State Rep. Christine Barber is an exceptionally effective legislator
Letter to the editor, Somerville Journal August 19, 2020 A few of years ago, I answered a reporter’s routine question about the status of a bill that I was working on for the Sierra Club. Tired and frustrated with the lack of momentum of progressive climate legislation in the building, I broke the unspoken rule of lobbyists in Massachusetts politics and pointed to the flaws in the political structure of the State House -- “Let me be clear,” I asserted. “Don’t confuse what goes on in this building with democracy.” And that’s exactly what he printed. I was surprised to see this quote recently, out of context, in a Letter to the Editor to the Somerville Journal from State Representative candidate hopeful Anna Callahan along with former gubernatorial candidate Bob Massie and Greg Nadeau, who appears to have been a State House staffer decades ago. The point was to disingenuously tie the failings of the State Legislature to a candidate and colleague who I admire and have worked with on n