Man, it must not be fun to work on Beacon Hill these days.
First, there was last week's adoption of a strict dress code ruling out jeans, spaghetti straps and hockey jerseys as a wardrobe choice. (Togas were banned several years ago.) Now, there's a ban on using Twitter at work (though, mercifully, FaceBook appears to have been spared for the moment).
What's next? Will legislators have to go to work every day and sit for hours on end trying to find ways to solve problems?
It's starting to seem like this august institution is really just high school for grownups, where it's necessary to have strict rules of decorum to keep the kids focused on the tasks at hand.
We think most Massachusetts residents would agree with us in saying that we wish Beacon Hill would be a little more like 'The West Wing' and a lot less like 'Glee' without the singing.
We once read that it's poor etiquette to take out your phone and send an instant message to someone or check your e-mail if you're in a setting where taking out a crossword puzzle would also be rude. Would you consider pulling out a crossword puzzle at your job? Would you even think of doing it in the Legislature? (Note – sadly, we have personally observed this practice with our own eyes.)
The state Senate recently rejected a ban on texting while on the House floor, but a special Senate committee is being formed to study decorum in that chamber instead. Who knows what they will think of next?
We thought it was sad when legislators spent so much time agonizing over their committee assignments to see how popular they were with leadership. This is much worse.
You know what they call people who spend all their time worrying about what they are going to wear to work, whether or not they're in the "in" crowd, and how they will send out instant messages to their friends? Well, when it comes to political leaders, we'd call them big disappointments.
Our main point is that all of these things should go without saying. We should be able to expect that our "full-time" state legislators already know they need to show respect for the job by dressing appropriately and refraining from goofing off during work.
Maybe then, legislators could stop wasting time worrying about how to conduct themselves and focus more on the real problems that are facing people in Massachusetts, problems like an 8.2% unemployment rate and a $1.5 billion budget deficit.
