In what might be called the “anti-commonwealth” ad, the Fox brigade at Scott Brown headquarters raises the class warfare banner of their wealthy GOP backers against Massachusetts. Esteemed BMGer Rob Eno lauds it as “perhaps the best web video of this campaign” on wannabe blog RMG. As a Warren partisan, I agree. If Brown was running for Senator of the Republican Party his “I’ve got mine, you lose,” argument might find some support. But it has little to offer the 88.38% of Commonwealth voters he and his Republican Party do not represent, and underlines how completely he has become a servant to the “Kings and Queens” of Wall Street and Washington since he got elected.
Tellingly, the ad starts with JFK and Bill Clinton, and ends with Ronald Reagan and angry, Sarah Palin-like distortions of President Obama and middle class icon Elizabeth Warren. That is the same political road Brown himself has traveled: from a likable new face with a JFK ad to a Boy’s Club GOP insider, voting against jobs for Massachusetts on narrow ideological grounds, for a law backed by religious extremists that would allow employers to strip employees of birth control because they didn’t approve of their personal choices, and retaining a top campaign advisor who organized an Internet smear campaign against a political rival.
At the end of the spot, Brown tries to run as a Red Sox. That helped him in 2010, but now it just reminds informed voters that as a state Senator he tried to junk Fenway Park and move the team out of Boston and down toward New York.
Discuss
9 Comments . Leave a comment below.Have you done a poll or a survey to establish this fact? I can’t say it for sure as you have, but I don’t think the average MA resident knows anything about what you talking about. And I don’t think the “informed” voters in MA will be deciding on who will be Senator based on your reference to a vague issue from many years ago (2001) but you can keep trying. Has EW ever gone to a Red Sox game, sat in the bleachers and had a Fenway Frank? I’m still perplexed by her comment recently about talking to other voters…
Stap & Shop or Dunkin Donuts might have been better lines to talk about (thankfully she didn’t say at line at Chick-fil-a…)
If I was running the Warren campaign, I’d use some of her money to make sure every voter in the Commonwealth knew that Scott Brown tried to close Fenway Park and move the Red Sox down toward New York when his vote might have mattered on that issue.
That, combined with his new GOP Best Boy persona, is enough to win the election.
He can retire and make cologne commercials in his old age.
Fenway Dump must be replaced. Why can’t Boston Red Sox fans actually enjoy sitting in a modern facility?
The comment is only half tongue-in-cheek.
Fenway Park isn’t going anywhere soon. The ownership has invested quite a bit of money on expansions, new concessions, and so forth. The Fenway neighborhood immediately around the park is growing, as a number of large apartment/condo buildings have been built nearby, and there’s a huge project planned for the commuter rail stop and parking lot there, involving retail storefronts on both Beacon St and Brookline Ave, office space, and housing.
I’ve been to a lot of ball parks in my life (25+ MLB parks). There’s a reason why folks travel across the country to go see Wrigley and Fenway but don’t do that for modern parks.
and neither can Romney. They deserve each other.
…but omits any mention of Hughes and the body of the poem.
Absurd!
Could Brown have picked a poem that sounds any further from the ethos of the contemporary Republican party? Also, if I recall correctly, Senator Kerry used this poem somehow in his 2004 presidential campaign.
Let America be America Again
Poor people, African Americans, Native Americans, immigrants, America not being great to everyone, and environmentalism? This is the polar opposite of today’s Republican brand.
It is remarkable how much of music and literature, written by people who agree far more with Democratic values get used by Republicans.
As mindbogglingly as both Romney and Brown quoting Langston Hughes, for a longer time Republicans have “stolen” Woody Guthrie’s This land is your land”. This song could be considered an anthem for the 99% though written decades ago. It would be wonderful if Obama took this incredibly patriotic song and used it as one of his songs.
Recently, I went to the Clearwater Festival where the Guthrie family sang the full song – and remembered my surprise decades ago hearing the later verses and learning that Woody wrote it to counter the saccharine “God bless America”
The full lyrics are:
was when Pete Seeger sang “This Land Is Your Land” – every verse of it, reportedly because he insisted that he wouldn’t do it unless he could sing the whole thing. It was awesome.
just let America be.
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Tue 21 May 3:34 AM