Posted by
Bert Chapman on Thursday, January 14, 2010 7:26:16 PM
During the 1988 presidential campaign, Democratic nominee and then current Massachusetts Governor Michael Dukakis claimed credit for the burgeoning growth of his state's high tech industry by calling it the Massachusetts Miracle by falsely crediting it to his policies. Actually, it was the free market oriented policies of the Reagan Administration and the initiative, intelligence, and ingenuity of the American workforce that spurred the development of this important industry.
Just over two decades later a real Massachusetts miracle may be in the offing. The reddest of red states (see my early 2007 posting on how U.S. political commentators get their political colors wrong) may be about to send a Republican to the Senate. Following the death of Ted Kennedy, the Bay State's Democratic Governor Deval Patrick appointed party hack Paul Kirk and former national committee chair to keep Kennedy's Senate seat warm until a special election could be held. Democratic Attorney General Martha Coakley won her party's nomination and the Republicans elected state Senator Scott Brown to be their apparent sacrificial lamb in an election for a seat which had not been in Republican hands since Edward Brooke's 1978 defeat. (In fact, many Republicans outside of New England would have described Brooke as a RINO to use a contemporary acronym.)
Brown has run a remarkably effective campaign and has given himself a fighting chance thanks to an energized cadre of supporters. Brown is ably tapping into grassroots concerns over the cost of Obamacare, the President's fiscal profligacy, and his ineffectual response to terrorism. His defense of traditional marriage also gives one hope that there are still some lingering vestiges of Puritanism in a state now noted for its pagan moral proclivities.
Coakley, who thought she could coast to a coronation, has proven to be a leaden campaigner who has resorted to lame and irrelevant attacks against Rush Limbaugh and Sarah Palin, brought out tired old abortionist cliches about the somewhat pro-life Brown being against women (which caused one of Brown's daughters to publicly denounce Coakley), and failed to address the genuine economic concerns and anxieties of Massachusett's residents. A recent sign of her campaign's desperation was one of her apparatchiks slugging a reporter from the Weekly Standard for allegedly stalking her. Sounds like paranoia is afflicting her campaign. Her campaign is being bolstered by a six figure contribution from the Democrats union cadres and she still may demagogue her way to victory. Massachusetts state officials are already threatening to delay certification of election results until they can figure out a way to fraudulently manufacture enough votes to propel Coakley to victory. While I'm not as optimistic that Brown can shock the political world as some conservatives are, his strong campaign should encourage us to realize that opposition to the fraudulent and increasingly ineffective Obama is rising in one of the keystone states of his electoral coalition. Stay tuned and see what happens in next Tuesday's election.