As two of his fellow nominees for governor were inside Maryland Public Television prepping for Saturday?s debate, Green Party nominee Ed Boyd and a few supporters were outside arguing with a security guard about where they could put a handful of his campaign signs.
“Maryland has the best democracy money can buy,” Boyd was telling someone on his cell phone Saturday evening, wearing a sweat shirt that said: “We will not be silent.”
Boyd is not silent but he doesn?t get heard much in the media, which largely dismisses third-party candidates.
“The folks that don?t want democracy are actually running the country,” Boyd said in an interview. “Everywhere we go, the citizen has no voice.”
Boyd, 45, is a disabled Navy veteran who almost lost his leg in the service. At one point, he was homeless after he got out of service, but now runs a temporary employment agency.
Boyd has little good to say about Democratic Baltimore Mayor Martin O?Malley or Republican Gov. Robert Ehrlich.
“If [O?Malley] wants to run the state the way he runs the city, we?re in trouble,” said Boyd, a Baltimore City resident.
“Ehrlich refuses to give anything” for public services, such as higher education, Boyd said.
Boyd has an extensive campaign platform, but his biggest issue is the cost of energy and electric rates.
Baltimore Gas & Electric “has given those guys a lot of money to keep their mouths shut,” Boyd said, and to the Statehouse leadership as well.
“Those guys have been bought and sold by big business.”
Boyd?s solution is to reinstall rate caps, and ultimately, to have the state buy the utility industry, from transmission lines to power plants.
He wants to see a law passed requiring a “living wage,” rather than a minimum wage which “only maximizes poverty.”
He said he believes a living wage in Maryland currently would be about $10.52 an hour.
Boyd is not expecting his campaign to be successful, he just wants to talk about the important issues and the need for change.
“One of those two guys is going to win, but they really do not know what the real citizens need,” Boyd said.
“It just [doesn?t] feel like democracy.”
