Mike Capuano is the progressive candidate in the special election to replace Ted Kennedy in the senate and he deserves our support. There are a lot of good things to say about Capuano but it is also important to discuss some of the unsavory elements of Martha Coakley's career.
Coakley is a careerist and supported her two former bosses in the Middlesex DA's office as they ran for governor--Scott Harshbarger and Tom Reilly, who was clearly the least progressive candidate in the last Dem primary for governor.
Far more damning is her continued support of Harshbarger and Reilly's involvement in one of the worst cases of child sexual abuse hysteria of the '80s--the Fells Acres case. A mother and two adult children (Violet and Cheryl and Gerald Amirault) were convicted and sent to prison for very lengthy sentences (Gerald served 18 years) on the basis of vigorously coached and outlandish testimony from children. Harshbarger and Reilly sacrificed children (by implanting "memories") and the Amirault family for their political ambitions, even long after the nation recognized the hysteria involved in most of the allegations of sexual abuse in daycare centers.
