The Eternal Scott Brown Campaign

[WilliamPitt]

Sen. Scott Brown, R-Mass. in the middle, and Rep. Joe Heck, R-Nev on the left.
(Photo: Talk Radio News Service / Flickr)

The Eternal Scott Brown Campaign
By William Rivers Pitt
Truthout | Op-Ed

Tuesday 18 March 2014

I don't think I'm breaking any new ground by saying Godfather III was not a good movie. It had all the potential in the world, and we really wanted it to live up to its namesakes, but it just didn't get the job done. It did, however, have one line for the ages, delivered by Michael Corleone after yet another assassination attempt, when he had to face the fact that all his efforts to legitimize his family had fallen to dust once again: "Just when I thought I was out, they pull me back in."

This is how I am feeling about Scott Brown right now.

I lived in Boston for forty years, and Scott Brown landed on my face after Ted Kennedy died in 2009. State Attorney General Martha Coakley declared her intention to run for his seat in the special election slated for January of 2010, and Scott Brown - a Republican who had served six terms in both the state House and Senate - won the GOP primary against perennial clown candidate Jack E. Robinson to earn the privilege of facing Coakley.

No one thought he had a chance - a Republican taking Ted Kennedy's seat? - but a few things happened in relatively short order to upend the whole process. First, Coakley seemed to think the seat was hers by right, and pretty much didn't bother to campaign. Second, the nascent molecules of what eventually coalesced into the Tea Party saw a once-in-a-lifetime chance to stick it to old-guard Democrats (Kennedy's seat held by a Republican!) and flooded Brown's campaign with cash. Third, and most important, it was a special election on a cold, rainy night in January. Turnout is low enough for midterm elections as it is, but on this night, I think maybe fourteen voters bothered to go to the polls, and nine of them were Republicans.

Add it all together, shake it up, and you've got instant landslide. For the first time since God wore diapers, Massachusetts would be represented in the US Senate by a Republican. I managed to wedge my way into the Dalton St. Marriott ballroom for the Coakley "victory party," and if they had been handing out nooses as freely as they were handing out booze that night, there would not be a single living Democrat left in the Commonwealth.

This was my first Scott Brown campaign.

My second Scott Brown election came two all-too-short years later, because there is no gravity: the Earth just sucks. See, Ted Kennedy died midway through his six-year term, so they had to have an election to fill his seat, but then they had to have another election in 2012 when Ted would have been on the ballot for re-election, and so Scott Brown had to run again, and for the second time in two years, we were smothered by Vote For Me Because Of My Truck commercials from Scott Brown, lather, rinse, repeat.

...except, this time, Mr. Brown was forced to encompass the superior intellect of Elizabeth Warren, his Democratic opponent, and he was forced to encompass the fact that it was 2012, a presidential election year, which meant voter turnout would increase by orders of magnitude. By the time they finished hosing the blood off the walls, Elizabeth Warren was shopping for lodging in the nation's capitol, and Mr. Brown was taking a law firm gig while doing occasional turns on Fox News.

This was my second Scott Brown campaign. My second in two years.

The rest: http://www.truth-out.org/opinion/item/22536-william-rivers-pitt-the-eternal-scott-brown-campaign

[11 Bravo]

1. If he gets his ass kicked again, will he move to Vermont?

Last edited Tue Mar 18, 2014, 01:04 PM - Edit history (1)

I swear, that smarmy skid mark is only slightly less odious than Mitt Fucking Romney.

[Blue_Adept]

2. You and me both

I had thought we were done with him, but no, he keeps cropping up. And since he has quasi celebrity status in the state due to connections through his wife as well, they've got easy access to cameras being around them.