Congratulations to Governor Patrick

He's up 25 points over Kerry Healey, has the endorsement of virtually every paper in the commonwealth, and has come through the reprehensible campaign run by the Lt. Governor and the Mass GOP with only a few scratches and bruises.

Meanwhile, he's run a decent campaign, focused on the positives, and watched the good citizens of the Bay State reject a campaign that used spurious character assassination as a way to divert attention away from a non-existent legislative record. Another blonde harpy in a twinset with a fetish for negative ads bites it. Let's hear it for Truth And Justice!

So what would a Patrick administration mean for us out here in the far-western frontier?

His support of the Cape Wind project may help streamline the wind project up on Florida Mountain. Like it or not, it appears the citizens of Florida, Savoy, Rowe, and Monroe are OK with it there, for the right reasons. It's good money for these folks: the developers are going to pay good commercial rate taxes on the land. There'll be some infrastructure improvements. And yes, there's a green energy, hippie-dippie component to the project that, while perhaps negligible in the great big scheme of things, is heading in the right direction.

Some local folks may end up in the Administration, giving them a chance to make a big statewide splash. Mr. Patrick has some well-qualified long-time supporters out in this part of the jungle, and hooray for patronage. Just try not to forget us little people when you head out to the big city. I recommend the Harvard Gardens, on Cambridge St. outside Charles Circle, for a quick drink and bite close to the State House.

Will our "taxes" go up? Hard to say. It's a bit of a politician's argument rather than actual dollar-based real world accounting. We pay all kinds of dough to all levels of government in sorts of forms. Property, income, sales, meals, excise taxes. RMV fees. Hunting and fishing and dog licenses. Professional licensures. Even the extra money they want to take wood to the dump (but that's another post entirely). Who's to say our taxes have gone down if we pay $30 less per year in property taxes but an extra $65 to register our car? Or if your income tax rate goes down to 5.1875% while it costs an extra $25 to renew your pipefitter ticket? Before anyone can realistically say "he's going to raise our taxes", keep in mind that no politician has really ever reduced the "size" of government to any appreciable degree, and somebody's gotta pay for it.

We may actually see some folks getting health care that need but can't afford it. Anyone can jiggle the numbers and talk about the $295 fine for not insuring workers and make it sound like politics, but the real issue is far more complicated. The basic philosophy of the Patrick administration seems to be "let's do what we can to help these folks", where the Romney attitude seems to have been "poor people should just shut up, get real jobs, and stop dragging down the economy by not wanting to die."

At least that's my take on it.

But it's all theoretical, and now as always, most of our lives change very little based on who's holding some political office somewhere. The translation into legislation of the conservative attitude of government as a burden vs. the liberal attitude of government as a facilitator is what I'll be using as my barometer to measure the change in the political weather come next year. Electing Mr. Patrick could turn out to be the best thing Massachusettts has ever done, or it could be a high-priced ticket to insolvency. Neither extreme is likely, but at the very least, the change in the atmosphere is something to look forward to.