Massachusetts
Surprisingly, even I had to double check that spelling.
So, by now you’ve probably heard. In today’s special election to fill Teddy Kennedy’s Senate seat, Republican Scott Brown won. It’s not so much that he deserved to win. We Democrats deserved to lose. In the closing days of this special election, it seemed like the only Democrat taking notice was President Barack Obama. And even his stumping was way to late to save Martha Coakley. It’s easy to blame Martha Coakley for losing the seat, but the blame falls on all of us. If Democrats truly treasured that 60th Senate seat, we would have come to her aid much much sooner. It was only in the face of last minute numbers that we truly mobilized. But it was far too late.
Now the question begs, what does this all mean? The timing of this election was extremely bad in the current political climate. People thought they’d see change by now. But those of use who are more politically savvy know change takes a little more than a single year. Barack Obama, despite several small political wins and patching up the ills of the previous administration, has yet to deliver (to steal a WWE term) a Stone Cold Stunner. Had the Health Care bill been passed before this special election, would expect the result to be quite different.
However, I’m actually glad we lost this seat. The GOP is celebrating tonight but in the morning they’ll realize that now they’re under the gun to deliver. You see, the Republicans on the Hill can’t call the Whambulance anymore. They’ve gotten by well for the past year claiming the lack of power to bend the political landscape in their favor. They’ve gotten by just blocking Democratic legislation and saying that’s all they can do. Truth be told, the supermajority hasn’t been working out for us. All the debate within the Democratic Party on how best to deliver health care reform gave the GOP the argument that if Barack Obama can’t deliver even his own party on the issue that America has to be gong down the wrong path.
Now that the supermajority is gone, Republicans no long have the luxury of sitting idly by while Democrats suss out the details of legislation. Now they have to prove that they’re willing to be bipartisan. They HAVE to engage in the current debates and most importantly they HAVE to have alternative solutions. Simply saying NO is no longer acceptable.
So Scott, congratulations and party hard. A few short hours from now the work begins. We kind of already know where you’re going to stand. Just keep in mind that your election has forced your party to actually start doing some work. I guess in that sense we all win.
