This was originally posted this as a comment in David’s diary Scott Brown reelect kickoff #fail.
I went to Scott Brown’s reelection campaign kick-off Thursday night since it was here in Worcester. WHAT A SNOOZER. But it was entertaining to watch his attempt at stagecraft.
The sidewalk was almost empty outside Mechanics Hall when I arrived about 5 pm. The event didn’t even warrant more than a few protesters, and they were busy being interviewed by new crews when I walked by.
Parked immediately in front of the Hall’s door was a little vehicle with a rotating speaker on top. The looped Scott Brown monologue it was broadcasting over and over echoed down the darkened, nearly-empty streets. Orwellian creepy.
The volunteers just inside the door were doing their duty trying to get everyone to “sign in” before proceeding. The one that homed in on me was dedicated to completing her task to the point of being offensive.
The little sign-in sheets invite you to “join one or more of the Coalitions to support Scott Brown”. Here are the options, in the order offered. I can only guess that many listed were for show – a nod to needing to look diverse: Veterans, Women, Democrats, Independents, Conservatives, Students/Youth, African Americans, Hispanics, Sportsmen, Attorneys, Catholics, Jewish, Small Business Leaders, Elected Officials, Union Members
As usual for this kind of event, supporters were placed on risers behind Brown on stage. The staff carefully arranged the only black person (a little girl with a white parent/guardian) and the only Asian person in the room in the front row on stage so when the cameras were on Brown, they would show how “diverse” his support is. Worcester is 30% not-white, but everyone in that room was as white as I was except for those two brown people. White and middle-aged. I blended right in.
You can see the African-American girl in this picture immediately behind and to the right of Brown. The Asian woman is further right, wearing a red top and black skirt. They can be more clearly seen in this video.
Also amusing was watching the staff hand out “home-made signs” for people to wave. What you want to bet that if you look at pictures from his recent public rah-rah events, you’ll see the exact same signs made of white poster board?
The event started with one of his daughters leading us in the National Anthem a cappella, then his wife gave a short speech that included little “He’s got my vote but I made him work for it” type jokes. Standard fare.
I’ve seen press reports that Brown’s speech was fiery, but honestly I was distracted by his constantly breaking character during pauses in serious parts of the speech to smile and wave at people in the balcony. Something that did cut through the fog though was the inanity of this statement he made: “The reason the government has lost all credibility in stopping illegal immigration is because of the magnets we create like in-state tuition breaks that bring more people here in violation of the law.”
The hall was pretty full but I wouldn’t call it packed. And although the crowd of course loved him, there wasn’t the kind of electric energy in the room I’d expect from a campaign kick-off. He’s definitely still got supporters, but if this crowd was representative, I’d say this supporters aren’t as fired up as maybe they once were.
He is really good looking though. No doubt about it.
Cross-posted at Pam’s House Blend.
of Brown’s monologue echoing through the empty streets! I could almost taste the Victory Gin in all of its oily goodness when I read it…
Brown talks about the power of being the 41st, or 60th, deciding vote in the senate. It would be interesting to know more about what those votes he made were. As a candidate he’s complaining about super PACs. In an article about Super PACs in the January 20th Globe, we learn that in 2010, legislation to require more transparency from Super Pacs failed to advance by one vote. Guess whose vote that was? There’s not too much a candidate can do about this problem, but congress has tried, and Scott Brown is a senator who voted against a proposed solution. (S 3628, September 2010.) This bill “lost” with 59 yea votes. Senator Brown could have been the one more vote needed to advance this legislation, but instead he voted nay. Is this one of the deciding votes he was touting at his reelection kickoff event?
To my recollection he didn’t get specific during the speech about his “60th” votes. But something I found interesting was that although he was one of the few senate Republicans to vote for DADT repeal, and although he talked about his military service and venerated veterans in his speech, he didn’t mention his recent vote for open service. This despite that fact that DADT repeal was supported by a majority of Republican voters. He talks a great line about being independent of the party line, but I think he’s actually afraid to admit when he’s strayed from the party line even when the vote he took was popular with voters.
is that he has always been a reliable yea for the party leadership’s positions. The cases in which he cast votes “proving his independence from strict party allegiance”, are often ones in which the outcome was already known and his vote was “released” so he could show a contrary vote as a record builder for independence. In other words, those votes were for show.
When the GOP could control their caucus in the legislature, the preferred mode of operation was to count the votes that they had and then allocate the ones the didn’t need to members who would benefit with their constituents if they ‘took a stand’. That is to say, taking a stand is ok as long as it doesn’t matter. Not just ok, but preferred as long as it doesn’t matter.
This is why I can’t support a GOPer even if I like them. The party will never let him or her matter on the things that might attract me to them.
More here.
I’ve been agahst at Scott Brown’s political tradecraft as demonstrated at this announcement rally in Worcester. He cannot stay on message, or rather his message contorts itself.
I watched as WBZ televised a portion of the speech live. As noted in the Brown press released posted here, the Senator said,
Right. No “us.” No “them.” Just “We the People.” Leave the divisiveness to Elizabeth Warren, he was saying.
So then the camera at WBZ pulled back to swing over to the station’s reporter for a live analysis. And what did the camera show us as it pulled back?
A sign on Brown’s podium reading, “Scott Brown. He’s for us.”
And a banner saying the same thing.
No “We the People” in sight.
So who’s sowing the seeds of division here?
Did the speechwriters speak with the sign makers?
It’s a revealing chink in the re-election campaign of Scott Brown.
I couldn’t stomach more than two minutes of the video of his “I’ve got the odds and the establishment against me. boo hoo schtick but I couldn’t last more than thirty seconds of his wife bringing up the book, the abuse and then trying to tell me he’s gone hungry and jobless for extended periods of time. blech. Cry me a river whydoncha….
I think he wants to lose so he can retire to a comfortably well appointed, but suitably bitter, victimhood at some wingnut welfare think tank…
The stories from his book are out there and there is likely no one who does not recognize that his childhood was pretty hard. It is also pretty clear that he was helped by many of the same programs he now votes against.
Though it says something that Brown survived his childhood, the fact is it also shows the community did a huge amount to help him do so. It is clear that the schools he attended gave him a good enough education that he was able to get into a pretty exclusive undergraduate college – on scholarships. It also, from his own stories, provided him a huge amount of support and guidance from caring teachers and coaches. (He was already a Tufts graduate and in Boston College Law School when he posed for his famous Cosmo photo. )