Mitt Romney (who has not recently been to Argentina, and thus is having himself a pretty good month) breezed into the State House last night to unveil a portrait of what appears to be an old-ass version of himself. Haha, at least they got the hair right.

Romney’s gubernatorial portrait boasts two props, and neither of them is an armadillo. One is his wife, because hooray for family. The other, the Globe tells us, is “a leather binder that has a medical seal representing the state’s landmark healthcare legislation, approved during Romney’s tenure.”

Tim Cahill be damned, health care is key to Romney’s continued kinda-relevance on the national stage. (So is monogamy!) The fluffing he received on the subject last night helps things immeasurably.

Except that, not too long ago, Romney’s legislative counterparts weren’t so keen on letting him take credit for the state’s health care reform law. When I was researching last winter’s Boston magazine profile of then-speaker Sal DiMasi (not to be confused with this excellent post-indictment version), both Sal and Robert Travaglini were eager to say that they, not Romney, did the heavy lifting on that legislation.

Sal was particularly uncharitable. I asked him about a then-recent Time article that called health care reform Romney’s “defining moment.” The article “gave Romney an awful lot of credit,” he said, bitterly. “It’s easy to make PowerPoint presentations without specifics.”

[State House News photo]

DeLeo tried hard to reinforce the “hamburger guy” image he’s crafting for himself, mentioning that he still goes to the post office himself and does his own errands in Winthrop and Revere. Congrats on that count, sir.

The Chamber was one of King Sal‘s favorite forums for destroying political opponents. DeLeo showed no such bent. Instead, he talked about cooperation, etc.

Interesting, though, that the one good shot he did get in was aimed squarely at DiMasi. DeLeo mentioned his first act as speaker was implementing an eight-year term limit on the position. Then he wandered off script, musing that, if his members wanted to reconsider that stipulation seven and a half years into his term, he wouldn’t argue.

Then he caught himself, looked around the room, and mused, “You know, eight years is a long time to be speaker!” The laughs rolled in, so he indulged the crowd. “That’s like an eternity!”

DeLeo also said that, in the upcoming budget debate, his House would “limit earmarks much more than in the past.” That statement is sure to raise eyebrows on Beacon Hill, as DeLeo’s spot in the speaker’s chair was said to depend largely on his ability to dole out earmarks to supporters while suffocating opponents. What a difference a year, and 81 votes, can make.

There was talk of policy and personality politics (Deval Patrick still needs help dealing with reporters, Bob DeLeo likes hamburgers and term limits and doesn’t seem as evil as Tom Finneran), and up until the end, the roughest treatment went to bloggers (Lehigh – “They think they’re this great independent force. They’re just cheerleaders on both sides… They’re just nattering”) and Sal DiMasi (Sandler – “Sal started out as a guy from the North End, and obviously he didn’t end up like that. He’s proof of DeLeo’s greatest danger”).

That wasn’t pretty. But it wasn’t anything compared to what happened when somebody asked Braude about whether gambling might be coming to the state this year.

His response: “The fact that, when people are in their toughest, most frightened moment, this is what you dangle in front of the nose of the middle class – it’s staggering. The notion that we would rely more on that because it doesn’t have the T-word, is insane. They’ll do slots and one destination casino and think everything’s fixed. Rhode Island wants to bail out theirs. Can anyone make the case that casinos have saved Connecticut?”

He then described a trip he and Margery Eagan took to Foxwoods. They’d planned to spend several hours; they only lasted fifteen minutes. “You go inside, and it looks like a Civil War hospital. You’ve got 75-year old people on ventilators smoking, with their pile of quarters in front of them. It is totally demented.”

Adam Reilly rightly laughed off Rogers’s last-minute denunciation of DeLeo’s coronation. The soon to be ex-Majority Leader claimed, on the one hand, that DeLeo was being installed by the DiMasi-Petrolati machine, while on the other, he whined about Sal DiMasi backing out of the deal they’d cut in 2004.

I laughed off Rogers’s statements for a different reason.

Early last year, when the furious succession battle was swirling around Beacon Hill, I spoke to a Beacon Hill source who was very close to Rogers. I asked about the Rogers campaign for the speakership, and DeLeo’s, and the 2004 deal that’s common knowledge around the State House. That’s when Rogers had supposedly suspended his first speakership campaign, allowing DiMasi’s elevation to speaker, in exchange for a guarantee that, when he left, the gavel would pass to Rogers.

The source’s reaction: Nonsense. No deal such ever existed.

Here’s what this source close to Rogers said at the time, and what I’ve verified since DeLeo’s ascension. The only deal that DiMasi and Rogers ever cut was a deal that, when DiMasi eventually left, there would be no hand-picked successor.

Instead, Rogers, who feared that DiMasi would bypass him, secured a commitment that the campaign to succeed DiMasi would be free and open and competitive, with no anointed successors.

Rogers was furious at DeLeo’s machinations over this past year because he felt that, when he responded by lining up his own supporters, and was subsequently singled out for rebuke, he was being put at a competitive disadvantage. Not because he was promised the speakership. But because he was promised a fair fight for the speakership.

And all this stuff last week, about “Talk to Tom Finneran, he was there,” and all the rest? Nothing but a Hail Mary at the closing seconds of an ugly loss.

[Herald image]

Patrick also tapped four current lawmakers. The panel’s apparent enforcer is Taunton Rep. James Fagan, who’s famous around these parts for being the DUI lawyer who tried to lower the threshold for drunk driving to 0.02. The Herald criticized the bill, a fact that drove Fagan to deliver a bizarre anti-newspaper rant at a Judiciary Committee hearing. The Rep’s tact also earned him instant internet fame earlier this year.

Sal DiMasi should take caution: Hand over those documents, or risk being ripped apaaaaht!

(Cross-posted from Boston Daily)

Democracy happened on Tuesday, and what a mess it left behind. John Kerry beat back some RFK lookalike. Longtime Senate fixture Dianne Wilkerson was overthrown by an astronaut’s daughter in a low-turnout race that broke largely along racial and neighborhood lines.

A machine boss’s daughter brought gubernatorial hellfire upon her head in a race she already had sewn up. And Carl Sciortino, the kid Rep who lost his nomination papers and couldn’t find anybody in Somerville to give him money, won on stickers over a guy who actually had his name on the ballot. Wicked drama all around.

But the day’s biggest winner might be anybody willing to take on the city’s most powerful man.

Way back in January, this column compared Mayor Menino’s field ops to a rusty Datsun. The results of the New Hampshire primary, where Hizzoner went all-in for Hillary Clinton, certainly belied that analysis. Wilkerson’s loss is another story. It’s the latest in a string of local races (Tom Reilly, Jeff Drago, Boston’s presidential primary) that the mayor has put his shoulder into, and still lost.

“The urban mechanic needs a tune-up,” a source inside City Hall quips. “City Hall was a ghost town on Tuesday. The lights were on but nobody was home. Michael Kineavy dispatched City Hall staff to work the polls, man the phone banks, and get out the vote, and Wilkerson still lost. The mayor’s machine is rusty, and while he may have high favorability in the polls, it’s certainly not translating into votes.”

Last week we detailed Majority Leader John Rogers’ latest campaign filings ($56,000 spent on cars, food, phones and golf). There’s another sizable withdrawal coming out of that account soon: A $30,000 settlement with state campaign finance regulators.

OCPF announced the settlement—not a fine, mind you—yesterday. OCPF’s investigation into a June, 2007 Globe story about the Majority Leader’s questionable use of campaign funds (he’d funneled nearly $200,000 into a consulting business his former law partner had set up for the apparent sole purpose of consulting for him) revealed that some of that money ultimately paid mortgage bills on a Falmouth vacation home one of the consultants jointly owned with the Norwood Democrat.

The way it works is: Rogers sends money to a friend, who pays another friend a salary, and right after getting paid every month, that other friend makes a payment on the Cape house. A house which Rogers co-owned. Nice system, that.

Some people will doubtlessly react to this news by saying that the settlement effectively kills any chance Rogers has of beating back the DeLeo/Petrolati forces and becoming the House’s next speaker. (After a long, long, long, long, long, long time, obvs.) Others might say that it’s proof that Rogers is ready to lead from Day One.

The Hill and the Hall has different concerns. It’s not so much how Rogers’ vacation home gets paid for, but the fact that he’s apparently funneling campaign cash into the real estate market. Real estate? In this market, Mr. Majority Leader?

There are so many better ways to get rich off sketchy 75 State Street schemes these days. Think inelastic demand. Card games, stolen cigarettes, what about bankrolling dog fighting, maybe?

This is the (alleged) thievery portion of our weekly report, apparently. So let’s point out that (alleged!) thief John Buonomo rolled to victory on Tuesday, despite having quit his post the week before. Let’s also point out that, while Buonomo is widely expected to take his name off November’s ballot, he has yet to do so, and that, when given the chance to rule his client out of the race, Buonomo’s lawyer refused and deferred comment to the Secretary of State’s office.

And this is what Bill Galvin’s office had to say: “We can’t say yes or no until we get something from them.”

(Please, please Lord, let this guy think he has a shot of getting re-elected in November. Please let him run. It would be a truly spectacular spectacle. Truly.)

And besides, Buonomo’s sitting on top of nearly $135,000 in campaign funds. What’s he going to do with that if he skulks off the ballot and out of office? Buy a house?

Final numbers aren’t in yet, but let’s assume that right now, Ed O’Reilly is still on the hook for $400,000 in loans to his campaign. (He was in for upwards of $600,000 of his own money, but at last report, had been able to reimburse himself for something like $200,000.) Now, according to our dreadful math skills, O’Reilly’s 153,636 votes cost him $2.60 apiece. Of his own cash. That’s one hell of a vanity run.

But take heart, Ed. Your own personal financial disaster is nothing compared to Mitt Romney. The former governor spent $1.16 million per delegate for the privilege of failing in front of the whole country. Mitt’s $40 million in personal funds shook out to $147,601 per delegate.

So, Ed, next time somebody comes up to you and tries to say that challenging John Kerry was a fantastically dumb thing to do, remember this: It wasn’t as dumb as it could’ve been.

We neglected to mention one big name missing from last week’s orgy of OCPF data: House Speaker Sal DiMasi. Here’s what the big guy’s money has been up to these past eight months.

DiMasi raised $234,000, spent $209,000 of it, and ended August with $416,491 in hand. He dropped $12,534 on lawyerly stuff with Tom Kiley’s firm, nearly $10,000 on printing and mailings, over $1,000 in “gifts” from a Newton liquor store, and roughly $900 for rounds at the Ipswich Country Club.

And while much has been made about the $30,000 DiMasi spent on feeding himself and others, there are other line items that pop out. Like the two $1,000 expenditures for “professional services” with Vitale, Caturano & Co. in February.

Beyond that, there’s the torrent of money flowing towards Sage Systems, the controversial consulting firm headed by a DiMasi associate, Bill Carito. DiMasi’s own campaign account sent over $58,000 Sage’s way; his Committee for a Democratic House PAC added $42,872 this year. The PAC sent over $48,000 to Sage in 2007.

Sage has long been the subject of grumbling among backbenchers and old Finneran loyalists, who have claimed the Democratic House PAC is being used as a sop for the Speaker’s friends. The PAC funds the maintenance of voter analysis software, and House members have to pay to access the data; Finneran’s PAC, by contrast, made direct payments to Reps facing re-election fights. (This year, the Mass. Republican House PAC made $500 maximum contributions to 12 candidates. When the issue was raised earlier this year, the Speaker’s political aides argued that the firm’s work has a much greater impact on local races than $500 contributions would.)

But Sage is also doing quite well for itself. From January, 2007 to August, 2008, it pulled in over $855,000 worth of business. The Speaker’s campaign account, his PAC, and the Democratic State Committee paced that business.

Still, in this election cycle, just 38 House Democrats took advantage of Sage’s services. Tony Verga did, to the tune of $21,500. He lost on Tuesday. Paul Donato, one of the speaker’s close confidants, dropped $13,000 with the firm and easily won his re-election fight. Charlie Murphy spent well over $66,000 with the firm. For that kind of money, Sage should throw in free tickets to St. Croix. Or not.

Wire services contributed to this report.

(Cross-posted from the slick new Boston Daily)

How hard has the legislature been working? On Thursday, the thirstiest day of the week, the House and the Senate both missed last call. Now that’s public service. As Governor Deval Patrick told a group of kids who were regaling him with birthday wishes, “It’s insane down there right now.”

In racing towards the end of the legislative session, legislators passed bills on global warming and health care costs, establishing universal pre-K education, securing Greenway funding, bailing out the debt-addled Pike, and approving several billion in new bonding expenditures. Additionally, they overrode nearly half of the Governor’s budget vetoes.

Most will need several uninterrupted days on the golf course to recover from such exertion. And, as luck would have it, they’ll be able to enjoy a cold one or ten on the links. That’s because, just before checking out until next January, the pols legalized booze on golf courses. Fore!

The House also struck a blow for freedom and soaring eagles and such, advancing a bill that would order the state pension system to divest from Iran. That bill wasn’t without some controversy, though. Byron Rushing announced that he’d be voting against the measure, complaining that the bill was “only about terrorism.” In that case…

The clock did run out on two high-profile bills – Patrick’s bid at criminal records reform, and same-day voter registration. Oh well. Maybe somebody’ll get around to that by 2010. Maybe not.

Though distinguished by remarkable productivity, the session’s end resembled the weeks that followed it, in that it was often overshadowed by House Speaker Sal DiMasi’s ongoing quest to retain control over his restless Democratic supermajority. It seems that when legislators gather to vote along party lines, they also tend to plot and scheme and spread disinformation about their boss’s future, and each other’s ambitions. There had been whispers that the faction lining up behind Ways and Means Chair Bob DeLeo might be using budget veto overrides to reward supporters and punish enemies. The chairman was busy working his cell phone, but the override process largely consisted of reps shuffling into the chamber, voting with leadership (Dems yes, GOP no), and then ambling back out of the room. At one point, Speaker Pro-Tempore Thomas Petrolati had to urge his charges to remain in the room, so that they might dispense with the business ahead of them in a more expeditious manner. Some allowed themselves to be herded; others did not.

In one interesting development, the House advanced a popular bill that had been stagnant since January. According to the Herald, leadership had “put a hold” on the bill after pocketing $42,000 from an interest group opposing the legislation. And then, after being held for months upon months, the bill moved. It was Wednesday, after 5pm, and over at Herald Square, the paper was preparing to ship a story about the bill’s curious death. By the time the story ran, on Thursday, the bill wasn’t dead; it was undead and on the move!

Still, from the ceremony celebrating the death of the last bit of law Kris Mineau could cling to, you’d never know that there was angst and scandal swirling through the State House. Patrick and DiMasi laughed and embraced and delivered speeches that made onlookers weep. Senator Dianne Wilkerson cheered the end of “a very dark, evil chapter in the history of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts.” Everybody cheered the fact that Mitt Romney is no longer governor. And then the crowd sang happy birthday to Patrick.

The Senate joined little kids and gay marriage advocates in celebrating the governor’s aging. The body took a break from overriding his budget vetoes to enjoy a bite of Modern Pastry rum cake with the birthday man. Afterwards, Senate Minority Leader Richard Tisei warned his colleagues, “I might be a little unstable on my feet because that rum cake was very strong.” He confirmed that he’d marked the occasion by posing for a photo with Patrick, and then attempted to get his colleagues to begin their upcoming five-month vacation on a responsible note.

“When we come back in January, chances are, we’re going to come back to a real mess. We should do what we can right now to contain spending as best as we can. These agencies aren’t going to fall apart. They can certainly afford a little belt-tightening. I don’t agree with the governor on a lot of policy issues. But he is correct on sounding the alarm.”

The speech, unlike that killer midday drunk joke, went unnoticed. Looming economic disaster? Sounds like something that can wait until January. Until then, most legislators have uncontested reelection contests to worry about. Have a nice summer, fall and Christmas, everybody!

Wire services contributed to this report.

]]> http://www.paulmcmorrow.com/2008/08/01/the-hill-and-the-hall-week-in-review-22/feed/ 0 http://www.paulmcmorrow.com/2008/07/03/the-hill-and-the-hall-half-year-in-review/ http://www.paulmcmorrow.com/2008/07/03/the-hill-and-the-hall-half-year-in-review/#comments Thu, 03 Jul 2008 16:23:18 +0000 admin http://www.paulmcmorrow.com/?p=221 Continue reading →]]>

(Cross-posted from Boston Daily)

There’s still a couple weeks left in the current legislative session, but since we’ve just passed the year’s halfway point – and since some of us are going to the beach a few days early – now seems as good a time as any to tally up the winners and losers from politicking in the first half of 2008. Here’s who did well, who did terribly, and who just got done on Beacon Hill and in City Hall.

Governor Deval Patrick

The good news first. The noise on Beacon Hill this half-year revolved around the governor’s legislative successes and failures – a dramatic departure from last year, what with talk of Cadillacs, drapes, and political incompetence. He’s suddenly able to walk the State House halls without tripping over his own feet (on most days, anyway), and it’s his policy proposals, not his relationship with the House Speaker, or a string of embarrassing staff shakeups, that dominate the headlines.

In this sense alone, the governor enjoyed the first six months of 2008 much, much more than he did the first half of 2007. And that’s saying something, considering that Patrick spent much of the half-year fighting for a doomed casino bill, and then, on the eve of the bill’s ceremonial slaughter, abandoning the few Reps who were actually willing to invite the Speaker’s wrath by standing with him when he bolted town to look for a book deal.

It was an appropriate end to a maddening six-month saga.

Stymied in its bid to squeeze coinage out of telecom companies, corporations, and restaurants, the administration dressed up a desperate cash-grab as an economic development proposal. They couldn’t convince the House that Sheldon Adelson was the answer to the state’s property tax crisis, (because he isn’t). Casinos would provide cities and towns with one-eighth of the local aid dollars that the Lottery does, dollar for dollar. So, without a real reason for existing, the thing – along with a significant volume of the governor’s political capital – got put down.

Whatevs. Few people, outside of Dan O’Connell and Clyde Barrow, gave it a fighting chance in the first place. Yet, even with one horribly awful legislative defeat on his record, Patrick still isn’t doing too bad for himself this year.

For one, he got King Sal to cave on corporate tax loopholes. For another, he can suddenly play ping-pong and not get murdered in the press for it. Plus, he finally saw his $1 billion life sciences package squeeze through the legislature – just in time to jet off to San Diego and get crowned the biotech industry’s governor of the year. He trotted out his signature education reform initiative and didn’t get totally destroyed for not knowing how he’s going to roll the teachers unions, or find a few extra billion to pay for the thing.

And, most importantly, a longtime Beacon Hill observer points out that for better or worse, this year’s budget – assuming it ever gets passed – is basically Patrick’s budget. It’s been nearly two decades since the legislature showed this much deference to the governor’s budget, and Patrick certainly didn’t get that courtesy last year.

House Speaker Sal DiMasi

One word for you: Oof.

Sal’s been getting it from all sides, and the trouble isn’t going to go away. That casino victory was forever ago, and regardless of how many energy bill parties the guy attends, this session will be remembered as the one that could undo that awesome legacy DiMasi was building for himself. That’s because any one of these seventeen active or pending ethics investigations could bring the feds into the party. They haven’t taken down a speaker in a few years now – too long, in their world.

Worse, when DiMasi’s friends weren’t running around making things worse (you don’t wave red at a bull, Rich), they were planning for his demise. Or voting on stuff while in St. Croix. That one sure didn’t help.

DiMasi can’t even seek refuge in the well-tailored arms of big business. It’s been less than a year since he vowed to institute a sales tax holiday every year of his speakership, and he’s already gone back on that promise. It sure is hard out there for a pimp.

Senate President Therese Murray

Murray has had the easiest time of the Big Three thus far. She won a staring contest with the House that would’ve turned a comprehensive oceans management plan into a blinking neon sign in Buzzard’s Bay reading, “Hey, Jay Cashman! Build here!” She played the peacekeeper – or, more correctly, the adult – when tensions over casinos and presidential politics had Patrick and DiMasi pissing in the direction of each other’s sandboxes. And she exploited the simmering conflict between the two to push her own big-ticket agenda for reforming health care and transportation.

The latter episode also showed the limits of big thinking on Beacon Hill: Interested interests quickly rallied and beat back the most ambitious efforts to squeeze police details and the MBTA’s lard-heavy retirement system. It didn’t take threats of bodily harm to scale back anyone’s thirst for reform.

Mayor Tom Menino

Boston’s most powerful person won’t have to deal with Ralph Martin next November. He’s got enough campaign cash to give every poll worker in town a platinum grill. Michael Flaherty’s taking shots at him, but they sound a lot like the ones Maura Hennigan lobbed back in 2005, and we all remember how that one turned out.

The Boston City Council

By our count, the august body hasn’t been eviscerated on the Fox 25 morning news in weeks. That has to be a record, or something.

Fat cats. Or, alternately, children

Carla Howell has a very real chance of bleeding every hack in the state dry. Either that, or she’s going to visit untold disaster upon each and every child in the Commonwealth. That’s because small government is beautiful, and because Carla Howell hates your children. Remember that, come November.

Lucidity

Failed gubernatorial candidate (rather spectacularly at that) Christy Mihos recently launched Christy2010.com, a website pushing him as an “Independent for Governor of Massachusetts.”

Mihos has not yet decided to run for governor in 2010, saying, “We’ll see what the future brings, but right now I’m pretty happy running a business where we’re doing pretty well because we’re giving people what they want.”

Dignity

The biggest loser of the year thus far, by a long shot. Take State Senator James Marzilli, for instance. He beat back sexual assault charges in Arlington, and celebrated by going on an absolutely epic spree of groping, running and crying – punctuated by some of the greatest pickup lines we’ve ever read, by the way.

Over in the House, Rep. Jennifer Callahan had a goon/colleague “personally threaten” her during the budget, saying, sayin“I could really hurt you if I wanted to.”

James Fagan pulled not one but two absolute nutters. The first, in March, was eight uninterrupted minutes of vitriol about drinking, gambling and the evils of the working media, whom he glared at while labeling “vultures” that “prey off the bones of … tragedies.” That was Fagan staying within himself, apparently. Last week, he promised to “rip apart” six-year old rape victims, adding, “I’m going to make sure that the rest of their life is ruined.”

And speaking of ruined lives! Earlier this week, House members “booed loudly” when told they’d have to come to work on July 3. Don’t you know who they are???

Speaking of vacations, the Hill is taking a long overdue one next week.

(Cross-posted from Boston Daily)

A whole mess of pols in expensive suits showed up at the State House on Wednesday to witness the unveiling of a portrait of former Senate President Robert Travaglini. Headliners included former Governor Paul Cellucci, former Pike official and son of Eastie James Aloisi, Boston Mayor Tom Menino, former House Speakers Tom Finneran and Charlie Flaherty, and Travaglini’s first political boss, former AG Francis Bellotti.

The event–seemingly lightened by the unexpected absence of former Gov. Mitt Romney–provided the assembled politicians the forum for what they do best. They cracked wise and busted balls.

Gov. Deval Patrick emotionally recalled that Travaglini was the man who administered his oath of office, saying, “I’ll never forget that day.” He also recalled huddling up with Trav and Sal DiMasi after the election; Trav flatly told Patrick, “I’m out of practice cooperating with the governor.”

Menino took the podium promising to “bury” the guest of honor, “not praise him.”

“You’re finally funny!” the former president shot back. The mayor appeared ready to follow through on his vow, then spied a Senate aide clutching a tape recorder. “Awww,” he moaned, before launching into a grudging, but florid, recitation of Trav’s greatness. Then he paused, staring at the aide, a wide, open-mouthed grin on his face.

And the yuks kept on coming. Finneran speculated, “I’m the only member of the media who has ever been, or will be applauded in this room.” He added, “The mayor told me to be careful of that recorder. I have to be cautious for other reasons – I’m still on probation!” Then he expounded on the profound cultural differences between the Italian-American Senate leader and himself: Trav plied legislators with Pope Juice, while Finneran preferred Johnny Walker Blue.

It was just one of several references to getting tanked. DiMasi ventured to say that the wine they drank in the legislature was much better, “than what you and the mayor used to drink.” Trav claimed that anybody who was thinking about leaving the old neighborhoods had second thoughts once DiMasi succeeded Finneran: “East Boston and the North End? The party goes on all night!”

And Senate President Therese Murray, recalling the meticulous manner in which her predecessor arranged the knickknacks in his office, told a story about breaking into the president’s office one night and rearranging everything in sight. “We climbed out one window and then in yours,” she revealed, adding, “We put all our leftovers in there, too.” Murray also gleefully recounted Trav’s skill at “filling every open clerk and court officer position. He had a full employment office coming out of there.”

The current House Speaker had attendees roaring when he contrasted the continuity between Trav’s time in leadership and Murray’s with the recent transition in the House. Finneran, he said, had told him, “Just try not to do what I did.” DiMasi paused, then confessed, “It hasn’t been easy. You’re rubbing off on me a little too much!”

DiMasi also chided his predecessor’s verbosity. “Tom Finneran took most of my two minutes. Were you speaking for Romney, too?” He paused, setting up the punchline: “You did that during your whole tenure as speaker.”

Trav refused to be upstaged. After being regaled by several rounds of the legislature’s customary greeting for Italian-Americans – a resounding chorus of “Heyyyy! Heyyyyyyy!,” interspersed with the occasional “Woo!” – he began with, “Governor, none of those toll-takers were my guys.”

He paused for applause, then added, “But if you’re looking for an apology from me for providing employment opportunities for qualified residents from impacted communities … I offer no apology.” Then he talked about public service. Then he pulled the curtain off his portrait. It’s a rather massive thing – smaller than the monstrosities belonging to Calvin Coolidge and Horace Mann, but still large enough to put Billy Bulger’s to shame. (There are no gratuitous Abe Lincoln busts or creepy mystery hands in Trav’s portrait, either.)

In the press scrum that followed the ceremony, Trav brushed aside suggestions that, now that he’s legally allowed to lobby his former colleagues, he’ll be roaming the halls frequently. “I don’t have to come up here,” he said. “Yeah,” a reporter shot back. “You just pick up the phone.”

“That’s right!” The former president brushed aside a reporter’s suggestions that his portrait, styled after the classic Brahmin portraits hanging in the Athenaeum, was incongruous with his standing as the chamber’s first Italian-American leader. He did, however, concede one point: The artist, Tom Ouellette, “Could’ve given me a little more hair.”

Suffolk County DA Dan Conley has won a string of murder convictions recently. Does this mean he’s not the devil in a nice suit – and that he’s no longer easy prey for upwardly mobile Boston pols?

A hot rumor hit the internets this week: Governor Patrick’s chief of staff, Doug Rubin, will soon dump the administration for the Obama campaign. Hub Politics cited “unconfirmed rumors afloat” concerning Rubin’s imminent departure, and then speculated about all the great palace intrigue that will follow the resignation.

One problem, though. Rubin said Wednesday that he’s not leaving. Which just goes to show you: When trading in unsourced, unconfirmed rumors, stick to the rumor-mongers you trust. The Hill and the Hall: Your finest source for baseless speculation since, like, seven months ago.

From the Department of How Can We Miss You if You Won’t Go Away?: Mitt Romney may have skipped the ceremony honoring Travaglini, but the preceding night, he was back in Boston and in rare form. The failed presidential candidate headlined a Republican fundraiser, played to the crowd and beat up on his successor for trying to fix education by leading with his heart, not his calculator: “I’d say how much can I spend first, and then I’d design it,” Romney said.

Perennially bored rich guy William Weld was in the house too, and for some reason he called Romney “someone who is inevitably going to be, soon or late, the president of the United States of America.” Halloween’s still months away, Bill. Why try to sew terror now?

Wire services contributed to this report.