The Dorchester Reporter
A bad week for democracy
By Bill Walczak, Reporter Columnist
September 17, 2025
Before last year’s election, President Trump made it clear that he was planning vengeance on his political enemies, particularly on those who wouldn’t cave to his “big lie” about his 2020 loss to Joe Biden or his demands to illegally reverse the outcome. So far, he’s made good on the threats, stripping protections for some senior leaders deemed disloyal even as they themselves have been threatened by America’s enemies.
Having the US Department of Justice target Trump’s enemies will undoubtedly result in financial harm or bankruptcy for many of them. And the threats to prevent law firms from getting government contracts unless they provide millions of dollars in free legal help to Trump friends, such as coal mine owners? That used to be called extortion, but apparently no longer.
One of the worst aspects of this administration to date is the lack of statesmanship when troubles have emerged. Humans can be herdable and it’s not difficult to get groups of people riled up.
That’s true at the local level, too. Back in 1984, when I was president of the Columbia-Savin Hill Civic Association, the community was up in arms over an MBTA issue widely known as “the Savin Hill fly-over.”
When the Red Line extension to Quincy/Braintree was planned in the 1960s, instead of putting a junction where the two lines came together geographically, just south of Savin Hill, they decided to put the tracks adjacent to the Dorchester tracks until they went into the Andrew Square tunnel. As a result, the trains from the South Shore passed by the Dorchester stops (Savin Hill and Columbia, now JFK-UMass), which meant that anyone going to UMass or the other businesses and attractions of Columbia Point had to go to Andrew Station and take another train back to Columbia station. And Dorchester residents were unable to use a train that passed through their neighborhood.
Residents in Savin Hill made the case that if the T built an interchange — a “flyover”— the neighborhood could get access to both branches— and vice versa.
But there was a hitch: Many South Shore residents did not want Dorchester residents to have easy access to Quincy/Braintree by subway. Instead, the T suggested a second platform at what is now JFK/UMass station to serve the Braintree branch.
Savin Hill residents organized and fought back. A Boston Globe editorial weighed in on their side (“Getting Savin Hill on the line” 6/4/1984) arguing that the flyover would “right a 15-year-old wrong.” John Kerry, then running for the US Senate, claimed he was “the only candidate for the US Senate who has publicly endorsed the Savin Hill Flyover.” Many other elected and prominent officials joined him.
When MBTA officials were invited to a civic association meeting to explain why they wouldn’t do it, they presented information that exaggerated the cost of the flyover at a time when fancy atriums were being added to new suburban train stations to attract riders. The crowd of about 150 people at the Little House started getting restive. When I loudly accused the T representatives of lying, the crowd started yelling at them, and I got worried that things could get out of control.
I cooled the crowd and learned a lesson that day about how easily a group can get riled up. Politicians know that very well. Throughout my lifetime, our presidents have generally acted responsibly when cooling actions are required.
Until now.
I disagreed politically with George W. Bush on most matters, but it was an act of statesmanship when, after the 9/11 attacks, he visited the Islamic Center in Washington, saying: “The face of the terrorist is not the true faith of Islam… Islam is peace.”
Who can forget when 2008 Republican presidential candidate John McCain shut down a man at one of his campaign events who referred to Barack Obama as someone who “cohorts with domestic terrorists and is an Arab.” “No. [Obama] is a decent person who you don’t have to be scared of as president of the United States,” McCain said. When a woman at the same event insisted “can’t trust Obama - he’s an Arab,” and McCain took the microphone from her and said that Obama “is a decent family man and citizen that I just happen to have disagreements with.” The senator was booed for his comments.
Obama memorably said, “There are no red states or blue states, just the United States.”
Trump seems to have no interest in uniting Americans. Following the political murder of Republican Charlie Kirk last week, which followed the political murders of Minnesota Democrat Melissa Hortman and her husband and shooting of a Democratic state senator and his wife in June, you’d hope that Trump would want to bring the American people together against political violence.
But instead, Trump responded by blaming the “radical left,” saying, “My administration will find each and every one of those who contributed to this atrocity and to other political violence, including the organizations that fund it and support it.” He ignored that we knew virtually nothing about why the shooter acted or whether he was “radical left,” or the fact that political violence is also perpetrated by the radical right.
As Abraham Lincoln said "A house divided against itself cannot stand."
Perhaps there’s some hope for democracy on the home front? Not based on the turnout for last week’s election for mayor and city council. With Josh Kraft dropping out of the race, it appears that the preliminary election has decided who will be mayor for the next four years. But even after millions of dollars were spent to draw distinctions between Michelle Wu and Josh Kraft, and with what happens in Boston regarding schools, property taxes, policing, immigration, housing, climate change, and crime largely determined by who is mayor, only 22 percent of registered voters could find the five minutes it took to vote. That meant that 322,368 registered Boston voters didn’t vote, and only 16 percent of Boston’s registered voters determined who will be mayor for the next four years.
Yes, it was a bad week. Democracy remains in trouble.
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Recent Bill Walczak columns & an interview:
“Let’s do the right thing and right now restore health care on Carney campus.” September 4, 2025 https://dotnews.com/2025/let-s-do-right-thing-and-right-now-restore-health-care-carney-campus
“Episode 13: A look at the Savin Hill Neighborhood” July 11, 2025 video podcast https://www.dotlifepod.com/episodes/episode13-july112025
“How will mayoral, statewide candidates respond if Trump/Congress cuts prevail?” June 19, 2025. https://dotnews.com/2025/how-will-mayoral-statewide-candidates-respond-if-trumpcongress-cuts
“America: The View from the UK”. June 12, 2025 https://conta.cc/3T9SuDX
“Daily Table, a noble experiment tackling food deserts and health disparities is closing” May 10, 2025. https://conta.cc/4mgYIPI
“Podcast brings us back to anti-war Catholic Dorchester circa 1972” April 16, 2025
https://dotnews.com/2025/podcast-brings-us-back-antiwar-catholic-dorchester-circa-1972
“Questions in search of answers in this year’s mayoral campaign” April 9, 2025 https://conta.cc/44jvatS
“Assessing the state of readiness for Boston to blunt the ravages of the monster storm”.
January 29, 2025. https://conta.cc/3PX0DKj
Learning the ropes – “How I learned the best way to get positive action out of city hall”. January 9, 2025. https://dotnews.com/2025/how-i-learned-about-best-way-get-positive-action-out-city-hall
“A health center was conceived 50 years ago this week. Health center history tells a useful story for today”. December 5, 2024 https://dotnews.com/2024/codman-square-health-center-was-conceived-50-years-ago-week
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