Scott Brown isn’t a very good senator but he is a very good candidate. That’s why liberals backing Elizabeth Warren should be very concerned—and why the Warren campaign needs a new strategy for defeating the only Massachusetts Republican in a federal or statewide office. Joan Vennochi, a veteran observer of Massachusetts politics, sounds the alarm:
Brown is strategically choosing issues that repackage him as the independent voice he claimed to be when he ran for the late Ted Kennedy’s Senate seat. That’s politics, and he’s good at it….
When Brown sent congratulatory notes to honor roll students, Democratic consultant Steve McMahon told the Boston Herald, “A cynic would say he’s politicking on the taxpayer’s dime, a staffer would say it’s a good constituent service, and a voter is likely to say, `What’s the difference?’ ” Democrats might, instead, ask: “Why didn’t Elizabeth Warren think of that?”
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Warren is not known as the candidate who reaches out to average people. Instead, she’s known as the candidate preferred by Barbra Streisand, Cher, and the local liberal elite.
Liberal candidates don’t win statewide office in Massachusetts unless they can win big—and win big—among two key constituencies: suburban women and urban residents. Right now, Warren has only a slim lead (46-42 according to a recent poll) with female voters. Meanwhile, the New England equivalent of Southern good ol’ boys who control most city halls (e.g., Boston’s Mayor Tom Menino) are noticeably distancing themselves from Warren’s campaign, and signaling that Scott Brown is okay with them.
The sooner Warren’s campaign and her allies recognize that they’re up against a Ronald Reagan-type candidate (not-too-bright, but genial and able to connect emotionally with voters, and hard to demonize), the better—both for Warren and for the Democrats’ chances of holding onto the Senate in November.