Trav Resigns, Murray New Senate President

Trav's done in the Senate. Now he's going to go into the influence peddling business, oddly enough with Atty. Tom Kiley, who was counsel for another Senate President you may have heard of, named Billy Bulger. But nope, it doesn't stink. Not even the fact that he's auctioning his services off on ebay.

Our new Senate President, Therese Murray, has an impressive past, even by Beacon Hill Standards. Here's some highlights:

--Was a "mitigation manager" for Stanley Dukakis for $1,022 a week

--Made sure the family is taken care of on the state payroll: Nephew Michael Whalen works for Treasurer Tim Cahill for $32,000 a year. Then there's her daughter Lauren. Can't forget about her! She was hired as a human resources coordinator by Attorney General Tom Riley at $46,000 a year. According to some she left on Jan. 10th because of course, your budget doesn't get cut when Mommy's the President of the Senate.

-- Today in the Boston Herald, Senator Steve Panagiotakos (D-Lowell), who's taking over Murray's post of the head of the powerful Ways and Means Committee said: “She will stand up to anyone. But Terry’s not confrontational for the sake of being confrontational. She’s someone who wants to get things done. She knows as much as anyone about the inner workings of state government.” She sure isn't (she gets others to do it for her) and sure does. Take a look at this.

Let the fun begin.

Thankfully, the Mass GOP tried to at least hold off the vote for a little while over questions surrounding misuse of taxpayer fund at Tourism Massachusetts. Regardless, that didn't hold much up and Murray was elected President today, 34-5, right down party lines.