Guest MINDSETTER™ Daniel Harrop: Real Choice for Providence

Guest MINDSETTER™ Daniel Harrop

Guest MINDSETTER™ Daniel Harrop: Real Choice for Providence

The panic was palpable. There were tears as Brett Smiley withdrew from the Democratic primary for Mayor last Friday at Prospect Park.  There were smiles as Jorge Elorza accepted his endorsement.  And then fear set in and the Democrats began to eat their own…

As the Republican candidate for Mayor, I had expected this to be a love fest between these two Progressive Democrats.  For months I have debated them, and it is difficult to tell them apart.  Smiley approached the race from an intellectual perspective, with multiple policy statements on how to turn the city around.  I still have not found enough time in my schedule to read the hundreds of pages he posted, or the eight page “summary” in 6-pt. type he recently passed out.  Elorza approaches the race with an emotional pitch, that we must become “One Providence” and our city will succeed.  After months, I still do not know what this means.

Nevertheless, at joint appearances they were the best of buddies, always cordial and polite to one another.  I doubt there is a formal deal between them for combining their campaigns.  They could finish each other’s sentences in our public forums. They understand each other.  There is no need to talk of a deal.

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But they now seem to understand what they have done: the two Progressives have fought to a draw, each using up all their money and still they stood a distant second and third in the smart betting on the primary.  For months they have talked about “changing the atmosphere at City Hall,” changing the “You-Gotta-Know-A-Guy” culture, but had avoided directly criticizing City Council President Michael Solomon, the endorsed machine establishment candidate. Somehow they forgot the fourth important person in the Democratic primary, Buddy Cianci.  The word initially went out that Buddy’s people should vote Smiley, whom Buddy considered the weakest candidate, since Brett was not polling much off the East Side. The old ladies at the church festivals were not likely to vote for this Progressive and his husband.  Elorza is the biggest threat: a well-educated, erudite, city judge with no hint of scandal about him. Smiley should have stayed in, Elorza should have pulled out, if the Progressives wanted a candidate. Smiley might have squeaked by in the primary, the Progressives and Buddy’s people voting in an unholy alliance.

Now the Progressives have become their own worst enemies and must stop the unspoken devilish pact between the City Machine, which includes Progressives like Yurdin and Zurier but is the establishment, and Buddy’s supporters. Surely our former Mayor wants to run against Solomon, tainted with a sweetheart deal of a city loan he has not paid back and some 26 ethics charges, courtesy of the fine investigative reporting from GoLocalProv, and a formal complaint from the city’s Republicans. 

The press frequently dwells on how the Tea Party has been tearing the Republicans to pieces.  There has been little focus on the Progressives, equally fanatic as the Tea Party, who are tearing apart the Democratic Party, and ruining their chances of electing Progressive candidates.  You could make a good case this is happening in Rhode Island’s Democratic gubernatorial primary this year.

So Messrs. Elorza and Smiley panicked, and in their fear they began to attack.  We heard how Solomon is the “King of the ‘Know-a-Guy’ clique,” who will return Providence “to the dark days of its past,” and is too “ethically challenged” to be Mayor. The expected love fest in Prospect Park turned into a lynching. Even we Republicans, who have disagreed with almost every proposal Mr. Solomon has put forth, have never felt he was a Lord Voldemort. You could see the fear in their eyes as they realized they are now likely to lose the primary.  It is too late to get Smiley’s backers to write large checks to Elorza, to fill his coffers before the primary and let him go toe-to-toe with Solomon in TV ads.  It is too late to combine their staffs and figure out a workable team.  It is too late. They had their chance last June, just after Buddy announced, but they missed their opening. Vanity is a terrible thing.

Now, Progressive friends, the Mayoral race is likely to be between a twice convicted felon, whose financial incompetence allowed 6% cost of living adjustments to bankrupt the city, versus a Democrat, who is ethically challenged and/or an incompetent administrator (that's what the Democrats are saying about him), versus a (god forbid) Republican, with a thirty plus year successful, unblemished medical practice and extensive charitable and community involvement who also has an MBA besides his doctorate and is referred to by the Green Party Chair as "a nice man." Yes, the choice for Progressives, and Providence, will be difficult in November.

Dr. Daniel Harrop is the Republican candidate for Mayor of Providence.

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