Voters desert President Barack Obama in Ted Kennedy seat
A Democratic stronghold is under threat and losing it could cost the president dear, writes Christina Lamb in Boston
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To lose Kennedy’s seat would be a humiliating end to Obama’s first year in power, particularly as Kennedy was one of the first senior Democrats to endorse him for president. Not only would it be an ominous sign for the mid-term elections later this year but it would lose the Democrats their supermajority in the Senate, robbing them of their ability to sidestep Republican filibusters, and derail healthcare reform.
Bill Clinton, the former president, flew in for a rally last Friday even though, as a United Nations special envoy for Haiti, he had not slept for three days. “I came here to tell the people of Massachusetts that this country’s revolution was born in Massachusetts against those who abused power ... do you now want to put Massachusetts on the side of the power abusers?” Clinton said.
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Most alarmingly for the Democrats, the main plank on which Brown has campaigned is Obama’s healthcare plan, which he says will mean Massachusetts subsidising states such as Nebraska. He has kept quiet on issues such as his opposition to same-sex marriage.
“People who I never in a million years thought would have voted Republican are going to him,” said Rhonda Serre, a mother of two who has lost her job but still supports the Democrats. On Friday Brown was joined by Rudy Giuliani, the former mayor of New York. “This election will send a signal and a very dramatic one,” Giuliani said. “Believe me, the Democrats are frightened.”
Most analysts still believe the Democrats can win. But even a narrow defeat will be portrayed as a victory by the Republicans. Brown’s Senate campaign is already being studied by party strategists as a model. “He’s making healthcare a front-and-centre issue in the most liberal state in the country and it’s working for him,” said Whit Ayres, co-founder of Resurgent Republic, a group of conservative strategists.
“It’s the albatross around the Democrats’ necks.”
timesonline.co.uk |
