Markey Makes Progressive Pitch to Belmont Dems

In parts of speech, an interjection is a word solely designed to convey emotion.

Think of "Oh no," or "gosh" at the beginning of a sentence. Some speakers will place the interjection at the end, as a way to seek agreement. 

Take US Rep. Ed Markey, for instance, who spoke before a room filled with supporters who came out early on Sunday morning, Feb. 24, to Patou Thai Restaurant in Belmont Center. 

Markey – a candidate to fill the unexpired term of former US Senator John Kerry who was approved as US Secretary of State this month – said he said wants to secure the hopes of President Obama to the people as the next Senator from Massachusetts.

"That's what we are all about with the Democratic Party, huh?" he said before approximately 100 residents on his first of a four-stop day in eastern Massachusetts on a rainy, grey February morning.

For Markey, the "huh" wasn't a stumble or a break; it was his way of reaffirming what his progressive supporters already knew: that Markey will bring his liberal beliefs with him as a member of the US Senate.     

Speaking after introductions from Belmont State Rep. Will Brownsberger and Middlesex Sheriff Peter Koutoujian – who kept referring to the 66-year-old who has been in the US House for 37 years as the "kid from Malden" – Markey said he was running for Senate because "something has to happen about the tsunami of gun violence" – deaths by guns were the equivalent of three Sandy Hooks (referring to the 27 deaths at an elementary school in Newtown, Conn. in December) every week – and insure the laws are passed because the only technology near a child at school "is a computer and not a gun."

"I'm running for the senate to take these guns off our streets," said Markey to the applause of those in attendance.

He said he would use his position to prevent any roll back of the Affordable Care Act – the so-called ObamaCare – passed in 2010 by President Obama that expanded a form of health coverage to nearly all citizens.

"But our health care system is still a 'sick-care' system and that system needs CPR," said Markey, the CPR standing for coverage for all, prevention of illness at the earliest  and increase in research in health and medicine. 

He said Republicans seek to "retreat" on medical research that provides hope to all citizens on disease prevention. 

"They do not care if an indiscriminate cut in the NIH budget, in the science budgets and the graduate medical education budget it destroys our chance to advance and to find a cure," Markey said.

Markey also pointed to environmental issues – "The plant is running a fever and there is no emergency rooms for planets" – calling for a "clean energy revolution in place that we can move from Kentucky coal and Oklahoma oil to a new generation of innovation that dramatically reduces the amount of greenhouse gases."

He told how President Kennedy challenged the country "to be bold" to fund landing a man on the moon and "the challenge for this generation is to ensure it has the wisdom to invest in the science and technology of the next generation in clean energy technology, biotechnology, in telecom and cybertechnologies that gives us the lead," he noted.

While he did his best at slamming the opposition, Markey also said he has worked on a number of bipartisan issues and we will bring that experience in cooperation to the Senate floor because this is an institution that needs to work again."

Markey emphasized the two major differences between him and his main challenger, US Rep. Stephen Lynch: support for abortion availability and the two-year-old national health care law. 

He said that his run for Senate was to benefit all the people in the state.

He recalled when his aunt died a few years ago, he visited the South Lawrence triple decker near the mills where she and his father grew up. Living there today was a young Dominican couple with their own children.

"The accents were different but the aspirations were the same as our family in America," said Markey.