It looks like Rachel Maddow has the same thoughts as the op.
That trio that questioned Rice the other day? (Collins, Mccain, and that other guy)Well guess who they’re buddies with? Go on Guess.
Link Skip to 5min in.
The trio was McCain, Lindsay Graham, and Kelly Ayotte. Later Rice met with Susan Collins, Bob Corker and Joe Lieberman.
Yeah, I can’t imagine the Democratic candidate losing a special election to Brown, presuming they don’t go insane and take a vacation from campaigning while insulting the voters like Martha did. Brown really damaged his standing with the whole Native American debacle.
Now Richard Tisei would be an interesting Republican candidate. Was a popular state Senator for twenty years, came within a few thousand votes of unseating the incumbent (who admittedly had major image/ethics problems), and he’s gay, which would help assuage liberal guilt for not voting for a Democrat.
However, he also just lost to somebody any Democrat would have pounded in a primary (that’s my district, and I certainly would have welcomed the chance). Tierney needed to go and still does, and the Dems needed to primary him - seniority or not, he’s useless even without considering his wife’s and her brothers’ ethics problems.
Tisei’s a good guy, sure, but he’s sailing under the wrong flag. And now he’s the guy who couldn’t even beat Tierney.
ETA: Just to show you the state of the GOP bench, Tierney’s last challenger was a simple embarrassment of a Teabagger, who’s now left his law practice to promote some late-night-infomercial company. The guy worked in my town, and was notable for parking his SUV on the street with NOBAMA license plates and anti-government slogans painted all over it, and had some birther sign in his lawn. He’d always seemed pretty sane before that, though.
May not be about Scotty. Any open Dem seat is worth it for them. And its good to see how forgiving they can be to Kerry.
I think there’s some truth to the GOP wanting Kerry’s Senate seat to open up. Brown could win another low turnout special election like he did in 2009 after Ted Kennedy died and left the seat vacant and then temporarily filled by appointment. The swiftboat propaganda is eerily silent. Several Republicans have endorsed John Kerry’s nomination for Secretary of State.
I’m not certain that the Secretary of Defense position is open yet. Has Panetta declared that he’s stepping down?
He’s not running for president, therefore not worth swiftboating.
He hasn’t declared it, but it sounds like he doesn’t plan to stay on the job that long and I don’t think he is expected to stay.
Kerry won’t be swiftboated because the next SOS and SOD are going to be Democrats no matter what, and because his seat won’t open up if they do it, and because they know they probably can’t get away with the same lies twice anyway. That’s it.
Didn’t Tierney have a boatload of cash to spend? I live in that district too, and I’m sure he outdid Tisei’s mailings 3-1, and I got two different push-poll calls about Tisei.
While in principle any Democratic senate vacancy favors the Republicans, wouldn’t it favor them a lot more in a state where they’d have a good chance of replacing him? Even with an open seat, any Republican is going to have a serious uphill climb in a statewide Massachusetts race.
The idea of Brown running again sounds a little like a Sartre-ish nightmare. He ran and won in January 2010, ran and lost in November 2012, and (assuming Kerry left office in January) would be campaigning again for an election in June or July 2013, and then would have to run for a full term again in November 2014. It’s hard for me to see him winning a third Senate election in 3 1/2 years, let alone winning three out of four. It seems to me that voters would just be sick to death of him.
A lot of us are already sick to death of him.
To be honest, I’ve been sick to death of him since he won the special election to replace Cheryl Jacques in the State Senate in 2004. This was back when same-sex marriage was the big issue in Massachusetts, with various attempts to amend the state constitution to ban it before the Supreme Judicial Court’s ruling took effect. Jacques, who’s a lesbian, resigned her seat to become chair of HRC. The special election to replace her was widely seen as a preview of how races would be affected by the issue. Brown, the anti-SSM candidate won, which was considered a bad omen for all the legislators who had voted against the proposed amendment. As it turned out, the election was a fluke, and the pro-SSM candidates won in every seat that was contested between the two sides for at least a couple years.
The one thing from that time that cemented my opinion of Scott Brown was his mention of Cheryl Jacques’s “alleged family responsibilities” toward her partner and their daughter.
Trust me, if Rice had the Senate seat and Kerry was UN Ambassador, then you’d hear swiftboat attacks with the prospect of open cabinet positions.
Scott Brown earned my disdain when I heard this interview with him:
http://www.rawstory.com/rs/2010/04/16/gop-senator-explain-opposes-financial-reform/
Emphasis mine. He’s a fucking dipshit. Which makes him perfect for the 21st century GOP, of course.
I saw coverage on MSNBC of Truckie Brown McBarnjacket at his debate with Elizabeth Warren; and during some campaign rally. where he was trying to wave his dick around, but only looked like a douchetruck.
I’ve never even BEEN to Massachusetts and just want to punch him.
What’s the big deal with him and the truck anyway? They sell them to anyone who’s got cash or financing.
It shows he’s not one of them limousine liberals everyone hates.
For those who poo-pooed the idea that Brown could win a special election:
Scott Brown up big in early polls.
If Massachusetts Democrats don’t get their act together and find an appealing candidate, it’s starting to look like the Republicans may have finessed a Senate seat.
It’s his name. Sounds like “malarkey.”