[Cross-posted from the ProgressMass blog. Like ProgressMass on Facebook and follow us on Twitter.]
Man, oh, man. Did Republican Scott Brown choose the wrong week to have one embarrassingly terrible news story after another, or what?!
The week led off with fundraising figures for July through September. Republican Scott Brown announced what could have been an impressive $7+ million total, if it wasn’t put right next to the $12+ million total of his Democratic opponent, Elizabeth Warren. Even with Wall Street & Big Business squarely behind Brown, with corporate PACs filling Brown’s campaign coffers, Brown couldn’t keep up. However, this was hardly the ignominy-of-the-week for Brown.
How last week unfolded for Republican Scott Brown could be pointed to, if Brown loses his re-election bid, as the week the wheels really began to come off. Literally every weekday featured a new embarrassment for Brown.
On Monday, both the Boston Globe and FactCheck.org (independently from one another) call out Republican Scott Brown’s attacks on Democrat Elizabeth Warren as dishonest. The Globe goes with the word “misleading” while FactCheck.org prefers the word “distortion.” Either way, a serious blow was dealt to the shaky credibility on which Brown rested his mudslinging.
On Tuesday, it was revealed that Republican Scott Brown’s organizers are paying homeless people $8 an hour to pose as “Obama Supporters for Brown.”
On Wednesday, Republican Scott Brown made an unforced error that will haunt him for some time. At a campaign stop in Taunton, Brown accused the mesothelioma victims’ family members who appeared in Democrat Elizabeth Warren’s campaign ads of being “paid actors.”
“A lot of them are paid,” Brown said. “We hear that maybe they pay actors.
The blowback from such heartless (and demonstrably false) comments was understandably immediate:
“What Scott Brown said today is so offensive to me and my family after what we went through,” Jackson said. “He’s sunk to a new low.” […]
“Let Scott Brown tell me to my face that I am nothing but a paid actor, and I’ll set him straight on what it was like to watch my father suffocate to death,” English said. […]
“To dismiss what my family went through by calling me a paid actor isn’t just disrespectful, but it’s cruel,” Yapp said. “He’s attacking people who lost loved ones to asbestos poisoning, just because we stepped forward to tell the truth about Elizabeth Warren. Sen. Brown showed his true colors today. He’s a politician who will say anything and attack anyone that gets in his way.”
Suffice it to say, by Wednesday night, Republican Scott Brown issued his forced apology.
On Thursday, Republican Scott Brown faced dual embarrassments. First, a supporter of Elizabeth Warren found herself as the unwitting “star” of one of Brown’s TV ads. The Warren supporter happened to have crossed paths with Brown earlier in the year; and, the Brown team used that moment of videotaped footage in their ad, presenting this Warren supporter as a supporter of Brown’s. The Brown campaign claims to be reaching out to the Warren supporter to resolve the complaint. We’ll see.
That wasn’t Thursday’s only embarrassment for Republican Scott Brown. You might recall from the debate in Springfield earlier this month that Brown presented his brief training visit to Afghanistan as having “served” in Afghanistan. You might also recall that Brown has pushed for the so-called “Stolen Valor” bill, to criminalize the act of lying about military awards or service for monetary or other benefit. Putting those two together, you might legitimately wonder if it’s hypocritical of Brown, who has promoted the “Stolen Valor” bill, to stretch the truth or otherwise misrepresent his visit to Afghanistan. If you wondered that, you wouldn’t be alone. On Thursday, the Boston Globe released an editorial calling Brown out for this very hypocrisy. But that’s not all. The veteran who inspired the Stolen Valor bill also called Brown’s claims “seriously misleading.” Ouch.
On Friday, we returned to the theme of campaign supporters appearing in TV ads. On Wednesday, Republican Scott Brown accused Warren’s supporters (whose family members died of mesothelioma) of being “paid actors;” and, on Thursday, it was revealed that Brown used a Warren supporter in his ad. Well, Brown may be wishing he used more paid actors or Warren supporters in his ads when it was revealed who Brown was using in his ads (warning: link contains offensive language).
Scott Brown Supporter From Ad Calls Elizabeth Warren ‘D*****bag,’ Obama A ‘Muslim’ On Facebook
[…] On one post made in August, well before Brown’s ad appeared, the worker, George Patriarca, calls Warren a “DOUCHEBAG.” On another he labels the president a “f*****,” and on a third he says, “there is a Muslim in the White House.” […]
“I attended Brandeis,” he says underneath one photo. “Jew U. Great school. the people, not so much. One thing I learned is that Jews have a persecution complex and they hate themselves. That is why I believe they vote for liberals.”
This is who Republican Scott Brown casts in his television ads to represent the people of Massachusetts.
Add it all up and it truly was an embarrassment-a-day for Republican Scott Brown last week, with less than a month to go until Election Day.
Elsewhere, don’t miss these other Must-Reads on Republican Scott Brown from last week:
· The Human Rights Campaign released its scorecard for members of Congress on LGBT rights. Massachusetts’ Congressional delegation all scored high marks, except for Republican Scott Brown’s failing grade.
· A scathing column in Go Local Worcester reminds us that, on women’s issues, Republican Scott Brown is “all talk.”
· The MetroWest Daily News released an editorial pointing to Republican Scott Brown’s relationship with the co-owners of the compounding pharmacy reportedly responsible for the meningitis outbreak as a glowing example of “campaign cash taint[ing] regulatory decisions.”
What embarrassments does Republican Scott Brown have in store for us this week? Stay tuned for the next “Weekly Scott Brown-d Up” to find out!
While canvassing this weekend I was chatting with a couple BU students who told me that EW had lots of volunteers on campus but Scott Brown was paying students to canvass.
and
Check out this paragraph from Brown website:
1979:
Impressed by their response and rescue efforts during the Blizzard of 1978, Scott soon joins the Massachusetts Army National Guard. Thirty two years later, he is still serving today as a Colonel. During the summer of 2011, Brown completed his annual training in Afghanistan, where he was privileged to serve with fellow Guardsmen on the front lines.
the Maginot line? 🙂