Have you been following the special election in Massachusetts to replace Ted Kennedy in the Senate? It has become something of a flashpoint in the last couple of weeks, with Republicans trumpeting their candidate, Scott Brown, as having a better-than-usual chance to win in Democratic Massachusetts, and thus destroy health care reform. My personal feeling is that the whole thing is a lot of wishful thinking from people who live in an echo chamber where the whole world is one big "Tea Party" movement ready to "take back America," and that Martha Coakley, the Democratic nominee, is going to win no matter what, but special elections are notoriously hard to call and Coakley has run an absolutely awful campaign, so I could be wrong. You never know! Anyway, Gail Collins, who has been completely energized over the last six months, takes a look at the race today and includes a great rant about the super-majority in the Senate that is well worth your time.
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More importantly, his daughter was on American Idol.
http://aylabrown.com/
I am going to do my country a service and drag my ass out of bed early on Tuesday to vote; You're Welcome. I will try not to accidentally select Independent candidate Joe Kennedy ["no relation"], the "Tea Party" candidate, by mistake.
I just moved! I have to register-I hope I'm not too late.
Did you change your the address on you ID yet? I would just go to your former voting location. I moved next door, so it isn't much of a stretch, but in the primary I just stated my old address and it was fine.
If you haven't changed your address with the commonwealth and registered in the new location, call the precinct captain or town clerk from the old address to see what you should do.
If you already changed your address with Mass, the new precinct may give you a provisional ballot that would only be used after they vetted your eligibility (post-election) because Tuesday is in, like, soon.
FYI, a DL isn't the only acceptable ID. A utility bill, pay stub, etc. works. So, vote early and vote often!
http://www.sec.state.ma.us/ELE/eleifv/howvote.htm
I'll see ya'll at the polls bright and early Tuesday morning.
Martha Coakley is a grade A asshole, but old habits die hard (ahem, hahd).
Coakley's campaign has been awful, especially given the "Most Important Health Care Vote Ever" hype around filling the vacancy.
Excuses I've heard:
- the President is too busy with _________ to stump.
- Senator Kerry is recovering from hip surgery redux.
- Gov Patrick is hoarding any political capital he may have left.
- Fmr Pres Clinton is in detention with Sec Clinton (and now going to Haiti with Mr. Bush).
- Fmr Gov Dukakis has no political weight anymore. (!!)
- Substance doesn't win elections, it's all about style.
- Spelling errors (Massachusettes?) don't reflect on the candidate herself.
- Going dirty/negative is the only way to bring down a likeable conservative candidate. (???!???!?)
And then there's this mind-boggling notion that independent/unenrolled voters will "screw it up anyway," so Coakley's organization isn't trying to reach out to them (us [me]). (!?!??!?!?!?!??)
To paraphrase Sorkin, when you're voting for the lesser of "WHO CARES," it's hard to work up enthusiasm for two candidates so astoundingly unqualified to represent the commonwealth.
"To paraphrase Sorkin, when you're voting for the lesser of "WHO CARES," it's hard to work up enthusiasm for two candidates so astoundingly unqualified to represent the commonwealth."
Amen. Although I might vote for Coakley just because Scott Brown and his minions are calling me 5 or 6 times a day to do otherwise.
Ha ha Scott Brown has totally lied about not knowing any Tea Partiers yay.
p.s. Yay also for commenter voters!! Thank you!
If she loses, Pelosi can just suck it up and they can pass the Senate bill to the President, like, tomorrow. No votes necessary!
Interesting op-ed in the Times the other day asserting that the current filibuster rules are unconstitutional http://www.nytimes.com/2010/01/11/opinion/11geoghegan.html?partner=rss&emc=rss&pagewanted=all . This can't be what the framers/founders had in mind.
As for the election, it's close enough that the Obama campaign successor Organizing for America is working its e-mail lists and has geared up its Internet phone banks to try to get folks from outside Mass. to help get out the vote. I hear NOW may be doing the same.
They should have gone with Mike Capuano, he had more (metaphorical) balls than the dull Coakley.
And I bet that's the real reason Mike Dukakis hasn't been heard from since the primary — he put his arm around Capuano's shoulder and said, "This is the guy."
The only non-dull part of Coakley is what she'll say next. Not the substance, but how. The horrible western Masshole accent sounds like she's a Tourette/Down's victim with a lisp chewing gravel during a seizure.
I was thinking it sounds like her jaw is wired shut, but now I really see what you mean.
No kidding on the accent, not to mention she appears to have chewed off her own lips at some point in some horrible accident of oratory.
Yes but Scott Brown drives a truck!
I'm a Massachusetts voter, and Coakley's "campaign" has been godawful. There's also some simmering mistrust of her from the progressive end of the spectrum because of her involvement in the Amirault case, one of those day care child molestation witch trials from the 1980s.
But the alternative is a gone-to-seed Cosmo centerfold who hates gays, so I'm voting for Coakley.
(Yous guys is making me homesick, sniffle, fuck ya motha, etc.)
Wait, Scott Brown is THIS GUY:
http://wonkette.com/237494/mass-state-senator-unleashes-devastating-im-rubber-youre-glue-defense
Ye cats!
As a Boston College graduate (and employee) and a bleeding heart liberal, this video of Doug Flutie endorsing Scott Brown is like a kick square in the crotch. http://www.thefoxnation.com/entertainment/2010/01/13/doug-flutie-endorses-scott-brown
Ugh. Female lefty from MA here, and I've sworn for years I would never cast a vote for Coakley, never suspecting it would come down to this. I'm one of many people who is deeply disturbed about her involvement in the above mentioned Amirault case. Doing whatever it takes to advance your political career is one thing, but when this includes campaigning to keep an innocent man in prison when the MA parole board voted unanimously to commute his sentence(2002), and actively keeping him imprisoned 6 months longer than he has to be(2004), among other travesties, well, I can't condone that with my vote.
I'm royally pissed that it's come to this all because few of us were paying attention to the primary, where we had other credible choices. Also pissed about the party line voting thing that has turned Congress into a giant game of Survivor with fewer surprises. *sigh*
I voted for Capuano, and was sort of startled by how badly he lost.
Yeah, the MASenate twitter feed and self reporting on boston.com were both skewing heavily in Capuano's favor all day on primary day, so I made the mistake of getting my hopes up. In the end, it pretty much played out the way the polls said it would. I swear if there had been more time for a real campaign, Capuano or Khazei would have taken it.
Ditto on the vote, ditto on the bewilderment.
Ditto. Why the heck did Coakley win so big? Insider status? Mass. politics are starting to depress the crap outta me.
@bittersweet: starting to? You managed to survive the Romney administration without the aid of Zoloft?
Yes. Capuano was the guy. It's really a shame he lost.
@jolie – well, at least Mitt didn't do too much damage. And the economy was OK.
Mass Dems are nothing to write home about either. Yeah, I'm talkin' to you, Gallucci, Wilkerson, Finneran et al.
I too am a disappointed Capuano voter.