Tag: scott brown

#rsrh Sen Scott Brown: Elizabeth Warren hates freedom of conscience. And Ted Kennedy!

Here’s an important pro-tip for aspiring doctrinaire liberal politicians deciding to demagogue on the White House’s recent attack on freedom of conscience: know your territory.  Yes, Massachusetts is a Blue State.  It’s also a very Catholic one (somewhere around 44%, in fact).  And – because of simple self interest, really* – Scott Brown has long been a champion of conscience exemptions for Catholic hospitals.  Why, in 2009 he explicitly wrote to the Pope himself to avow that “I believe in a conscience protection for Catholics in the health care field and will continue to advocate for it…”

Oh, wait, no, that was Ted Kennedy.  Brilliant move on Elizabeth Warren’s part, there: by calling Brown’s identical position ‘extreme’ she’s just managed to urinate on the memory of the man who her own party considers to be the patron saint of Obamacare.  No wonder she couldn’t get confirmed: it’s entirely possible that the woman wasn’t even sure which part of the Capitol building she was supposed to testify in…

Moe Lane

PS: Another pro-tip: if Martha Coakley thought that something was a winning strategy, it’s probably… not.

*Any pro-choice Republican that wants any kind of support from the national party at all had better be for a conscience exemption.

Elizabeth Warren’s inaccurate Karl Rove whining.

So let me set the background, here.  Crossroads GPS  is a 501(c)(4) associated with American Crossroads (a 527 advocacy group which has Karl Rove advising it; this will be important later), and it put out this ad on Massachusetts Senate hopeful Elizabeth Warren (who is running, of course, against Republican Senator Scott Brown).  Said ad helpfully points out that Warren was up to her eyeballs assisting the 2008 TARP bailout – yes, the same bailout that she’s now trying to be a class warrior against:

Summation of the video: Elizabeth Warren talks a good game, but she was involved in TARP, in a supervisory role – so if people don’t like the way that TARP unfolded, blame her.  The ad alludes to the way that Warren sucked up to the Chamber of Commerce in order to try to get support to be made the formal head of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau.  Moving away from the ad: Warren also tried that with the 2010 crop of freshmen House Republicans, with about the same amount of success.  On the other hand, Warren did manage to put into place the man who would eventually succeed her as chief CFPB bureaucrat… one Raj Date, former executive at Capital One and Deutsche Bank.  All in all, this is all pretty standard, somewhat interchangeable Washington insider (Democratic edition) stuff from Warren.  Nothing special, alas. Continue reading Elizabeth Warren’s inaccurate Karl Rove whining.

#rsrh MA-SEN: The Two Warren Whos.

Howie Carr of the Boston Herald had entirely too much fun with this piece discussing two Democratic potential sacrificial lambs candidates for Senate potential sacrificial lambs next year.  They are who I have dubbed the ‘Warren Whos:’ the battered, never-got-to-be-Consumer-Finance-Protection-Board Chair Elizabeth Warren and Newton, MA Mayor Setti Warren*. They are, of course, hoping to somehow unseat current Republican Scott Brown… and let’s just get this out of the way: yes, he’s not nearly conservative enough a Republican for… well, pretty much almost any state besides Massachusetts, these days.  But Scott Brown is in Massachusetts, and he does have the elementary good sense to not require conservatives to officially remember that he’s there.  I sincerely doubt that he’ll have an expensive primary, and Scott Brown will reportedly have a fat war chest for the general.  I suppose that what I’m saying is, don’t expect the GOP to shiv this guy in the back if we don’t absolutely have to… and ‘GOP internecine warfare’ is probably one of the hidden assumptions in any Democratic plan to retake this MA-SEN seat.

Anyway, a taste of what I mean by ‘fun,’ from Howie:

Elizabeth Warren or Setti Warren (no relation)? A Harvard law school professor and Obama appointee or a guy whose first name is Setti, which means a pablum-puking limousine liberal can’t pretend he mistakenly voted against Setti because he thought he was just another white male, which no self-respecting moonbat would do, unless of course he’s gay.

Howie goes on to note that Mayor Warren’s ‘qualifications’ – local guy, BC graduate, life-long MA native, Iraq War veteran – will have absolutely zero traction with MA progressives, who by all accounts much prefer the (largely self-) martyred Harvard Law professor with no electoral experience… and, apparently, not enough governmental experience to successfully navigate through the nomination process.  Which is frankly fine by me: while I cannot hope to expect that the Democrats can actually go out and find a candidate as catastrophically unsuited for campaigning as Martha Coakley was, Elizabeth Warren will make for an acceptable substitute.  Particularly since there’s every chance that progressives will throw money at this race with wild abandon…

Moe Lane

*Happens to be black.

#rsrh Elizabeth Warren, trying to be a tough guy.

There’s just something entertaining about watching an Ivy League intellectual like Elizabeth Warren try to act all tough and stuff:

The Harvard Law School professor and consumer protection adviser to President Obama told The Huffington Post in March 2010 that if a full consumer protection agency wasn’t possible, her second choice would be “no agency at all and plenty of blood and teeth left on the floor.”

Particularly since Warren’s nomination to head the new (and likely, useless) Consumer Financial Protection Bureau ended up resembling the political equivalent of a subcompact car hitting a brick wall at 90 miles an hour.  I’d think about being sympathetic, except that the woman is gearing up to martyr herself again on behalf of a Democratic establishment that could care less about her; this time, Warren’s apparently going to volunteer to for the sacrificial victim role in Scott Brown’s re-election campaign.  I learned a long time ago that some people simply like to be degraded like this; it’s not my cup of tea, but if that’s what it takes for Warren, well…

Moe Lane

PS: I note for the record, of course, that if a Republican talked like this we’d never, ever hear the end of it.

#rsrh Say what you like about Scott Brown…

…and goodness knows that your average conservative has quite a bit to say about any Republican who can win a statewide election in Massachusetts.  I’ve done some muttering myself.  But this must have been hysterical to watch:

With fiscal negotiations consuming Washington, Democratic Gov. Deval Patrick opted to use his remarks at the Edward M. Kennedy Institute for the U.S. Senate to scold the “conservative movement, so-called,” for “sapping the optimism out of our country,” positing Kennedy as the quintessential optimist.

That led to Sen. Scott Brown, R-Mass., taking the stage in an unadvertised appearance, addressing Kennedy’s widow, Vicki, and grinning, “I told you I’d come. Little surprise to everybody, isn’t it?”

Brown, elected to replace Kennedy last year in a historic stunner, said, “Me of all people, I understand the large shoes I have to fill.” He praised Kennedy’s knack for working across the aisle for compromise, then looked at Patrick and addressed him directly: “I have to go and do the people’s business, Governor, as you referenced. There are good people who do want to move things forward, regardless of their political party.”

Now, it’s politics – and 21st Century American politics, at that; so you can’t expect public smackdowns between politicians to involve pistols and canes and knife fights in hotels.  But this is fairly strong stuff, by the standards of these civilized times.  Especially when you consider that Governor Patrick has no intention whatsoever of running against Brown next year; which is a sentiment apparently shared by most of the Massachusetts Democratic party…

Moe Lane

(Via AoSHQ Headlines, and they really need a better way to link to those.)

#rsrh QotD, Scott Brown edition.

Heh.

This much is worth remembering: When he entered the national consciousness, he was considered something of a lightweight. Sure, he was camera-ready – a handsome, fit guy surrounded by an attractive family. But as someone asking the people to send him to conduct the serious business of the United States Senate, he had little in the way of a legislative record. On the podium, he was more than a bit wooden, delivering halting lines like a high school jock going through the motions in his run for student council. And the jock label fit. Even though he graduated from a competitive college, he had distinguished himself on campus as an athlete, not a scholar. In the special election to fill the seat of Massachusetts’s most famous senator, his main obstacle was a credentialed Democrat who had earned a reputation for competence as the state’s attorney general. The prospect of this neophyte ascending to the Senate threw members of the intellectual class into fits of apoplexy.

Yet in the art of retail politics, the agreeable guy with the handsome face was a star, quickly establishing himself as the superior candidate. It was more than just the stamina he showed in shaking hand after hand after hand. It was the pleasant doggedness and smiling ease with which he did it. He clearly liked campaigning because he clearly liked people. And people clearly liked him.

Trust me.  Click through the link and keep reading.

Via RCP.

Democratic 2012 Massachusetts strategy: Kennedy.

Kennedy Kennedy Kennedy.  They’re trying to recruit Victoria Kennedy (Ted Kennedy’s widow) for the seat for 2012.  They actually tried to get her to run in 2010, but she refused – and she’s supposedly refusing now, but apparently the possible challengers to Scott Brown have already been collectively weighed by the state party, and found wanting. So there seems to be no better options for Massachusetts Democrats right now, which is as funny as it is unsurprising.

Now, the objective merits of a Victoria Kennedy candidacy can be argued – if you believe this Boston Globe puff piece, both she and her husband only used boats because walking on water takes too long to get anywhere – outside of the context of Massachusetts politics… in much the same way that a Jeb Bush 2012 Presidential candidacy can be objectively argued outside of the context of national politics.  Subjectively, however… this will hardly sound disinterested, but I can’t imagine that Massachusetts Democratic politicians are honestly enjoying the prospect of the ‘Kennedy seat’ surviving.  Scott Brown’s win earlier this year was the first time a Senate seat for MA changed hands in over a quarter of a century: does that state really lack for ambitious politicians who are tired of waiting for their chance*?

Moe Lane Continue reading Democratic 2012 Massachusetts strategy: Kennedy.

WH ready to go up against Cheney… says anonymous source. Wait, what? #rsrh

[UPDATE] Welcome, Instapundit readers.

Do these people actually understand how this looks?

But debating Dick Cheney on terrorism? The Obama White House says it’s happy to do that anytime, as it did with Sunday’s split-screen standoff between Cheney and Vice President Joe Biden.

The dueling appearances, along with what is a clear administration strategy to play up its newly aggressive approach in Afghanistan, show a White House determined to project a posture of strength on national security and trying to gain the upper hand with Republicans who wish to portray Obama as weak.

“We have never engaged in chest-beating on what we’re doing on terrorism,” said a White House official, who was pleased by how the interviews had played out. “But this dynamic where we’re responding to criticism from the former vice president gave us the opportunity to explain what we’re doing, without just going out and talking tough.”

Except that what they didn’t do was debate Cheney. They whined about him. And then they bragged about whining about him. Anonymously. Joe Biden wouldn’t actually dare go face-to-face with Dick Cheney on this issue. Heck, he won’t dare go face-to-face with Scott Brown.  And don’t get me wrong: that might even be smart strategy on Biden’s, or the White House’s, part.  But this isn’t September 2008: the Democrats aren’t able to have it both ways quite this comprehensively anymore…

Moe Lane

NRSC dropped money into Brown race… *quietly.*

I approve.

Working quietly and under the radar, the National Republican Senatorial Committee shifted $500,000 to the Massachusetts GOP in the weeks leading up to Tuesday’s dramatic election, according to Republican sources.

The NRSC transfer, made in several dispersals beginning Jan. 7, was used for phone and mail get-out-the-vote operations targeted at independent voters, said Rob Jesmer, the NRSC’s executive director.

NRSC officials kept quiet about the money transfers, despite public taunts from their Senate Democratic counterparts that the GOP leadership was declining to put money behind Brown’s candidacy.

…and do you know why I approve? I approve because the Coakley race has become a giant hole in the ground in which the Democrats have been pouring money for the last few weeks; and if the DSCC had realized that they were spending five times as much as the NRSC had they probably wouldn’t have spent it. Fear of the unknown is the most potent kind of fear, folks; and this was a large unknown space on the map for Democrats. I’ll happily endorse the NRSC spending half a million to help win one of the seats that the DSCC spent 2.5 million defending: how about you?

Now, if we can only convince them to stop getting involved in primary races…

Moe Lane

PS: Positive feedback works to correct behavior, too. Just saying.

Crossposted to RedState.