And the GOP expands the map a little more. Seriously, they are having a pretty outstanding recruiting year, which is always a good sign.
When asked what the first word that came to mind when they mentioned the name Scott Brown, 11% of New Hampshire residents replied “carpet bagger”. That’s a pretty significant impediment for him considering how New Hampshire feels about outsiders. He’s also running 32/41 favorable/unfavorable with independents against a popular ex governor (55/33 fav/unfav with inds.), so… good luck Scott.
Yeah, one of the factors of the GOP losing the Adirondacks-region NYS congressional district 4 years ago is thought to have been the dislike of “outsiders”. So if up-up-upstate New York is anything like New Hampshire (and the Adirondacks has been likened to a western New England), Brown will have an uphill battle.
Ok, first of all, I’ll admit 100% Hillary Clinton was indeed a carpetbagger when she won the New York Senate race. However, there is a bit of difference between someone running in New York state when they’ve spent the last 8 years in Washington DC as opposed to someone running for the Senate in New Hampshire when they were a senator from Massachusetts two years ago.
From what I understand, New Hampshire politics is very local. The state has a population less than the city of Chicago and a populace who has a keen interest in politics. Unless there is a huge Republican wave, I can’t see this working for Mr. Brown.
Brown has a good chance of winning this seat mostly because it is a midterm election and he is not a SoCon. In 2010 Kelly Ayotte defeated a sitting Dem Congressman with 60% of the vote.
Right now things could not look worse for the Dem chances of holding the Senate. But November is a ways off.
THe polls does show he’s an underdog, but he’s competitive enough that it will force Democrats to spend a lot to defend the seat. Plus it never hurts to actually have likeable Republicans running in high profile races. The Republican Party needs Scott Brown.
Scott Brown is a complete lightweight. The party needs intelligent people with rational principles, not vacant drones with nice hair.
He’s a Senatorial candidate, and he’s probably at the median as far as intelligence in that body goes. Plus he helps with the GOP’s working class bona fides, being probably the poorest member of the Senate should he win.
Most legislators just vote the way the party leadership or their constituents tell them. Maybe 10% of Senators and Congressmen routinely think for themselves. Those are the ones you see on Sunday talk shows. Has Shaheen done anything to distinguish herself as particularly intelligent or useful, aside from providing a needed vote for Harry Reid?
Is he really running for the Senate, or is he actually running for President?
Does it need him more in New Hampshire than in Massachusetts? The GOP in Massachusetts wanted him to run for governor this year.
I guess I can only view this as part and parcel of Brown’s “me-first!” mentality.
Brown narrowly beat the worst candidate in recent memory at a time when the Republican base was whipped into a frenzy over lies about the proposed health care bill. When the regular election came to pass, the state came back to its senses and elected a Democrat. He simply isn’t a Republican messiah and I’m not seeing where this supposed rock star persona is going to carry over into a neighboring state. He couldn’t get elected to the Senate in Massachusetts again, I’m not seeing how he gets elected as a carpetbagger.
(Underlining mine.) Really? You really think that??
Most legislators just vote the way the party leadership or their constituents tell them. Maybe 10% of Senators and Congressmen routinely think for themselves…Did Scott Brown do anything to distinguish himself as particularly intelligent or useful while in the Senate, aside from providing a needed vote for Mitch McConnell?
Unlike Shaheen, Brown actually listens to his constituents as well as his party leadership. Shaheen just votes with Obama 99% of the time, even though NH is not a reliably liberal state.
Brown is a little more independent-minded and thus better for the state.
May we assume you have some factual basis for that assertion? Or that NH voters would agree with you?
Which assertion? I made a few. Brown’s voting record in the Senate was not reliably conservative. Shaheen’s record is almost uniformly pro-Obama. New Hampshire is not Massachusetts, it’s far more libertarian-minded.
The assertions that Brown “actually listens to his constituents” and is “independent-minded”, and that Shaheen is a mindless Obamabot, and that New Hampsters therefore would prefer Brown - despite alll the polls that show otherwise and are therefore skewed.
The polls show Brown with a disadvantage, but he hasn’t been campaigning and Shaheen has. And their voting records speak for themselves. Shaheen voted for every gun control bill brought up in the Senate last year. I’m sure that will go over very well in New Hampshire once the NRA starts running ads. That’ll dig into her poll numbers nicely.
C’mon. Brown has been campaigning in NH ever since he sold his house in MA.
Your caricatured views of New Hampsters and their voting proclivities are also, shall we say in summary, contrary to all recent evidence. Which therefore must be skewed, right?
This has been a message from the Reality-Based Community. We now return you to your scheduled fantasies, already in progress.
New Hampshire is an anti-gun state? News to me. Much more liberal Vermont next door is very pro-gun.
Come up and visit sometime. You might learn something. Might.