Michael S. Dukakis, a three-term governor of Massachusetts and the 1988 Democratic nominee for president, sat down with four students reporters from Watertown public schools on July 13, 2012.

     He won his first election in 1962 and still lives in his same Brookline home. His view of local and national politics is unique, especially considering that not only did he run for president, but so did one of his lieutenant governors (John Kerry) and one of his successors as governor (Mitt Romney).

     In the hourlong interview conducted in a conference room at Northeastern University, Mr. Dukakis covered many subjects, from education and public transit to healthcare and immigration, from Scott Brown and Elizabeth Warren to Mitt Romney and Barack Obama.

    Here is a transcript of highlights of that wide-ranging interview. (Note: This transcript was edited for space and clarity.) 

ON EDUCATION

     What do I do at Northeastern? I teach. A lot. I teach public policy, state and local government. I'm now teaching a graduate course in health policy and politics. I don't have to say this is a good year to teach health policy and politics. And I spend a lot of my time working with students on co-op on internships trying to open doors for them...

     Let me tell you, I don't know why more colleges and universities do not do co-op. Our kids [at Northeastern University] are not having trouble getting jobs these days, even in the middle of a recession. ... The combination of work and study can't be beat. Why don't other schools adopt this? Beats the hell out of me I don't understand it.

     So I'm busy, but it's great fun. It gives me an opportunity to teach the stuff I love to teach and see if I can inspire these students of mine to think seriously about public service and politics.

ON BEING GOVERNOR

     What was the hardest part [about being governor]? I suppose getting elected. I mean that's the tough part, not that being governor isn't but – being governor is is great fun folks. There's no better job in the world, especially in this state. I mean you've got all kinds of talented people, there's no excuse for not having top-notch people working for you. It's a great state. ...

     There's nothing like being in a position where you can really make a difference in the lives of your fellow citizens, and that's what public service is all about. So I had a ball. You know, there's good days, not-so-good days, and that kind of stuff, but there's nothing like it. ...

     You'd be amazed what you can learn as governor on the T that you don't learn in a limousine with a lot of State Troopers around. ...

     You know if you are on the streetcar and you are open with people, they'll come over and talk to you, tell you all kinds of stuff -- sometimes about your own administration that you don't know.

ON POLITICS

     I did not do a good job [winning re-election in 1978], as a matter fact I was defeated for re-election the first time. I think we did lots of good things [my first term as governor], but I had terrible relationship with the legislature. Now you say, "You were a legislator." I was one of the rebel legislators. I got elected in 1962 at a time when this state was one of the three or four most corrupt states in the country. I mean it was bad. Bad. And I remember when I was out campaigning for the legislature the first time and people would look at me and say, "You look honest. I'll vote for you." I finally called my mother and said, “Thanks. You produced a kid that at least looks honest.”

     So a lot of the stuff that I did as a legislator – with other legislators – was designed to try to clean up this mess. But as a result the kind of establishment guys were not great fans of mine and they were practically in mourning when I was elected governor. But it was my own fault. I really didn't work at that relationship. ...

     But [when I returned to the governor’s office] I had learned that lesson and so I worked very hard to make sure that my legislators were actively involved in what I was doing and what I was putting together, and we get a lot of very good things together with not a lot of conflict, with a lot of good hard work.

ON PUBLIC TRANSPORTATION AND MITT ROMNEY

     You take the T for example. When I was elected governor, the T was a basket case. It was a disaster. I used to take the streetcar to work from Brookline. Longwood station to downtown Boston is a 10- to 15-minute ride; three days out of five, it would break down. I'm not kidding you. It was unbelievable. Not only that, it was a very small system ... and there had been no investment. The streetcars were 30, 40 years old, the stations looked like your cellar. ... We just organized neighborhoods. And finally killed the master highway plan and thanks to Tip [O’Neill], we got a change in federal laws so that we could use all of this interstate highway money, that we had rejected, for public transportation. It had never been done before. Couldn't bust the highway trust fund. Gasoline tax money had to be used for highways. We were the 1st state to be able to do that.

     So today Boston probably has the best public transportation system in the country. If Boston is a success today -- and it is, the city is remarkable -- it has everything to do with that decision, folks. I shudder to think what Boston would look like today if we had built six- eight-lane expressways in and out of the city with this inner-belt highway.

     Fortunately, although we let it deteriorate badly, we never got rid of the T. We abandoned some rail lines, for example you could go to the Cape. When I was a kid you could go to the Cape on a train, it was wonderful. We need that badly. You are never going to deal with the congestion on the Southeast Expressway and Route 3 unless you get a train. And the rail lines are there, folks. We had an opportunity to do that and we blew it.

     Now, I've got to tell you I'm not a big fan of this guy [Mitt] Romney. I think he's one of the worst guys we’ve ever had. He couldn't get anything done. The state's infrastructure, when he left, was a disaster. Rusting bridges, potholes, he couldn't get anything done. The one construction project that he did was the so-called flyover at the Sagamore Bridge on the Cape -- $62 million bucks and it's worthless! They're still back up there. Anybody could've told you that. And the $62 million could have extended the commuter rail from Stoughton all the way down to Bourne on the way to Hyannis. You ask yourself, which one of those projects would relieve congestion more from here to the Cape: good train service or this flyover? But we didn't do that.

ON IMMIGRATION AND SCOTT BROWN

     Look, it's an issue we have to deal with it. Unless you're going to say, “Anybody wants to can come to the United States” – and I don't think most Americans go along with the that – then you got to have some restrictions. The question is, what are they and how in particular do we deal with this enormous influx of immigrants, mostly from Latin America who came here illegally? Fortunately with some help from us, and I think we could probably do better, Latin America economically is doing much better. Mexico, for all of its problems, is doing better economically, and, of course, we have not been doing well economically. So the flow of immigrants into the United States, at least for the time being, has virtually stopped. ...

     So then people said what about the 800,000 kids who were brought over here when they were little through no fault of their own and have basically grown up as Americans, why would you want to send them back? So then we had these proposals for the so-called dream act where these kids could be given an opportunity to become citizens. That hasn't passed. I'm not sure if you folks are aware of it but a couple of weeks ago President Obama basically said, “We're going to do it by executive order.”

     Now I will tell you my one Scott Brown story: My wife, Kitty, has devoted herself both professionally as a social worker and as an advocate to refugees and immigrants. And we were out at a fund-raiser for the Codman Square Community Health Center [in Dorchester). Kitty had never met Scott Brown because he wasn't in the legislature when I was governor. So he arrived with his wife and, unfortunately for Brown, it was the day after he announced that he was voting against the Dream Act. So my dear wife proceeded to engage brother Brown in a very spirited conversation, and finally she said to him, “Look, we're heading back out to California and we've been working with a family that our daughter introduced us to, came over here legally from Mexico with a 4-year-old and a 5-year-old, two little girls, they're now being threatened with deportation. These two kids are stars. They both went on as graduates of San Jose State University, they lived in the United States since they were 4 and 5. What do you want me to tell them?” Know what Brown said? “Tell them to go back to Mexico.” Don't mention Scott Brown in my wife's presence. She wouldn't shake his hand. She said, “You can't be serious.”

     Putting Brown to one side, he's not the only guy. I think this is just stupid. I mean these are 800,000 kids who came here through no fault of their own, and they're terrific kids, why would you want to send them back? For all practical purposes, their Americans, they've grown up here, in many many cases they're very talented. Immigrant communities have revived whole cities of this country.

ON IMMIGRATION (AND MITT ROMNEY)

     The interesting thing about what the president did the other day [with the executive order] is that it seemed to meet with pretty general approval. I mean Romney won't touch it, and Romney, who used to be a pretty reasonable guy when it came to immigration, has turned into Mr. Tough Guy when it came to immigration during the primaries and is now trying to explain to people what he was talking about.

     It's interesting how what the president did with the executive order kind of toned down the debate. But clearly we need a new immigration law to make it possible for folks to pursue a path to earned citizenship.

     Fortunately the country is becoming more diverse. California now has no majority anything. There's no ethnic majority. We're becoming a much more diverse country and were better for it.

ON MITT ROMNEY (AND HEALTH INSURANCE)

     Do you really want to know? I don't understand Romney. I just don't. He's the biggest disappointment I've ever encountered in my political career. I mean, for one thing, I was a big fan of his dad, who was a very thoughtful guy. In fact, I courted my wife in the little yellow rambler convertible – you guys probably don't know what a Rambler is – because George Romney was the only automobile executive in Detroit making these small fuel-efficient cars at the time. They were making these horrendous fin-tail things that fell apart in three years, and got about 6 miles to the gallon. He became governor of Michigan, a fine governor, he became secretary of housing and urban development, a fine Cabinet secretary – by the way a department his son now says he wants to abolish.

     When Mitt surfaced politically, he was an independent, voted for Paul Tsongas for president, and when he ran against [Ted] Kennedy for the Senate, he was a thoughtful moderate Republican. I didn't agree with him on everything, but he seemed kind of in that tradition of Olympia Snowe from Maine and some of the folks we had here.

     He got elected as governor and wasn't a great governor, in fact turned out to be a lousy governor. But, at least in terms of what he was saying, he was, I thought, pretty thoughtful and enlightened. And as soon as he decided to run for the presidency everything changed. And the guy has just gotten worse and worse and worse.

     Now, to his credit, he started the ball rolling on the current health plan we have in Massachusetts. Now I had signed the universal health care bill, which, quite frankly, was a hell of a lot better than the one we have now and was based on the Nixon plan ... So it wasn't until January of 1992 that the full bill kicked in and by that time [William] Weld had taken over. He did everything he could to screw it up, unfortunately successfully, so we never managed to implement it fully. We implemented some of the things, but not the full one. So, anyway, Romney comes back and says, “Look, we are already spending three-quarters of $1 billion on free care.” These are uninsured people who show up in the emergency room because they have no insurance, and, of course, it's the most expensive care there is. It would cost a tenth of that if they had their own doctor. And so Romney, quite rightly, said, let's take this $600 million-$700 million bucks and see if we can't use that to insure everybody. … 

     Now there was a problem because the Democratic speaker of the house insisted employers make some contribution. He said to the governor, “Look, you talk about no free riders” – Romney meant individuals; all of us to participate, and we should – and he said, “What about employers? I want them to be required to contribute something.” Finally they came up with a consensus for a very modest contribution, and with that it passed, Romney signed it, but two days before the signing ceremony -- without telling anybody -- he vetoed that particular provision, which presumably they had agreed on. Now why did he do that? Because he was starting to run for the presidency and he was beginning to get some heat from the right-wing Republicans over this. It was clear what was going on here....

     Romney was absolutely correct in saying, “Look if you want to get rid of these pre-existing conditions or restrictions, where you're sick, your insurance company won't provide insurance for you and that kind of stuff, and if you want to keep kids on family policies until they are 26, everybody has to contribute.” Because basically if you say to folks “You don't have to have insurance until you get sick, then when you get sick go out and buy insurance,” you'll end up with premiums through the roof. Now he says he's against it. It's really kind of disgusting, to tell you the truth.

     And now he says, now it'll be up to the states, but he wasn't saying that at the time. He was saying, “Massachusetts is a national model. We've done it here. The country ought to do it.” But, apparently, as the Republican Party is currently constituted you can't be for this and get the nomination. And so as he has done in so many cases, he's basically flipped.

ON DEMOCRATS (AND HEALTH INSURANCE)

     Now, I don't think the Democrats have done a particularly good job of communicating with folks about why this is so important either, to tell you the truth. I mean, they keep talking about pre-existing conditions, fine. We have about 60 million uninsured people in this country, and another 30 million roughly, and the number's growing, who are waking up to find out they have $5,000-$10,000 deductible policies.

     The folks who do not have health insurance in the United States, and the folks who have these $10,000 deductible policies are working Americans. They're not sitting around, they're not loafing, they're not on public assistance. Overwhelmingly, 85-90 percent of the insured in this country are working people. So this is all about whether or not working Americans and their families can have decent affordable healthcare, and Democrats aren't saying that for reasons I do not understand.

     Now, if you went out and took up old tomorrow and said to the American people, “Should working Americans and their families have decent affordable healthcare?” What do you think the numbers would look like? Like 93 percent say yes. So why are the Democrats saying this? I don't know. ... For the life of me, I keep talking to my pals in Washington, saying, “Why aren't you guys talking about working Americans and their families? They're the ones that don't have health insurance.”

ON THE 1988 PRESIDENTIAL CAMPAIGN

     I wasn't happy I lost. I say to people, “I owe you all the apology because if I beat Bush I, you'd have never heard of Bush II and we wouldn't be in this mess."

     Look, I made a big mistake, and it was my decision and nobody else's. I made a decision that was not going to respond to the Bush attack campaign, and it was a mistake. Unfortunately, if the other guy is going to come at you with that stuff you got to be ready for it, you got to have a carefully thought-out strategy for dealing with it. Preferably one that turns it into a character issue on him. We could've done that. But I said no-no. I thought people were tired of that stuff. We had a lot of polarization during Reagan, now it's a lot worse. And it was a mistake. He did a lot of damage, and it was very difficult to repair.

     So, do I have regrets? Yeah, that was a winnable campaign and I blew it. But you can't walk around saying coulda, woulda, shoulda. At some point you got to kind of go on with your life, try to do good things. By the way, no Democrat has made that mistake since, with one exception: John Kerry. They started coming after him with that swiftboat thing. Imagine, here's a guy who was putting his life on the line, and did, running against a guy who was in the National Guard reading magazines in some airbase in Alabama. Same thing I did, he didn't think people would take this seriously. How could they do so? Well, some people did.

     Again, with the benefit of hindsight, my advice to him, you tell Bush to get that thing off the air, and if he doesn't do it within 48 hours, his military record and your military record will become issues in the campaign. What was he doing during the Vietnam War? Sitting in an airbase in Alabama. But John didn't do that, and it hurt him bad.

ON THE 2012 SENATE RACE: SCOTT BOWN vs. ELIZABETH WARREN

     He paints himself as a guy who is trying to be bipartisan. Unfortunately, if you go to Washington as a Republican, you're going to vote from Mitch McConnell to run the Senate. And the guy that may in fact turn the Senate Republican is that fella named Karl Rove who's raising millions and millions of dollars under this terrible decision. Citizens United has to be one of the worst decisions ever handed down by the Supreme Court of the United States. It's terrible , and [Antonin] Scalia was a classmate of mine at law school.

     My pitch is: if you vote for Brown, you're voting for Rove to run the Senate. Sorry, but that's the way the cookie crumbles....

     Occasionally he [Brown] will leave the Republicans, not too often....

     Now, can Elizabeth Warren win? Absolutely. How? She's got to organize every one of the 2,157 precincts in the state, just the way I did, just the way Deval Patrick did. 

ON 2012 PRESIDENTIAL RACE: MITT ROMNEY vs. BARACK OBAMA

     Right now [Romney’s] 20 points behind Obama in Massachusetts. Why is that? Because he was a lousy governor. He's not a popular guy here. And then when he started running for the presidency, he went out and started trashing the state around the country. I mean, people didn't like that.

     And his economic record in Massachusetts was lousy. I mean, we were 47th out of 50 in job creation when Romney was governor. Fourth from the bottom. And that's, by the way, something I keep telling the Obama people, they got to get out there, people got to understand. So he's just not a very popular guy here. He never ran for re-election, and if he had he would have been defeated. But he's smart, he's slick, makes a good appearance, all that kind of stuff. So it's going to be a tough race, a very tough race. 

--July 13, 2012--