or  at sec.state.ma.us/ovr. 

MEET THE CANDIDATES

Name: CARINA MOMPELAS

Address: 34 Walnut S., Brockton

Age: 24

Family: Single

Occupation: Financial analyst

Relevant experience: Ran for mayor of Brockton

Other: Volunteers for Best Buddies mentors with youth with RISE

Name: THOMAS O’BRIEN

Address: 38 Flint Locke Drive, Plymouth

Age: 56

Family: Married, 2 grown children

Occupation: Plymouth County treasurer

Relevant experience: Treasurer, 2006-present; state representative, 1996-2006; financial consultant 2000-2006

Other: Member, Kingston Lion’s Club, co-founder South Shore Recycling Co-Op, Massachusetts municipal treasurer’s license

RSN: FOCUS: David Sirota | Trump Reduced Workplace Safety Enforcement - Then Workers Died While Begging for Help

 

07 October 20 What Will You Do to Preserve Reader Supported News? There is no way this organization can survive and function with out reasonable support - from our readership. Right now we are not getting that. What will you do? With urgency. Marc Ash Founder, Reader Supported News Sure, I'll make a donation! Update My Monthly Donation If you would prefer to send a check: Reader Supported News PO Box 2043 Citrus Hts CA 95611

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IN A WORLD AWASH IN LIES ... Dear Marc, It was my pleasure to contribute. In a world awash in lies, RSN is a lighthouse beacon in a hazardous and stormy sea. Keep up the good work. / Bruce, RSN Reader-Supporter

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FOCUS: David Sirota | Trump Reduced Workplace Safety Enforcement - Then Workers Died While Begging for Help

David Sirota, Jacobin
Excerpt: "New data shows that COVID-19-related deaths followed after workers requested help from federal safety officials. Instead of helping, Donald Trump reduced enforcement of workplace safety laws."

o help their corporate donors boost profits and stock prices, Donald Trump and Republican lawmakers have pushed hard to force workers back into unsafe workplaces. During the pandemic, the GOP has brushed off science and reopened economies, demanded liability shields for employers, ended special pandemic unemployment relief, helped Amazon block a worker safety initiative, and encouraged states to punish workers who don’t return to their jobs.

For those forced back to COVID-19–infected workplaces, the Trump administration has weakened the agency that is supposed to be policing workplace safety. And now a new study shows the results: death rates spiked almost immediately after workers pleaded with that agency to help, but were likely ignored.

The analysis of Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) data comes from researchers at Harvard, Boston Children’s Hospital, and the Massachusetts Department of Public Health. It shows that “there is a correlation between OSHA complaints and COVID-19 mortality” — in specific, COVID-19–related complaints to the agency “are correlated with [COVID-19–related] deaths 17 days later.”

During the pandemic, researchers note that OSHA “has not issued any emergency or permanent standard specific to COVID-19 exposure at the workplace” and “had issued only four citations related to COVID-19.”

Meanwhile, the report notes that “the total number of federal OSHA inspections (of any kind) during 2020 has been reduced by two-thirds, compared to the same period in prior years.”

This graph shows how OSHA complaints almost perfectly reflected waves of coronavirus deaths. The graph tells the tragic story of workers crying out to OSHA for help, then being ignored, then dying:

A graph showing the correlation between national OSHA complaints and COVID-19 deaths per million.

“The Lowest Number of Inspectors in the Agency’s 48-Year History”

The situation at OSHA isn’t some random accident, and it isn’t just an agency hamstrung by the pandemic. It is the result of deliberate policy decisions.

A 2019 report from the National Employment Law Project found that workplace fatalities have hit a decade-high just as Trump has presided over a decline in OSHA enforcement activity. OSHA “now has the lowest number of health and safety inspectors in the agency’s 48-year history,” according to the study.

A 2020 report from the Center for Public Integrity found that OSHA has conducted fewer safety inspections under Trump than under Obama, even though the nation’s workforce has increased. That report also found that during the pandemic, OSHA inspections have dropped by roughly two-thirds.

At the same time, ProPublica reports that the Trump administration has “mothballed or outright killed” the Labor Department advisory boards that were created “to improve health, safety and whistleblower protections in nearly every facet of the workforce.”

Trump Reduces Deterrents to Unsafe Workplaces

These policy decisions have together reduced a key deterrent to corporate misbehavior.

For instance, the threat of a workplace inspection often incentivizes employers to adhere to safety standards. A 2012 study of California work sites found that “randomly inspected employers experienced a 9.4% decline in injury rates and a 26% reduction in injury cost” — and “no evidence that these improvements came at the expense of employment, sales, credit ratings, or firm survival.”

The Trump administration’s reduction in those inspections likely results in the opposite effect.

Similarly, the threat of big fines tells corporations that if they violate safety standards, they could face financial punishment. Under Trump, though, those fines have been minuscule during the pandemic, even as death rates have skyrocketed.

With OSHA failing to issue mandatory safety standards, “the agency hasn’t proposed a single penalty greater than $30,000 for coronavirus-related risks,” reports Politico.

In one instance that has prompted protests, OSHA fined meatpacking giant JBS just $15,000 after 290 workers were infected with the virus.

Workers Are Collateral Damage in Republicans’ Effort To Enrich GOP Donors

None of this makes any sense if the goal is protecting workers — but all of it makes sense if the goal instead is to protect the corporations that bankroll the Republican Party.

That is clearly the GOP’s top objective regardless of how many people are killed in the process — and you can even see it in the Supreme Court situation. Trump and Senate Republicans are right now trying to force lawmakers and congressional staff into the COVID-19 hot zone exploding in the US Capitol in order to try to install another corporate rubber stamp on the Supreme Court, which would ultimately boost corporate profits and crush workers.

Horrifying as that sociopathic plan is, it is merely a microcosm of the GOP’s larger project: their entire agenda is designed to force workers into unsafe workplaces in order to help their corporate donors.

Those donors want a right-wing Supreme Court, and they don’t care how many federal workers are killed to make that happen.

Similarly, they want an entire American workforce that is legally barred from suing employers, financially punished for refusing to return to unsafe workplaces, and unable to call the workplace cops when lives are put in danger.

In short, corporate interests want a legal system that turns workers into collateral damage in the quest for profit — and that’s exactly what the GOP is giving them.

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POLITICO NIGHTLY: Kamala Harris’ post-debate dilemma

 

BY CHRISTOPHER CADELAGO AND RENUKA RAYASAM WAIT TO DECLARE A WINNER — Kamala Harris will almost certainly deliver a memorable punch against Mike Pence tonight in Utah. It’s happened so many times before that her aides and close allies have lost count. When the lights are brightest, and Harris' back is against the wall, she comes through. Applicable sports cliches now come easy for them. She’s “a clutch player,” as a longtime associate put it. The trouble for Harris has never come during the largest moments of her political life. It’s after they’re over that she occasionally stumbles, when she fails to sustain the momentum she created after making a big shot. Harris nailed her presidential announcement last year in Oakland in front of 22,000 fans. Her campaign raised millions of dollars. MSNBC’s Rachel Maddow told her “there is a good chance that you are going to win the nomination.” But then, setting a painful pattern, Harris backslid: Her town hall meetings were checkered. She flip-flopped on major issues and equivocated on others. She deviated from her own message, which itself shifted from hard-nosed former prosecutor to kitchen-table incrementalist, and then to something somewhere in between that became essentially indecipherable. Don’t worry, campaign hands assured nervous donors at the time, just wait for the debates. Others like Joe Biden and Bernie Sanders have been around for years. Americans don’t know Harris yet. And they were right. Last June in Miami, Harris was on fire. She landed one of the cleanest blows on Biden of the whole primary when she confronted him on his previous opposition to busing for school desegregation. Her polls shot up again. Still more money poured in. Then Harris regressed. Under pressure from Biden, she fumbled the follow-up. She slid in the polls behind lesser-known colleagues and an impressive small-town mayor. Going into the most high-profile moment of her career, tonight’s vice presidential debate in Utah, Biden aides aren’t trying to lower the bar for her as much as they are raising it for Pence, a smooth-talking Hoosier who once hosted a conservative-radio show back home in Indiana. After tonight, Harris will likely have one more moment worth watching, during Senate hearings for Donald Trump’s nominee to the Supreme Court, Amy Coney Barrett. But tonight’s debate, and how it’s received, will become the stick for how she’s judged not just as Biden’s running mate, but also as a presumed presidential candidate in 2024. And this time, should she deliver an electric moment that powers thousands of tweets and eats up a morning of TV news highlights, Harris may not have to bother trying to sustain it, as a former Harris adviser noted to me. “This could be a mic drop moment for her,” the adviser said today. “It’s likely her last major appearance in the spotlight before Election Day, so she doesn’t have to worry about how her performance tonight could set expectations for a half-dozen more debates like in 2019. She just has to go out, nail Pence to a wall, and walk off leaving a trail of blood behind her.” Students participate in a mock debate as workers set up ahead of the Vice Presidential debate in Kingsbury Hall at the University of Utah in Salt Lake City. | Getty Images Welcome to POLITICO Nightly. Biden beauty is a thing. Reach out rrayasam@politico.com or on Twitter at @renurayasam.   DON'T MISS A THING AT THE MILKEN INSTITUTE GLOBAL CONFERENCE : POLITICO's Ryan Heath and Ben White are teaming up to bring you exclusive coverage of the 23rd annual Milken Institute Global Conference featuring 4,000+ participants and 500 speakers from more than 70 countries. Don't miss out on insights from the most influential minds and thought leaders reinventing health, technology, philanthropy, industry and media. Subscribe to our special edition "Global Translations" newsletter for everything you need to know directly from #MIGlobal.     THE DEBATES THE MATCH IN THE WASATCH — Before Pence and Harris square off in Salt Lake City, POLITICO has plenty of pregame reading: — “Mike Pence has the toughest job in politics tonight: defending Donald Trump’s pandemic response,” national political correspondent David Siders writes in his guide to what to watch for during tonight’s event. — Head to POLITICO’s 2020 Debate homepage for the latest news and analysis, and follow some of our reporters and editors starting at 8:30 p.m. ET for a live chat during the event. PALACE INTRIGUE BATTING CLEANUP — In 2016, Pence’s spot on the Republican ticket reassured conservative voters that Trump was one of them. Tonight Pence reprises his role as Trump’s chief explainer. Nightly chatted over Slack with White House reporter Gabby Orr about Pence’s debate strategy and his role in the administration. This conversation has been edited. What can we expect from Pence tonight? In many ways, tonight’s debate will be a 90-minute snapshot of the entire Trump presidency: Pence will provide a brief reprieve from the chaos and a smooth account of what the president has accomplished, what another four years would have in store and why voters should be wary of the Democratic ticket. This debate is, in some ways, a potential launch pad for 2024 GOP primary candidate Mike Pence. He has to deliver a standout performance to compensate for Trump’s erratic approach last week, but he also has a chance to convince future Republican primary voters that Mike Pence is the only person capable of bridging the divide between the MAGA base once Trump is gone and the many disaffected GOP voters who have been repelled by this president. That’s Pence’s greatest asset to the White House, right? Absolutely. It sounds silly, but he is the president’s translator. He knows what to say to simultaneously please Trump and placate voters who might be drawn to the administration’s policy agenda but have a tough time stomaching the president’s conduct or rhetoric. After 9/11, there were frequent reports of Vice President Dick Cheney being swept away to a “secure, undisclosed location” to make people feel confident about the presidential line of succession. It doesn't sound like anything like that is happening during the pandemic. Quite the opposite! The Trump campaign says there’s no time to stay put when the election is four weeks away, and that seems to be Pence’s attitude as well. A lot of folks in the Trump-Pence orbit who support the GOP ticket were nervous about him leaving Washington for the campaign trail so soon after the president’s diagnosis. I spoke with several White House officials and Pence allies earlier this week who were frankly dismayed by his decision to proceed with tonight’s debate and campaign events in Indiana and Arizona later this week. Who should play Pence in the Vice sequel? I’ve been waiting for someone to ask me this question! Easy. Kyle Chandler. FROM THE HEALTH DESK ANTIBODY LANGUAGE — White House physician Sean Conley said on White House letterhead today that Trump has developed antibodies to the coronavirus. If you’re scratching your head about what this means for the president’s overall prognosis, you’re in good company. Deputy health care editor Lauren Morello emails us: The type of long-lasting antibodies found in Trump’s blood on Monday — known as IgG antibodies — usually develop one to three weeks after a person is infected. Their presence signals that the body’s immune system is trying to fend off the virus. But Trump’s situation is complicated. The president announced his diagnosis early Friday on Twitter. Hours later, according to the White House, he received a high dose of Regeneron’s monoclonal antibody cocktail — lab-made proteins designed to fight off the virus. It’s not clear whether Trump’s doctors used a test that could distinguish between the lab-made antibodies he took and any his body made naturally. The positive antibody test might just be an artifact of Trump’s treatment regimen. Or, if the president has developed his own antibodies, that could mean he’s been sick longer than the White House has disclosed, because it normally takes Covid-19 patients at least a week to develop those defenses. So far, Conley’s medical updates have raised more questions than they’ve answered. The White House physician has refused to disclose whether the virus has damaged Trump’s lungs, even though he was given a drug reserved for severe or critical patients who need help breathing. Today’s scraps of antibody information deepen the mystery. COVID-2020 PLEXIGLASS HOUSES — Early photos of the plexiglass barriers set up for Pence, Harris and moderator Susan Page for tonight’s debate sent public health expert Twitter into a tizzy. After seeing aerosol scientist Alex Huffman’s Twitter reaction this morning, Nightly’s Myah Ward gave him a call. “This is absolutely ridiculous. It’s theatre of some kind,” he told Nightly. “Totally worthless.” Actually, it’s worse than worthless, said Huffman, a professor at The University of Denver. Public health experts have worked hard to educate the public and leaders on how the virus spreads through the air, he said, and they’ve made progress. “One stupid instance of people disobeying basic guidelines, seen by tens of of millions of people, could undue months of educational efforts that we’ve all been working on,” Huffman said. Plexiglass barriers should be used in places like banks or grocery stores to protect workers and customers from “virus cannonballs” being sprayed on each other’s faces, he said. But in a debate venue, with the candidates already more than 12 feet apart, these barriers serve no purpose and the particles can still circulate with the airflow of the room. Huffman said it’s even possible that the barriers will disrupt the room’s ventilation, creating pockets of unfiltered and unclean air. The Cleveland Clinic is the “health security adviser” to the Commission on Presidential Debates. The clinic released a statement on Tuesday, clarifying its role as an adviser but not an enforcer of Covid safety protocols. That responsibility falls on the commission. THE MAINE EVENT — Is Susan Collins making her “last stand”? In the latest POLITICO Dispatch, congressional reporter (and Mainer) Burgess Everett breaks down why Collins is on track to lose her seat representing Maine — and how the race marks the end of an era for moderates under the increasingly polarized politics of the Trump administration. Listen to the latest POLITICO Dispatch podcast ASK THE AUDIENCE Nightly asks you: What book, movie or TV show best captures your 2020 experience? Use our form and send us your answer, and we’ll feature select responses in our Friday edition. THE BACKSTORY ‘EVERYONE LOVES A WOMAN IN POWER UNLESS SHE’S SEEKING POWER’— Sexism in politics in nothing new, which got deputy magazine editor Elizabeth Ralph thinking: How do the obstacles that women face as politicians translate to the debate stage? In the latest episode of The Backstory, Elizabeth looks at historical instances of sexism at work in elections and how these dynamics might play out tonight in Utah. NIGHTLY NUMBER 54,000 The number of students in the Boston Public School district. Mayor Marty Walsh said today that the district will pause its reopening of schools for in-person education. The decision was based on the city registering a coronavirus positivity rate — the percentage of Covid tests that are positive — of more than 4 percent. PARTING WORDS PERSONAL FOUL — Nightly’s Tyler Weyant writes: I have a Covid confession: I tuned into Monday night’s New England Patriots-Kansas City Chiefs football game, even though I didn’t think it should be played. And I enjoyed it. In case you missed it: Patriots quarterback Cam Newton tested positive for Covid Saturday. In response, the NFL delayed the game barely 24 hours, until Monday. The Patriots flew to Kansas City using two planes: one for players and staff who came in close contact with Newton, and one for those who hadn’t. Foxboro, Mass., is not yet a hot spot on the order of the White House, but today Patriots cornerback Stephon Gilmore announced that he has tested positive, too. The team canceled its next two days of practice. Meanwhile, a photo of Gilmore hugging Chiefs quarterback Patrick Mahomes raced across the internet. I don’t know how anyone could look at that series of events and say the NFL didn’t make some, to put it charitably, questionable decisions. And it’s not as if this was the NFL’s first encounter with Covid: The Tennessee Titans have hit 22 cases. The NFL canceled the Titans’ game last weekend, and their game this weekend is in jeopardy, too. Why did the NFL pretend like the Patriots and the Chiefs were immune from the virus, after watching it take down a playoff team of young and healthy men? Simply put, because of people like me. It’s hard to admit this. Football has become a load-bearing column in our culture, one of the last shared experiences in a fragmenting society. Now that column might be rotting from the inside, thanks to less-than-ideal Covid planning. To be honest, something similar was true before the pandemic. We already knew football was killing some of its players — from long-term brain damage caused by repeated concussions — and, for the most part, we chose not to care. So I guess I’ll assuage my conscience by saying it out loud. But come Sunday, where will I be? In front of the TV, cracking a beer and sweating a bit about the safety of the players in the country’s most popular sport.   HELP BUILD SOLUTIONS FOR THE FUTURE OF GLOBAL HEALTH: POLITICO is a proud partner of the ninth annual Meridian Summit, focused on The Rise of Global Health Diplomacy. The virtual Meridian Summit will engage a global audience and the sharpest minds in diplomacy, business, government and beyond to build a more equitable economic recovery and save more lives. Join the conversation to help secure the future of our global health.     Did someone forward this email to you? Sign up here.   Follow us on Twitter Renuka Rayasam @renurayasam   FOLLOW US

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DANI BRZOWSKI: NEW AD ALERT

 

Did you see our new digital ad?  It’s a must-watch. If you haven’t already seen it, click here to view it. The ad is about my opponent’s terrible record on women and LGBTQ rights. He has supported restricting abortion for survivors of rape, voted against the Equality Act, and voted against transgender healthcare protections. He is anti-woman and anti-LGBTQ. And I am the queer woman running against him.  It’s a powerful ad, if I do say so myself. So it’s important that we put it everywhere we can. Can I count on you to chip in and help us run it? Dani Brzozowski Democratic Nominee for Congress, IL-16

Copyright © 2020 Dani for Illinois, All rights reserved. Our mailing address is: Dani for Illinois PO Box 1671 La Salle, IL 61301-3671