It’s only open to subscribers right now, but the New Yorker took a look at our congressional campaign in its “Talk of the Town” segment by reporting a conversation with Jack Porter.
I’m not entirely sure why they did this, other than he’s a character and makes the district look like another “Massachusetts-folks-will-elect-anyone-named-Kennedy” kind of place. It’s certainly not flattering, as the entire conversation takes place while hanging around Porter’s Volkswagen Jetta at the Vince Lombardi Service Area on the New Jersey Turnpike. My favorite quote from the piece?
[Porter] forecast the death of small-town New England liberalism. “In ten years, it’s almost like–it’s not going to be completely a red state, but it’s going to be balanced. Whenever you step a mile outside of Newton, it’s a totally different attitude that you get now.”
Porter points out how he’s also running against Romney and how he’s had brushes with the former First Family of Massachusetts (he had a tour of the Mormon Temple run by Mitt’s son Tagg).
Also worth noting: while the New Yorker gives significant ink to Joseph P. Kennedy III and Barney Frank, it never mentions Sean Beilat.
OK. That’s just too weird.
Not mentioning Beilat is telling- for the author and for Beilat.
There was an element of the Porter interview reminiscent of Mitt Romney at the end of his term as governor. Mitt was going around the country goofing on his liberal Mass constituents and Porter’s driving up and down the Jersey Turnpike goofing on his liberal Newton neighbors.