On the Next Right blog Patrick Ruffini makes the case that national Republicans should seriously contest the January 19 Massachusetts Senate race. It’s a strong case. Democratic nominee Attorney General Martha Coakley has none of Ted Kennedy’s magic and seems to be conducting a perfunctory campaign. Republican nominee state Senator Scott Brown is running TV ads. The current Democratic governor, Deval Patrick, has a dismal job rating. Barack Obama is not particularly popular in the state: he lost the Democratic primary (despite the endorsement of Ted Kennedy) to Hillary Clinton by a 56%-41% margin and carried only one of the 10 congressional districts (the one that includes Cambridge, natch). If you look at the town by town returns, Clinton ran very well in ethnic and working class areas. In the general election Obama actually ran behind the percentage of Bay Stater John Kerry. And Obama’s denunciation of Sergeant James Crowley undoubtedly did not play well in many of the areas where Obama did poorly in the primary; Massachusetts is still more town than gown.
Moreover, Massachusetts has been getting more like the nation as a whole in the past decade. Compare the national and Massachusetts Republican percentages for president in the last three elections.
2000 47.9 32.5 15.4
2004 50.7 36.8 13.9
2008 45.6 36.0 9.6
Ruffini’s point is that if national Republicans are prepared to contest at huge expense a months-long race in California (population 37 million), which Obama carried 61%-37%, they ought to be willing to contest at much less cost a three-weeks-long race in Massachsetts (population 6.6 million), which Obama carried 62%-36%. Sure, the chances of winning are well below 50%, but with Republicans and Independents enthusiastic and opposed to the Obama program and Democrats down in the dumps, those chances are significantly above zero. And the rewards of winning—reducing the number of Senate Democrats from 60 to 59—would be enormous. Even a close loss might have a jarring effect on congressional Democrats.
