General Discussion
In reply to the discussion: If HRC is nominated WITHOUT a primary challenge: [View all]MADem
(135,425 posts)is for it, though!!
I said "I cannot believe she didn't know the party platform" because that's what I meant. She's a smart woman, she surely had a television, she read the newspapers, and she knew where the GOP came down on issues like equality and a public health (non) response to the AIDS crisis. The "battle lines being drawn" were pretty clear in that era--there were stark differences between the party platforms.
Ed Brooke was the more conservative candidate in the Brooke-Peabody race--in fact Peabody was too LIBERAL for a lot of the MA racists who liked their neighborhood schools and liked people to stay in their lanes. I think you're misremembering a bit what Peabody's views were (and his ultra-liberal mother, getting arrested for trying to integrate pockets of the south, etc.). His second race was against John Droney, who was no rightie either--if you remember, that guy had Lou Gehrig's disease, he didn't make a very compelling appearance (had trouble walking/talking but his mind was totally sharp) and he didn't stand a chance for those reasons, not because of his political leanings.
If we're to get further down in the weeds, that guy was the Middlesex DA (a job that can make a person appear way more "conservative" than they actually are), a protege of John F. Kennedy (he worked on JFK's House/Senate/Presidential campaigns, and JFK basically made sure he got the DA job) and a fellow named JOHN KERRY was his eyes/ears/mouthpiece in the DA's office during the seventies and after Droney's failed Senate run after Kerry managed to jump over a lot of old Droney loyalists in that office to become Droney's Number One guy after graduating BC law. Droney wasn't stupid--he was an able DA, but he didn't have mobility, youth, vigor or a clear speaking voice, and Kerry had all that and more, and in effect, functioned as Droney's surrogate in public life. Kerry moved on after it became clear he wasn't going to succeed Droney as the Middlesex DA (jumped/pushed?) and it was onward and upward to better things for him. But let's not assume that Droney was a wingnut--his job was to put crooks in jail, never a touchy-feely gig on a good day.
In any event, Ed Brooke left politics before things got totally ugly, while there still was a thing known as a "New England Republican." But he left in the SEVENTIES and never held elective office again. The GOP in the eighties had their "southern strategy" well entrenched and they were leaning hard to the "law and order" right, going after those "welfare queens" and building up the military and wasting money on "Star Wars" to bring the Soviet empire to a close. And that's when Warren was aligned with them.
And sure, Ed Brooke was a RINO (or a New England Republican), and MA did like having our extra-special Black Senator, even though he said lame, mainstream stuff like "I don't like Stokely Carmichael," (sop to those South Boston racists) and he was even considered as Spiro Agnew's replacement by Nixon (fun fact)-- he didn't survive a third Senate run not because of his GOP affiliation but because he was screwing around on his Italian war bride and she wasn't having it. Surely you remember the fuss she was making? It got pretty ugly there for a bit--she wanted to Make Him Pay. He was spending a lot of time in DC and at Studio 54 "doing the hustle" if you will. What we didn't know, but found out much later (in the past decade, in fact) is that his main squeeze was none other than his "good friend" BARBARA WALTERS.
And when he lost his seat, he lost it to a WAY more liberal guy, a Democrat by the name of Tsongas, whose wife sits in his old House seat today.
Amazing that the dude is still alive after all these years--he's 95, and living in FL, I believe. His current wife bears a slight resemblance to Barbara Walters, too--go figure.