Word: ackermanns
(lookup in dictionary)
(lookup stats)
Dates: all
Sort By: most recent first
(reverse)
...Fifty-four years later there are only two women holding that office --Connecticut's Ella Grasso and Washington's fireball, Dixie Lee Ray. A Cambridge woman hopes to join the lonely twosome this fall by challenging incumbent Gov. Michael S. Dukakis for the Massachusetts governorship. That woman is Barbara Ackermann...
...faces stiff competition in the September 19 Democratic primary from Dukakis (who is wowing crowds in his "Blizzard of '78" sweater) and from Ed King (former Massport director and All-American footballer). Operating on a shoestring budget (her sevenmember staff receives just $500 a week), Ackermann must compete with the media blitzes and black-tie fund-raisers of King and the "Duke." "Massachusetts voters are very sophisticated," says the former Cambridge mayor and veteran of five years on the Cambridge School Committee and ten on the Cambridge City Council. "Often, it's those who didn't go to Harvard...
Talking about energy, Ackermann explains almost apologetically, "I got hooked into this nuclear energy thing--it wasn't my issue at first. Like a lot of other people, I was led to believe nuclear was the only answer." She seems frankly surprised that a "bread-and-butter" candidate like herself should have strayed into the chic, dangerously emotional world of the anti-nuclear movement, but as she talks, she carefully dissociates herself from the "liberal, middle-class attitude," pointing out that she supports alternate energy sources from a "jobs point of view. Comparatively few jobs will be created by nuclear...
While maintaining essentially liberal positions on most issues, Ackermann must serve them up in a way which is appetizing to the blue-collar, middle-income voting bloc targeted by all three candidates. Perhaps this problem undercuts the potency of Ackermann's image. And when you can't afford TV spots, daily newspaper ads or consultants, the problem becomes a major...
Eliminating waste, Ackermann claims, is what allowed her to improve the human services in Cambridge without raising taxes. But state government, she believes, needs more than efficiency, it needs someone who cares...