For those who have been around this city for a while, Tuesday’s hotly-contested primary election was a throwback to an era when politics was the mother’s milk of everyday life in Revere.
However, one big difference between this political season and those of decades ago was the high degree of civility among the candidates. We won’t rehash the epic battles of Revere’s storied political history (though we chronicle them regularly in our Through the Years column), but this primary election reflected well upon the state of our city in 2023.
Although in the final analysis politics ultimately is a zero sum game — there are only winners and losers — the recently-concluded primary campaign brings to mind the famous “Man in the Arena” speech by President Theodore Roosevelt:
“It is not the critic who counts; not the man who points out how the strong man stumbles, or where the doer of deeds could have done them better. The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena, whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood; who strives valiantly ….and who at the worst, if he fails, at least fails while daring greatly, so that his place shall never be with those cold and timid souls who neither know victory nor defeat.”
Running for elective office takes courage. Roosevelt’s words truly apply to those who throw themselves into the political arena, especially at a time when everything everyone does is under a high degree of scrutiny.
So we wish to offer our congratulations to all of the candidates for putting themselves out there for the good of our community and for running high-level campaigns that were a credit to themselves, their families, their supporters, and our city.
