I got my hopes up a little bit when on October 21, the Providence Journal’s editorial page endorsed a “Yes” vote for Question 3, whether we should have a Constitutional Convention. The very first sentence of the endorsement was promising.

If Rhode Island ever needed change, it needs it now.

Amen. Do we ever. The best thing we can do is change a lot of things. If you haven’t noticed, Rhode Island isn’t doing so well. We’re still struggling economically, the taxes we pay don’t even come close to the services we receive. It seems every year or two, there is a new politician being investigated or arrested for something new. So yes, change is needed.

Then what does the Journal do in all additional endorsements? Let’s see if we can play a variation of the Sesame Street game “Which one’s not like the others?” but this one is more, “These are all like the others.”

Gina Raimondo
Seth Magaziner
Nellie Gorbea
David Cicilline
Jack Reed
Jorge Elorza
Peter Kilmartin

What makes them all the same? Well, for one they’re all either incumbents or Democrats or both.  How does this fit in with their desire for “change”? Ok, I can understand there being a change in the structure of how government works. We need things like line-item veto, stronger ethics laws, a change in the Lieutenant Governor’s duties. But we do also need change in the people. These are the people who have been leading us into the situation we’re in, or at least people with their party’s ideas.

And let’s be honest, it’s not like the Republicans have trotted out a slate of candidates that makes people really go “Wow!”  Heck, there isn’t even a Republican candidate for Treasurer, a statewide post! But in looking down that list, there does seem to be one that sticks out to me where the Journal really dropped the ball. It came in their endorsement for Peter Kilmartin for Attorney General.

In the endorsement itself, it leads of with “Kilmartin’s record as Rhode Island attorney general has been a mixed one, but it has been solid enough.” Later, the article says “We will not present his record as spotless.” Ok, I guess that’s fair. They go on to explain:

He failed to weigh in against the release of “thrill killer” Alfred Brissette. More troubling, Mr. Kilmartin has been weak, at best, in protecting the public’s right to know about the activities of its government. His office has opposed releasing records about a police investigation of underage drinking at Governor Chafee’s house. He held that government officials can directly charge members of the public for the cost of writing letters denying public-information requests. And, two years after Rhode Island revised its open records law, compliance has been poor, enforcement is rare and a culture of indifference, “if not outright hostility,” to the law prevails in the state, a group of First Amendment and news reporting advocates found in a detailed report.

Not exactly something that inspires a lot of confidence in the state’s top prosecutor. They must explain if they have so many issues with Kilmartin why they didn’t select Dawson Hodgson instead, right? Nope, not a word. What’d Dawson do, kick someone’s dog over at the Journal? I mean let’s start with the basics of what the job is. It’s the lead prosecutor for the state. It’s even a job that Dawson Hodgson has held previously and one that Kilmartin had not done prior to winning the office four years ago. The Attorney General is a job that requires the utmost honesty and ethics and the Common Cause’s 2013-2014 Legislative Scorecard had Dawson Hodgson #1 in the Senate on good government issues.

So what gives, Providence Journal? You wrote a half-hearted endorsement to Kilmartin and you list off a litany of issues with him in over the last four years. Additionally, four years ago he campaigned on a platform of cleaning up corruption in RI. That business doesn’t seem to have slowed in the least, with a second out of the last three House Speakers resigning in the face of scandal.

If we truly want change in the state, we need to start changing who holds these offices. If we keep electing the same people back to the same jobs, we are going to get the same results. The Journal missed a great opportunity to endorse the right man for the job in the Attorney General’s race. I’m not going to miss that opportunity and personally recommend Dawson Hodgson for Rhode Island’s Attorney General on November 4th.

 

Note: One writer’s opinion may not reflect the opinions of all Ocean State Current writers.