[UPDATE: This “story” is at the top of the Globe’s front page today (Thursday, January 3).]
Glen Johnson reports that, in a call to “Jim & Margery,” Ex-Senator-in 24-Hours Scott Brown said Massachusetts Democrats are “making it awfully tempting” for him to run for Senate again. “You got Ed Markey,” Brown continued. “Does he even live here any more? You’ve got to check the travel records. I’ve come back and forth…every weekend, almost, for three years, and I see, you know, most of the delegation, and I have never seen Ed on the airplane – ever.”
So the 2013 Scott Brown is not above negative campaigning either. This one ties into his, “I’m one of you, I’m an outsider” theme and paints Markey as the ultimate DC insider, to the point that he lives there full-time.
This issue has been raised before on BMG. Anyone think it has legs?
That argument has been tried before without much traction.
On the other hand, what’s Markey’s recognition outside his district? Has he even had a competitive race in the past 10 cycles? How much will this matter when Brown has excellent name recognition and has already been elected statewide?
his name is not to like, like, like him. He was well-liked in the last election and well-beaten. I like my next door neighbor that doesn’t mean I’d vote for him.
And when it comes time to raise money, will donors be coughing up $28 million to a guy who got his arse handed to him last time around? And how will said donors feel about supporting Brown knowing that if Markey loses, he’ll be going back to Congress? Markey represents some of the richest communities in the Commonwealth. It’s going to be interesting.
Brown’s only big advantage is the fact that this is a mid-term election.
and had already been elected statewide. How’d that work out for her?
when he was first polled up by 20 against Warren. : )
against an ineffectual candidate (Coakley), on the crest of a tea party wave that was just beginning to crash on shore. He was an unknown, and no votes could be stuck to him. Now, after a couple of years in the Senate, he has been shown to be a reliable vote for the Republican agenda. In the recent election, voters showed at the polls that they didn’t want HIM representing them in the Senate any longer, and elected Elizabeth Warren. I haven’t forgotten why I didn’t vote for him, and the circumstances a couple of months from now won’t have changed. He will still be a reliable vote for a Republican agenda, and that will still be unacceptable to me.
Yep – I thought the same thing this morning,as I drove to work. Good old Scotty, focusing on the silly stuff and ignoring the real issues. It didn’t work the last time, and probably won’t this time.
Glen Johnson (Politics Editor at boston.com and lead blogger for “Political Intelligence) ignores Brown’s embarrassing facebook and tweets falsely stating that Obama had sent over a new fiscal cliff proposal to Senate Republican leaders — a key development that nobody else had heard about.
But given the slightest opening to raise awareness of Brown’s criticism of a potential opponent and Johnson and the glob are all over it.
What the hell is it with those guys?
At least Brown has tipped his hand about another attack-based campaign.
HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA
Sounds like they are both in the same situation.
Negative works.
Most of Mass does not know Markey from Adam. Markey should not make the same slow motion mistake that Warren made with the Cherokee flap. He should hit back hard, and **definitively**. Otherwise he runs the risk of being defined by his opponent for those who do not live in his district.
Tit for tat is just what Brown’s writers are looking for.
Follow yourself into this wall…. Bam!
…until I saw Brown actually quoted saying that he has never seen Markey on a plane – seriously!?
between Boston and DC, doesn’t he? Or maybe not?
seen Ed Markey on a Boston to DC (Reagan) plane. Kennedy and Kerry were on the same plane. I shudder to think where we’d be if it had gone down. I followed Kennedy out to baggage claim where he met his staffer. Yeah, so that was awhile ago. But lots of people commute to work in DC from Boston. And in first class with special boarding it’s not too tough.
Why doesn’t he just call Markey a faux Indian and be done with it.
…I saw in December in Faneuil Hall? He looked remarkably like Congressman Markey!
Is it still true that Scott Brown has had exactly ZERO town halls while Senator?
Town Hall meeting on climate change in Arlington.
is just mad because he got beat up by a girl.
And Ol’ Etch-a-Sketch really only has one trick in the book. At least he’s telegraphing his kidney punches. Brown should have quite a resume of negative campaigning by the time the election arrives.
– Huffington Post, 1/2/13
Please proceed, Scotty.
That was a House race, where Markey had represented much of the district for decades and the opponent was unknown. A statewide special election against a much better-known guy who’s just leaving the Senate (today!!!!!) might be a different story. I wouldn’t assume it has no legs just because it didn’t work in the House race.
this is all that Brown could muster. It just makes him seem very small.
But what really struck me is that travel records is how he judges himself, not representing people who elected him. It’s sad that Brown didn’t hear that very loud voice rejecting him and his votes.
Didn’t seem to learn anything from his experience.
Sounds like he is egging to get the old job back rather than the safer path of running for Governor. I say-bring Em on!
Brown is just so manifestly unsuited for the job.
Now in the Senate he can serve as a reliable Republican vote with the same aplomb as any stuffed suit of clothing (and with better looks than most).
But being Governor is hard work, and the buck kind of stops in the corner office. He’d find the whole thing very unpleasant.
More to the point I just don’t see him as a credible candidate. What’s his rationale for running? What’s his campaign slogan, “I need a job?”
Scott Brown
The tall man who runs small campaigns.
In 2000, everyone in New York knew Hillary Clinton moved there for exactly one reason: To run for U.S. Senate. Republicans spent the entire campaign hammering her on it constantly. She beat Rick Lazio by 12 points.
Voters just want to know if you’re going to represent them well. They wouldn’t have cared if Ted Jr. moved from CT to run, and they sure as hell don’t care if Markey’s been in DC a lot while he’s been, y’know, representing them.
New York is a special case. The City and nearby suburbs are choc full of people who were born outside of New York. In the sense that we think of America as a nation of immigrants, New York is by and large a state of first-generation immigrants. I imagine California has a similar viewpoint, and perhaps Oregon, Washington, Florida, Northern Virginia, and Maryland do too. Perhaps to a lesser extent parts of North Carolina and Texas. Other states? I’m not so sure.
New York elected Hillary and RFK (who at least spent much of his childhood there), but Massachusetts is not New York. My view is that Ted Jr. “moving” from CT to run would have been disastrous. It would have been transparent and played into all the Kennedy entitlement resentment out there. He might be a very capable person but he’s never run for office and voters would see it as riding his father’s coattails.
Markey is a very different thing. He’s born and raised in Malden, and has been representing part of Massachusetts in the House for 36 years. He’s not a “carpetbagger” in any sense. I don’t think that voters care about the technicalities (e.g. Romney’s Utah tax returns), and you only have to “live” here on Election Day.
To me the bigger issue this raises is painting Markey as the consummate out-of-touch DC insider, to the point that he’s now 100% DC and 0% Malden, or something close to it.
Look at how much trouble life long MA native Coakley got
over calling Curt Schilling a Yankee fan. MA is by and large one of the most provincial and parochial places left in this country for good and for ill. It’s good we have preserved regional culture better than most places and have a lot of nifty local institutions, but its very unwelcoming to newcomers.
I assume that this will not be an issue raised by any other candidate for the Democratic nomination?
It very well could be, we are already seeing open season on Markey from
some of the Downing supporters here on BMG. I would hope considering the compressed timetable and ultimate goal of keeping this seat in Democratic hands that the Reagan rule does in fact rule and we avoid the circular firing squad of primaries past.
Just want to be sure when the point is a legitimate issue, as opposed to evidence of bad faith.
It’s a stupid non-issue when raised by Brown. Equally stupid when raised by a Democrat, if not more stupid in the context of the overall election. As for Scott Brown, there’s plenty of evidence of his bad faith on the campaign trail, as you yourself noted in 2012.
from flagging those things that political-party-supporters here can say with a straight face.
Brown mentions this, it is stupid and bad faith. Next month, once the gears get going, some other Democrat may notice that the presumptive nominee may not have lived much in the Commonwealth since the Ford Administration, and then it will be a Legitimate Question.
I therefore file this issue along with “judicial activism” and the Senate filibuster under “Positions Will Reverse As And When Expedient.”
I am sorely disappointed by the cynicism you display in comments like this. Most of your comments are so witty, insightful, and full of wisdom that it really does bring me up short when you run cynical rubbish like this up the flagpole.
I’m not sure I’ve heard ANY progressives or Democrats complain of “judicial activism” here. Similarly, the last time I remember any party using the filibuster was almost FIFTY YEARS AGO when racist Democrats tried to stop the Civil Rights bill — those Democrats were drummed out of the party, and became loyal (and racist) Republicans.
The filibuster abuse of the past two years is so far beyond ANYTHING that either party did in the past that to imply, as you do, that ending it is a hypocritical act of political expediency is egregiously mistaken — verging on dishonest.
Please share with me what Democratic behavior you claim is comparable to the GOP abuse of the filibuster during the past two years. Really, Dad, I’m serious.
WHAT are you THINKING of?
I will send you five bucks when anyone on here says it’s a “legitimate question.” It’s silly.
As for the filibuster, Tom is right. In 1993, when Clinton came to town, Bob Dole ramped up filibuster use dramatically. The Dems, when placed in the minority from 1995-2006, generally maintained that level (but not on Alito or Roberts). Then the Dems retook the Senate and every Congress since there have been twice as many filibusters as ever before.
My positions are clear and consistent:
Don’t abolish the filibuster, but make it a talking filibuster or some reform that precludes a minority of 41 is going to block a majority of 59 just by saying they want to.
Ed Markey’s residence is a non-issue.