massachusetts – Page 10

‘The People’s Seat.’

This was easily the most important thing said at yesterday’s Brown/Coakley debate.

(Via American Glob; H/T The Other McCain; see also Nice Deb.)

There’s a reason why Brown raised 1.3 million dollars in just over 24 hours (and over 1 million in 24 hours) yesterday; it’s because the Massachusetts Senatorial race reeks of entitlement. The major reason why Brown is able to be in a position to line himself up for an upset in a week? Because Coakley decided that she owned the seat sufficiently to not even bother with campaigning. And why did she decide that? Because she’s a Massachusetts Democrat and the Kennedy clan signed off on her nomination. What else did she need?

The truly ironic bit? Ted Kennedy must be spinning in his grave over this dismissive display of arrogance. The man was legendary for his thoroughness when it came to constituent services.

Moe Lane

PS: Scott Brown for Massachusetts Senate.

Crossposted to RedState.

How you can tell that the Democrats are worried about Brown/Coakley.

They don’t want to risk a loss slopping over on the President.

President Obama has no plans to travel to Massachusetts to campaign for Democrat Martha Coakley in the home stretch in the special election to fill the US Senate seat held by the late Edward M. Kennedy.

Presidential press secretary Robert Gibbs said today in response to a question at a briefing in the White House that the “president doesn’t have any travel plans to campaign in Massachusetts,” because “it’s not on our schedule to go to next week.”

But he sent out an email! That’ll teach us rascally Republicans.

Moe Lane

PS: Via a very bitter AMERICAblog. You’d think that they’d be used to the caustic taste of betrayal by now.

PPS: Scott Brown for Senate.

Crossposted to RedState.

Gov Deval Patrick (D, MA) just gave the GOP three more House seats.

And I’m blaming the Governor for this one because I find it inconceivable that he would have let his subordinates set policy in such a nakedly partisan fashion without him first signing off on it. Apparently the Democratic party just doesn’t care how many ‘moderate’ Democrats have to have their careers sacrificed to the leadership’s ambitions. I don’t know where we’ll use this development – yet – but if you think that we’re not going to use this (win or lose):

The U.S. Senate ultimately will schedule the swearing-in of Kirk’s successor, but not until the state certifies the election.

Today, a spokesman for Secretary of the Commonwealth William Galvin, who is overseeing the election but did not respond to a call seeking comment, said certification of the Jan. 19 election by the Governor’s Council would take a while.

“Because it’s a federal election,” spokesman Brian McNiff said. “We’d have to wait 10 days for absentee and military ballots to come in.”

Another source told the Herald that Galvin’s office has said the election won’t be certified until Feb. 20 – well after the president’s address.

Since the U.S. Senate doesn’t meet again in formal session until Jan. 20, Bay State voters will have made their decision before a vote on health-care reform could be held. But Kirk and Galvin’s office said today a victorious Brown would be left in limbo.

In contrast, Rep. Niki Tsongas (D-Lowell) was sworn in at the U.S. House of Representatives on Oct. 18, 2007, just two days after winning a special election to replace Martin Meehan. In that case, Tsongas made it to Capitol Hill in time to override a presidential veto of the expansion of the State Children’s Health Insurance Program.

…to hammer home the point that Democrats Lie, think again. The ads write themselves, and even should Coakley win the speed with which she’ll be installed will still let us run those ads. And she would be installed speedily: her party’s leadership doesn’t just lie. It assumes that the electorate is dumb, too.

It’s not, by the way.

Moe Lane

PS: That SCHIP veto wasn’t actually overturned, by the way.

Crossposted to RedState.

This is not DOOM for Coakley. Yet.

Further UPDATE: More from PPP here, via AoSHQ (and welcome to that site’s readers, by the way). You can sign up here to phone bank for Scott Brown.

But PPP is tweeting out a warning. They’re unabashedly a Democratic-aligned firm, but PPP played it straight in Virginia and New Jersey last year: if they say that Massachusetts is looking doable, then Massachusetts is looking doable.

Scott Brown for Senate.

Crossposted to RedState.

UPDATE: And now the Democrats are push-polling? Tsk, tsk, tsk.

Rasmussen: Coakley/Brown 50/41.

Nine points. In Masssachusetts. And look here:

Both candidates get better than 70% of the vote from members of their respective parties, but Brown leads 65% to 21% among voters not affiliated with either of the major parties.

Rasmussen’s not pretending that this race isn’t a tough one for Brown, and neither will I: but I told a reporter yesterday that Coakley would have to win by at least ten points to keep national Democrats from getting nervous. Her being single-digits now should set off alarm bells for both parties…

See also Legal insurrection, Jules Crittenden, and Sisu.

Moe Lane

PS: Scott Brown for Senate.

Crossposted to RedState.

Ah, former Governor Palin?

Time to start the waltz, methinks.

A few days ago Sissy Willis asked a very interesting question: Will Sarah Palin endorse Scott Brown? I’ve been thinking about it a bit; and while I can see the arguments both pro and con, I think that it’s time that Sarah Palin did. You have to speculate to accumulate, after all.

So let’s light this candle.

Moe Lane

PS: Scott Brown for US Senate.

Crossposted to RedState.

Pick yourselves up. MA special election next month.

As Ace of Spades HQ reminds us. Scott Brown is running for the GOP nod, and Democratic nominee Martha Coakley is already tap-dancing like crazy over abortion, of all things:

Coakley used her stark position on abortion rights to appeal to supporters for donations; in an e-mail, she declared her decision to make her position “a defining moment’’ in her campaign.

In a statement to the Globe yesterday, Coakley said that although she was disappointed that the Senate bill “gives states additional options regarding the funding mechanisms for women’s reproductive health services,’’ she would reluctantly support it because it would provide coverage for millions of uninsured people and reduce costs.

…more accurately, she is enthusiastically supporting it because she wants to be the next Senator from Massachusetts, only her last name isn’t Kennedy. Her ‘principled’ position was one that was made before Stupak stirred the pot with his amendment; so her principled position gets to go out the window – and never mind what she said before. After all, what are Massachusetts voters going to do about it? Vote Republican?

[pause]

You know, with this particular candidate this particular candidate, they just might. Even if you find him too pro-choice, it has to be admitted that he’s not a hypocrite about it.

Moe Lane

Crossposted to RedState.

MA SEN: Coakley versus Brown.

The primary results are in for the Massachusetts special election primary, and it’s Massachusetts AG Martha Coakley for the Democrats; State Senator Scott Brown for the Republicans. 10% turnout; special election on January 19th .

Coakley, of course, is cookie-cutter: as Jim Geraghty put it, the Democratic side was “lefty vs. lefty vs. lefty vs. lefty.” Scott Brown’s a bit more interesting, given that he’s running on strong opposition to cap-and-trade, and as a fiscal conservative. His opponent in the primary wanted “a Paris peace conference to negotiate with the Taliban:” enough said.

Continue reading MA SEN: Coakley versus Brown.

A graphic demonstration of the perils of a one-party state.

Elections have consequences.

A failed state.

While its electoral history allows it some pretense to claiming a democratic system of government, its current one-party regime has resulted in crumbling infrastructures and drastic budget shortfalls. Its supposedly high-minded ruling caste keeps getting embroiled in scandal after scandal, ranging from ordinary corruption to substance abuse; their highest figures are especially notorious about violating their own (loudly-proclaimed) religious principles when it suits them. When faced with an increasingly-popular and populist movement drawing on a glorious revolutionary past, the regime seems alternatively derisive and frightened – but cannot seem to find an answer past the standard nonsense that everything is all right, despite the evidence of one’s eyes. And ruling above all is an already deeply unpopular leader whose own lackeys privately worry about how he can win a legitimate election.

All in all, the Massachusetts Democratic Party has seen better days. Continue reading A graphic demonstration of the perils of a one-party state.

Gee. Barney Frank seems testy.

It’s almost as if he doesn’t like people actually treating him as some sort of elected official, instead of His Excellency, Baron Massachusetts-Four.

(Via @BrianFaughnan)

How dare that commoner object to having what he said be corrected by his betters! Didn’t he know who he was talking to?

Moe Lane

PS: I almost imagine that Article I, Section 9 is beginning to grate upon certain of our legislators. To effectively have the thing, but not the name of the thing itself…

Crossposted to RedState.