According to WRKO, Senator Scott Brown is pulling out of tomorrow night's media consortium debate at WGBH inferring that a disaster is not the time to put politics front and center. Is he right? Or does this seem like he's chickening out?
UPDATE: Warren also pulls out of the debate according to the Herald.
Meanwhile David Bernstein gets caught off guard thinking that Scott Brown's preemptive move was self-serving. Now that his newspaper's candidate (Warren) has pulled out for the same reasons -- concern for public safety, Bernstein has to sort of dial back. The dart toward Brown doesn't look so good now.
"So, now I think they're both being ridiculous and hypocritical. The debate doesn't affect public safety and cleanup any more or less than the ads both sides are airing; if those stay up, the debate should go on."
The pox on both houses is a little lame, I'd say. Voters view ad-buys a bit differently than they do watching whether politicians take advantage of the news cycle during the crisis.
There have been a lot of YouTube videos pertaining to the 2012 U.S. Senate race in Massachusetts that have been trying to go viral. Let's go to the scoreboard.
Of course, the winner, we all know, is the video of Elizabeth Warren talking about the debt crisis and fair taxation. In less than two months, it is approaching 800,000 views. By comparison, Scott Brown released a video offering meaningless (and pretty absurd - "go forth and conquer" anybody) platitudes about jobs. In almost three months, it is approaching 2,900 views. Yeah, a bit of a gap.
The right-wing has also gotten into the mix. The MassGOP released its first web video "Throw Rocks" a little over a month ago. It was most notorious for its squiggly, tinted camera-editing designed to make Elizabeth Warren look evil and scary. Well done, MassGOP. Credit where it's due, though. In just over a month, the video is approaching 59,000 views. That said, over 10,000 of the views (the plurality of views from any one site), according the page's statistics, were from HuffingtonPost.com, ostensibly with a liberal audience meaning that the MassGOP only served to drive up support and contributions for Elizabeth Warren with their ham-handed video.
The MassGOP dipped their toe in the YouTube water a second time with "Matriarch of Mayhem;" but, with sequels, it dropped off from the original. In about three weeks, it's at about 21,000 views. Apparently, the MassGOP got a good deal on the squiggly, tinted footage editing; and, apparently, the MassGOP thinks that everyone knows and respects the judgment of Douglas Schoen (who?), who the video references multiple times. The gist of the video is apparently that, because some people at Occupy events were rightly or wrongly arrested and a some people there don't like capitalism, um, Elizabeth Warren is bad... or something... huh?
Taking the Occupy-connection to whole new levels of silly shadowy production values, but relying on pretty much identical conceptual content as "Matriarch of Mayhem," Karl Rove's Crossroads GPS PAC spews out "Foundation." More Occupiers getting arrested (rightly or wrongly), more, um, Douglas Schoen (huh? who?), more shadowy, tinted film editing. Oh, and the tagline "We need jobs, not theories and protests." That's flat-out hilarious. After all, we do hear people complaining about, um, "theories" all the time. In almost a week, though, the YouTube video is up to 63,000+ views, fairly impressive. But wait. Where are these 63,000 views coming from? The plurality, 10,000+, have come from ActBlue.com, the Democratic fundraising site. In other words, the #1 site that has viewed Karl Rove's attack video has been a website dedicated to raising money for Democratic candidates. What is the #2 site? With 6,600+ views, it's Huffington Post. What is the #3 site? With 4,400+ views, it's DailyKos. In other words, of the 60,000 or so views, over one-third, or 20,000+, have occurred on liberal/progressive/Democratic-supportive websites raising money and/or awareness for Elizabeth Warren. Basically, the primary purpose of Karl Rove's video has been to raise more money for Elizabeth Warren. Well played, Karl Rove.
That said, Karl Rove's silly attack video seems to have partially motivated Elizabeth Warren's first campaign ad, a one-minute bio-spot that explains who she is, where she comes from, and why she's running. "Who I Am" packs a lot of material into a short time-span. And, in just over one single day, it has over 70,000 views. That well tops the viewing efficiency of either the MassGOP or Karl Rove.
So, to recap:
Elizabeth Warren on the economy: almost 800,000 views in under 2 months
Scott Brown on jobs: almost 2,900 views in almost 3 months
MassGOP's Throw Rocks: 59,000 views in just over a month (though 10K+ have been from HuffPo)
MassGOP's Matriarch: a dip from Rocks, 21,000 views in about 3 weeks
Karl Rove's Foundation: 63,000 views in almost a week (20K+ of which have been on ActBlue, HuffPo, and DailyKos, raising support and/or money for Elizabeth Warren - thanks, Karl!)
Elizabeth Warren's first campaign ad: over 70,000 views in just about 1 single day
So Elizabeth Warren talking about the economy tops Scott Brown talking about the economy more than 250 times over.
And Elizabeth Warren's first campaign ad has more views in one day than Karl Rove has in a week or the MassGOP has on either of its videos in 3-4 weeks. And that's a blessing for the GOP since Karl Rove's video has been a terrific donation-generator for Elizabeth Warren anyway.
Keep up the great work, Karl Rove and the MassGOP!
This episode is incredibly telling, both about Elizabeth Warren's unflappability and about Scott Brown's apparent supporters' willingness to proverbially throw rocks.
Elizabeth Warren holds a volunteer organizing event in Brockton and packs the room, like she did in Framingham earlier in her tour. She gets to the podium, and, before she can launch into her stump speech, a Teabagger interrupts the whole event to ask her about the Occupy Wall Street movement. The crowd, annoyed that someone would rudely interrupt Warren's comments, groans and wants the guy to shut up. But Warren quiets the crowd and urges them to let the Teabagger speak:
The crowd tried to shout the man down, but Warren told her supporters to let him speak. "No, no, it's alright. Let me say two things," she said. "I'm very sorry that you've been out of work. I'm also very sorry that the recent jobs bill that would've brought 22,000 jobs to Massachusetts did not pass in the Senate."
So Warren is not just unflappable but also quite magnanimous to someone who very rudely tries to hijack the proceedings.
But that's not where the story ends. The Teabagger decides to up the rhetorical ante with some well-thought-out and mature comments that some RMGers would probably applaud:
"Well, if you're the intellectual creator of that so-called party," he said, "you're a socialist whore. I don't want anything to do with you." The crowd shouted him down as he added that Warren's "boss," presumably referring to the president, was "foreign-born." He then attempted to storm out through a side door. Finding it locked, he retreated out the back of the VFW hall instead.
Here's the video:
So that's the level of rhetoric of Tea Party-sympathetic conservatives and - ostensibly - Scott Brown supporters or at least Warren opponents. "Socialist whore." And that's not a far cry from language users here on Red Mass Group have routinely used to describe Warren already. (Maybe the heckler happens to also be a Red Mass Group denizen.) I wonder if Scott Brown and the rest of Team Plagiarist (including Mr. CrazyKhazei and Mr. QueenElizabethWarren) would agree with that designation of Warren as a "socialist whore".
In a final display of grace and unflappability, before proceeding with her planned stump speech comments, she noted:
Warren took the challenge in stride. "So, we are here to do work, and I think we have a reminder that we have a lot of work to do," she said as the heckler struggled with the door.
(I will admit that I found it pretty hilarious that the immature Teabagger couldn't work the doors.)
Perhaps this is what the Massachusetts Republican Party so desperately and flailingly meant by "throwing rocks."
Following the "CrazyKhazei" scandal in which one of Scott Brown's right hand men was caught engaging in childish dirty campaigning, Scott Brown said:
US Senator Scott Brown said yesterday that he was unaware a top adviser was mocking a potential political rival under a false Twitter account, but Brown added that he has "made clear to everyone on or associated with my team that this type of thing is not to happen again."
"...this type of thing is not to happen again." Or else what? Well, we may find out. That report from the link was released on August 26, 2011. Given that Brown made those comments "yesterday" according to the report, Brown must have told Team Plagiarist on August 25, 2011, that "this type of thing is not to happen again."
Well, bad news for Scott Brown and Team Plagiarist. This type of thing happened again - the very next day! The Globe reports:
Scott Brown's campaign acknowledged tonight that one of its consultants, Rob Willington, had registered the domain name QueenElizabethWarren.com. The campaign has not put the website to use and would not say whether it planned to do so in the future or comment further on the matter.
Childish? Check. Dirty campaigning? Check. And, as the Globe mentions, the story was broken by Blue Mass Group:
David's post about Scott Brown's comments regarding "CrazyKhazei" (Scott Brown still playing the victim on CrazyKhazei) served as a reminder to go check if Scott Brown's consultants had created anymore Mass Senate related websites. I did a search through my Whois.sc account, and it showed me that QueenElizabethWarren.com had been registered on August 26, 2011 through 1&1 Internet, Inc.
Registered on August 26, 2011. Hmmmm, engaging in childish dirty campaigning on August 26. But what was it again that Scott Brown said on August 25 to his Team Plagiarist staff? Oh, right:
Brown added that he has "made clear to everyone on or associated with my team that this type of thing is not to happen again."
Well, it happened again. Rob Willington did it. So, now Scott Brown has to finish the sentence "This type of thing is not to happen again or else ________." Is Scott Brown going to fire Rob Willington? Or will he find a way to sweep it under the rug and demonstrate a lack of principle when it comes to dirty campaigning on behalf of his Team Plagiarist? It's been over a month. Anybody know if Rob Willington was given a pass by Scott Brown on his childish dirty campaigning?
Elizabeth Warren's surge in the polls and surge in fundraising has Scott Brown's Team Plagiarist awfully spooked. To step up to the challenge of facing a popular Elizabeth Warren who's backed by an army of small-dollar grassroots donors, Scott Brown has already started throwing big bucks at slash-and-burn political consultants. On that topic:
But the Warren surge may explain why Brown is spending money on consultants who practice a bareknuckle brand of politics.
The biggest payout involved more than $46,000 to the robocall firm FLS Connect. That company was linked to a smear campaign on behalf of George W. Bush against Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) in 2000. It was also tied to calls on behalf of McCain connecting Barack Obama to terrorists in 2008.
FLS-CONNECT LINKED TO SLANDEROUS ANTI-McCAIN ROBOCALLS IN 2000 SOUTH CAROLINA GOP PRIMARY
McCain Was Target Of "One Of The Most Notorious Smear Campaigns" In 2000 South Carolina Primary. According to the New York Times: "In the 2000 South Carolina primary, one of the most notorious smear campaigns in recent American politics peddled distortions and lies about him, among them that Mr. McCain´s current wife, Cindy, was a drug addict and that the couple´s daughter Bridget, adopted from Mother Teresa´s orphanage in Bangladesh, was a black child Mr. McCain had fathered out of wedlock." [New York Times, 1/17/08]
When you lie down with dogs, you wake up with fleas. In a fit of panic over Elizabeth Warren, Scott Brown has chosen to cast his lot with a firm that practices the most disgusting, the most dishonest, the most shameful brand of divisive politics.
Elizabeth Warren and her team might not have many fans on Red Mass Group; but, as far as I can tell, no one on Team Warren ever lied and race-baited about John McCain's adopted Bangladeshi daughter being a black child fathered out of wedlock. But that firm is the newest member of Scott Brown's Team Plagiarist. Psyched for 2012?
What's the word when one person copies another person's words without attribution? Oh, right: plagiarism:
In a message to students, the Massachusetts senator uses the exact words as remarks delivered by the former North Carolina senator at her campaign kickoff in 2002.
Brown's staff acknowledged yesterday the words originally were Dole's and said their presence in Brown's message was the result of a technical error.
A technical error? Since when is plagiarism a technical error? Scott Brown is becoming the lame excuse Senator. His right-hand man creates a dummy Twitter account to espouse inflammatory rhetoric? It's just "inserting levity." He votes against a Job bill literally chock full of Republican proposals? It's not "bipartisan." And now Scott Brown is caught plagiarizing - and it's a technical error. No big deal Nothing to see here!
And it wasn't just a simple accident - Scott Brown attentively left off Dole's biographical info from the passage:
Aside from the omission of an opening line -- "I am Mary and John Hanford's daughter" -- in Dole's speech, the Bay State Republican's language is the same throughout.
Given Brown's comfort with plagiarism, it's fair to ask the question, "How much of Brown's book Against All Odds is plagiarized?" Odds are, not more than a few passage, if any, are plagiarized. But who knows?
When then-Senator Joe Biden was accused of plagiarizing a passage in his 1988 Presidential campaign stump speech (which, fact is, wasn't plagiarism - he routinely credited the passage and forgot one time and was slimed with the plagiarism label), he withdrew from the 1988 Presidential campaign.
Will Scott Brown, having been caught for plagiarism here, do the decent thing and withdraw from his 2012 campaign for U.S. Senate? Will he resign from his seat? Probably not. Just business as usual for the Lame Excuses Senator.
UPDATE: In a totally expected but nonetheless shockingly cowardly display, Scott Brown relies on the old Washington D.C. trick: "Blame the intern!" Said Brown:
It was a summer intern that put together the site, we corrected it once we found out
It goes on:
Brown did not say whether he had ever seen the pasage [sic] on his website or whether he previewed the lifted words before they were posted in his name. The passage, which was directed to students visiting his site, was the sort of political autobiography that is meant to inspire. ...
Brown said today that a young intern launched the site when his office had "very little time and resources to put things up." ...
He scoffed at the notion that further investigation was needed into how the text ended up on his site.
What a courageous leader Scott Brown is. Blaming the lowly summer intern! Any other staffers or volunteers he'd like to throw under the bus while he's at it? It's the intern! It's the lack of time and resources! Please don't investigate! Scott Brown is wearing out the victim card and demonstrating great political cowardice and a lack of responsibility in the process.
Scott Brown claims to believe that Jobs are issue #1.
The big jobs bill comes to floor of the U.S. Senate. 50 U.S. Senators vote yes, and 48 U.S. Senators vote no (in addition to Senate Majority Leader Reid who had to vote Nay for procedural reasons). So, of course, it fails - despite getting 50 Yea votes - because the obstructionist Republican caucus in the U.S. Senate, fully supported by Scott Brown, filibusters everything that moves.
U.S. Sen. Scott Brown has voted against President Obama's $447 billion jobs bill, saying lawmakers should instead be crafting a bipartisan measure.
A "bipartisan" measure? A "bipartisan" measure?!?!
The Jobs bill was as bipartisan as legislation got. What were some of its provisions? Let's ask President Obama:
I am sending this Congress a plan that you should pass right away. It's called the American Jobs Act. There should be nothing controversial about this piece of legislation. Everything in here is the kind of proposal that's been supported by both Democrats and Republicans -- including many who sit here tonight. And everything in this bill will be paid for. Everything.
It will provide -- it will provide a tax break for companies who hire new workers, and it will cut payroll taxes in half for every working American and every small business.
Pass this jobs bill -- pass this jobs bill, and starting tomorrow, small businesses will get a tax cut if they hire new workers or if they raise workers' wages. Pass this jobs bill, and all small business owners will also see their payroll taxes cut in half next year.
It's not just Democrats who have supported this kind of proposal. Fifty House Republicans have proposed the same payroll tax cut that's in this plan.
No more earmarks. No more boondoggles. No more bridges to nowhere. We're cutting the red tape that prevents some of these projects from getting started as quickly as possible. And we'll set up an independent fund to attract private dollars and issue loans based on two criteria: how badly a construction project is needed and how much good it will do for the economy.
This idea came from a bill written by a Texas Republican and a Massachusetts Democrat. The idea for a big boost in construction is supported by America's largest business organization and America's largest labor organization. It's the kind of proposal that's been supported in the past by Democrats and Republicans alike.
Pass this jobs bill, and companies will get extra tax credits if they hire America's veterans.
Pass this jobs bill, and companies will get a $4,000 tax credit if they hire anyone who has spent more than six months looking for a job. (Applause.) We have to do more to help the long-term unemployed in their search for work. This jobs plan builds on a program in Georgia that several Republican leaders have highlighted, where people who collect unemployment insurance participate in temporary work as a way to build their skills while they look for a permanent job.
Pass this jobs bill, and the typical working family will get a $1,500 tax cut next year. Fifteen hundred dollars that would have been taken out of your pocket will go into your pocket. This expands on the tax cut that Democrats and Republicans already passed for this year. If we allow that tax cut to expire -- if we refuse to act -- middle-class families will get hit with a tax increase at the worst possible time. We can't let that happen. I know that some of you have sworn oaths to never raise any taxes on anyone for as long as you live. Now is not the time to carve out an exception and raise middle-class taxes, which is why you should pass this bill right away.
Tax breaks. Cut payroll taxes. Tax cuts for hiring new workers. Tax cuts for hiring veterans. 50 House Republicans proposed part of the bill. A Texas Republican proposed another part. Georgia Republicans led on another part. No earmarks. Cutting red tape. Attracting private dollars. Expanding existing tax cuts.
That's what was in this bill; and, it was all paid for.
That's what Scott Brown just voted AGAINST.
Because it wasn't "bipartisan."
That's Scott Brown's record now; and, he'll be hearing about it for a while.
It seems that, for a long time now, the Republican Party has worked to vilify intelligence. From the Republican War on Science to mocking anything associated with an Ivy League school, today's Republican Party seems to hate smart people and really, really, really wants voters to hate smart people, too.
Like a dim-witted moth to a flame, Scott Brown has taken this approach with Elizabeth Warren, differentiating his honorable "school of hard knocks" upbringing with her nefarious association with a highly-regarded institution of higher learning. In fact, it seems to be one of his central arguments for his candidacy.
Even though Sen. Scott Brown (R-MA) regularly tweaks rival Elizabeth Warren (D) for being a Harvard professor, a new Western New England University poll finds most voters aren't troubled by her affiliation.
Just 13% of registered voters said they were "less likely" to vote for Warren because she works at Harvard, while 21% said it made them "more likely" to back her and 63% said it "makes no difference" in how they would vote.
A trial heat shows Brown leading Warren, 47% to 42%.
Not surprisingly, if you check the crosstabs, of the 13% of registered voters who said they were less likely to vote for Warren because of her Harvard affiliation, the overwhelming majority of them were already "Brown supporters or leaners" as opposed to "Warren supporters or leaners" or "undecided" voters.
In other words, only a tiny minority of voters thinks that Harvard is as evil as Scott Brown wants you to think it is, and they're already Scott Brown voters. Undecided voters aren't turned off by "Harvard" or, by extension, "smart people."
Tough break, Scotto. You can't "dumb" your way to winning.
(It's also yet another poll that shows Elizabeth Warren within single digits of Scott Brown already, despite only having been a candidate for a few weeks. Team Brown can't be too thrilled about that.)
Scott Conway: To help pay for his law school education, Scott Brown posed for Cosmo. How did you pay for your education?
Elizabeth Warren: I kept my clothes on. I borrowed money. I was somebody who went to school and got student loans. I went to a public university at a time when they were well supported and tuition was cheap. And I had a part time job. So the combination got me through. I paid off my student loans about 10 years after graduation.
Scott Brown's not-so-shockingly tasteless and glibly sexist response:
HOST: Have you officially responded to Elizabeth Warren's comment about how she didn't take her clothes off?
BROWN: Heh heh heh heh. Thank God. Heh heh heh.
HOST: Heh heh heh heh. That's what I said! I said, hey look, can you blame a good-looking guy for, you know, for wanting to...?
Here's a collection of Scott Brown supporter Vote3rdpartynow's responses. Here's one:
a bitter old shrew with a bad attitude and a need for a makeover
Elizabeth Warren is a hostile angry bitter prune of a woman. She screeches and whines
And here's where V3PN demonstrates just how utterly devoid of any shred of humanity or decency he or she is:
I full intend to make hay of her scowl and bitchy attitude, because real men, unlike you, won't vote for a bitch.
How sad and scared and empty V3PN must be, employing the desperate and cowardly rhetoric of abuse against women.
I wonder, even though Scott Brown's comments were so much more succinct, just a simple "Thank God," does he not seem to feel the exact same way his supporter V3PN does? Is Scott Brown's overall philosophy not the same as V3PN's?
It would be shameful if it wasn't coming from a place of such desperation and fear.
Newton mayor Setti Warren, whose US Senate campaign has been short on cash and eclipsed by the emergence of Elizabeth Warren, plans to announce tomorrow that he is dropping out, according to an early supporter who received a phone call this afternoon.
A source close to the campaign confirmed the mayor was speaking with supporters and said he will make an announcement on the future of his Senate campaign in the morning.
Granted, as far as the primary goes, the biggest impact on the race may be that there is only one Warren running, preventing confusion, given that Mayor Warren was only getting 1% according to the recent PPP poll.
Has Mayor Warren's lackluster campaign done lasting damage to his political credibility? Surely, he must be considering running for Barney Frank's Congressional seat when Frank retires. Had Mayor Warren not run for Senate, he could have cleared that field. Now, seeing his weak polling and fundraising (even before Elizabeth Warren got in), I doubt other interested Democrats would shy away from a primary vs. the Mayor in 2014 or 2016, whenever Congressman Frank retires.
Similarly, will this move cue State Rep. Tom Conroy to back out and focus on re-election to the state legislature?
Or does this whole event have no impact on the race given how early in the calendar it is and little support the Newton Mayor had?
But Red Mass Group has achieved Elizabeth Warren Derangement Syndrome in record time!!!
In less than nineteen hours (and on a weekend, no less), there have been not one, not two, but three front page posts all freaking out about a single inspiring quote uttered by Elizabeth Warren that has managed to galvanize people of all political stripes across the Commonwealth and across the country.
RMG denizens must be completely freaked that Elizabeth Warren will demolish Scott Brown for there to be this kind of acute response.
RMG: Your One-Stop Shop for Elizabeth Warren Derangement Syndrome!
UPDATE: Make that 360,000+ views in five days. It doubled from yesterday's four-day mark of 180,000+ to today's five-day mark of 360,000+. Now, THAT is viral.
UPDATE #2: Make that 460,000+ views in six days! That's another 100,000+ views since yesterday. Will it break half a million views in one week?!
There are lots of quantitative ways that campaigns can measure how well they're doing against one another. Polls, money, etc.
In today's new media age, a fun one is video views.
Over a month ago, Scott Brown released a YouTube video of himself offering meaningless platitudes about jobs and the economy (wet blankets, and going forward and conquering, and whatnot). It's entitled "Scott Brown Talks About Jobs." In over a month, it's achieved just over 2,600 views.
Four days ago, a video of Elizabeth Warren talking about the economy, national debt, taxes, and the philosophy of the social contract hit YouTube. You can listen below; there's no Washington-speak, no Harvard-speak, just straight talk about economic realities in plain English, connecting with the voters.
In about four days, it's gotten over 180,000 views.
Scott Brown talking about the economy gets 2,600 views in a month. Elizabeth Warren talking about the economy gets 180,000 views (and counting) in four days.
This kind of metric is hardly definitive in any way, but it is interesting. And it is telling about who people are listening to and what messages are reaching the electorate.
By now, we've all seen the new independent poll that has Scott Brown and his sycophants quaking:
Elizabeth Warren has had an incredibly successful launch to her Senate campaign and actually leads Scott Brown now by a 46-44 margin, erasing what was a 15 point deficit the last time we polled the state in early June.
Brown was short and stern with my colleague Dave Catanese when approached at a Log Cabin Republican dinner last night in Washington. "Never been a big poll guy," he said.
Never been a big poll guy, huh, Scotto? OK, that's cool. You're truck-driving regular ol' tough guy. You shouldn't be concerned with polls.
Further, you definitely shouldn't be concerned with polls when you're at your taxpayer-funded U.S. Senate office when you're supposed to be doing the People's business.
A Hill staffer, who spoke with TPM by phone, sends this dispatch from the Senate side in the wake of today's PPP poll showing former White House financial reform adviser Elizabeth Warren leading Sen. Scott Brown (R-MA):
"Just walked passed Senator Brown's office and in the hallway was the man himself, lamenting into his cell phone, 'I don't understand how she can be down 20 points one week and is now up 2. What is going on?'"
Our tipster describes the scene:
Was heading to a meeting after just having read your reporting on the new poll. Was just about to walk by Senator Brown's personal office when he walked out of the main door of his office, cell phone in hand. He was mid-conversation but was responding to something on the other line with the line I reported. Was kind of dumbfounded to hear that kind of candor in a very public hallway. I'm guessing he realized that too, because he then looked over his shoulder, saw me, and hurriedly entered a side down to his office down the hall.
So, instead of doing the People's business in his taxpayer-funded U.S. Senate office, Scott Brown is apparently using the taxpayer-funded office as a satellite campaign office, talking polls and politics. That doesn't sound too appropriate.
It might be the People's Seat, but the seat is apparently located in a taxpayer-funded Brown for Senate office in one of the U.S. Senate office buildings.
And, I guess Scott Brown is a "big poll guy" after all.
Sen. Scott Brown, R-Mass., leads Democrat Elizabeth Warren by a 53-28 percent margin among likely 2012 voters, according to a poll conducted for the senator and the National Republican Senatorial Committee.
Matched against Warren, who was passed over for the top job at the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau in the face of GOP resistance and is considering a Senate run, Brown leads by a 25-point margin, with 18 percent undecided. He leads Newton Mayor Setti Warren, 57-21, and City Year co-founder Alan Khazei, 54-24.
Numbers like these suggest the election is already over and Scott Brown will cruise to re-election. Best thing to do is focus resources, time, and energy elsewhere. Scotto doesn't even have to worry about the occasional faux-moderate vote - he can pretty much dive as far right-wing as he likes without concern of political consequence. Nothing to see here.
My home town, Milton, was home to our nation's first piano factory long before my time. And while I have enjoyed music throughout my life, it pains me to hear how out of the tune some in the U.S. Senate are when it comes to America's energy policy and the nature of our global economy.
A case in point is a vote tonight in Washington on Senate Bill 940, seeking to raise taxes on our oil sector. The senators pushing this proposal may think they're targeting the conductor, but it would ultimately hurt the band members.
Prominent economist Mark J. Perry has pointed out that it's people, not corporations, that ultimately pay taxes. Among other things, higher taxes on the U.S. oil industry translate into lower wages, fewer jobs and lower returns for tens of millions of investors (e.g., mutual funds, employee pensions, IRAs, school endowments, etc.).
Gasoline prices statewide right now average $3.97, and politicians are feeling the heat. It's sad to think, though, that the best some Members of Congress can come up with to address price increases of a globally-traded commodity is to scapegoat our domestic producers.
As my friend Bill O'Keefe pointed out today, "proponents of [this] Senate legislation are simply engaging in cheap populism." Instead of marching to this misinformed beat, senators tonight would be well-served to remember that raising taxes on domestic energy companies will not lower motor fuel prices; in fact it will make energy even more expensive. Such a short-sighted policy proposal certainly does not address the need for much-needed tax reform either. I hope Sen. Brown agrees and votes nay on S. 940.
Two Senate procedural votes on Democratic measures to extend George W. Bush-era tax cuts for people who are not super wealthy failed on Saturday, preventing the measures from moving forward.
The votes sought to extend the Bush tax cuts for families making under $250,000 and $1 million, respectively.
Both votes garnered the support of 53 senators, but the Democrats needed 60 votes to end debate.
Even when setting the tax cut bar at one million dollars, Republican Senators (including Scott Brown) were unwilling to vote in favor of tax cuts. Don't they know it's our money?! Why do you think Republican Senators are holding middle class families hostage in the tax cut debate? Why are they willing to scuttle tax cuts for well over 90% of American families in defense of the super-rich?
US Senator Scott Brown, who only months ago was a little-known figure even within the tiny band of Republicans in the state Senate, not only catapulted to national stature with his upset US Senate victory, but is today the most popular officeholder in Massachusetts, according to a Boston Globe poll.
After less than five months in Washington, Brown outpolls such Democratic stalwarts as President Obama and US Senator John F. Kerry in popularity, the poll indicates. He gets high marks not only from Republicans, but even a plurality of Democrats views him favorably.
The support for Brown, whose victory became a symbol of voter anger, is consistent with widespread sentiment that incumbents in Massachusetts and Washington "need to be replaced with a new crop of leaders.'' That statement was supported by 50 percent of those polled, while 28 percent said they trust the incumbents.
Brown's appeal carries over to Independents and Democrats. He leads longtime incumbent Senator and presidential candidate John Kerry. Only 11 percent view Brown unfavorably.
Over at NRO's tweet page Marc Ambinder says that Sen. John Kerry is calling the MA race a "dead heat."
Meanwhile, the Wall Street Journal describes the corporate Friends of Martha.
We've argued that the leading health industry CEOs will one day be exposed as the most short-sighted business leaders in history, but how to explain the gala fundraiser that their top lobbyists hosted for Martha Coakley last night?
Amid a Beltway panic, the health lobby is riding to the rescue of the Massachusetts liberal, whose defeat in the special Senate race next Tuesday could deny Democrats the 60th vote for ObamaCare and thus maybe spare the U.S. health system from the coming damage.
As first reported by Timothy Carney of the Washington Examiner, the host committee for the fundraiser at Pennsylvania Avenue's Sonoma Restaurant includes lobbyists for Pfizer, Merck, Eli Lilly, Novartis and sundry other drug companies that have been among the biggest of ObamaCare's corporate sponsors. Other hosts-who have raised at least $10,000 for Ms. Coakley-include representatives from UnitedHealthcare, Blue Cross Blue Shield, Humana and other insurers. As far as we can tell, the insurance industry claims to oppose ObamaCare's current incarnation.
Remember Martha Coakley and the Massachusetts Democrats including the new senior senator never thought they would have to work this hard. They ran into a guy from Wrentham and his truck.
Imagine Martha Coakley sitting on the Senate Intelligence Committee and asked to consider the implications of this story from yesterday's Investor's Business Daily. Could she break out of her politically correct straight-jacket to ferret out jihadist agents at the Pentagon? Could she ask the right questions about what happened at Ft. Hood and how the PC police in the military enabled a Al-Q sympathizer to kill fellow Americans?
Frequently booked by the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR) as a guest speaker at its events, [so-called moderate American clerics like Zaid] Shakir Shakir tells his Muslim audience: "Jihad is physically fighting the enemies of Islam to protect and advance the religion of Islam. This is jihad."
Acceptable targets of jihad, he says, include U.S. military aircraft. "Islam doesn't permit us to hijack airplanes filled with civilian people," he said, but "if you hijack an airplane filled with the 82nd Airborne, that's something else."
The 82nd Airborne is based out of Fort Bragg, which is part of North Carolina state Sen. Larry Shaw's home district. Shaw is CAIR's new chairman. He is also a minority contractor who operates Shaw Food Services Co. near Fort Bragg. According to the legislator's financial disclosure form, Shaw Food customers include the Defense Department...
Will Fort Bragg be next? Does anybody care?
As the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq drag on, and as long as our troops are deployed in those Muslim countries, our troops stationed here will increasingly be targeted by homegrown jihadists.
To protect them, military command must stop currying favor with suspect Muslim groups and start beefing up counterintelligence activities. It must institute a policy of zero tolerance for Jihad Joes in the ranks.
If Fort Hood did not open their eyes, snap them out of their PC slumber, nothing will. Our brave men and women in uniform already have to worry about getting ambushed in Iraq and Afghanistan. They shouldn't have to worry about getting ambushed at home...
While there is rightly placed concern that we not label all Muslims as Islamic terrorists or enemy sympathizers, it is entirely proper to address certain aspects of violence as uniquely Islamic. After all, our enemies cite the sources of Islam as the foundation of their global jihad.
By ignoring this demonstrably obvious fact, the military is violating the first rule of war: Know thy enemy and what motivates it. That's a recipe for defeat.
Be afraid, dear friends. Martha Coakley will be too busy asking the wrong questions and place the blame elsewhere. She will worry about "hearts and minds" of the jihadist not the safety of Americans. Her approach will be guided by a Gitmo mentality that finds its home in the majority party.
To those who object to this prospect, consider the following. Coakley has a track record here in Massachusetts of looking the other way at wrong-doing, if not the wrong way at matters of public safety. After all she doesn't believe there's an illegal immigration problem in Massachusetts and her decision not to enforce laws is what makes her candidacy a dubious proposition for voters.
Elections have consequences. They should not put national security at risk.
