By electing Scott Brown to be Ted Kennedy’s replacement as U.S. Senator from Massachusetts, the voters have given President Obama a wake up call on the one year anniversary of his inauguration. Pundits may write their perception of what is going on in the political sphere, and pollsters may help us to understand and predict where the voters stand, but the election of Scott Brown is a crystal clear statement that the people of Massachusetts are frustrated and angry with the current administration.
There is no margin for error here; the Republicans had not had a Senator from Massachusetts since 1978. After having lost the Governor’s races in New Jersey and Virginia, the Democrats stand 0-3 in important campaigns since Obama’s taking office and have lost their filibuster-proof 60 seats in the Senate.
Explanations abound for the Boston Massacre. The Democratic candidate was wooden and ran a lacklustre campaign; Obama waited until the last minute to help; the issues were mostly local and the election was not a referendum on national health care; the party in power always suffers when the economy is bad and the Democrats inherited the errors of the Bush policies…
Three things are obvious: 1) Health reform is in trouble. Brown ran against health reform and the loss of the magic 60th seat places any bill in trouble. 2) Democrats are properly worried that the November 2010 elections will be catastrophic. The President is already weakened, and the Democrats chances of keeping control of both houses have diminished. 3) President Obama will have to focus on domestic issues between now and November.
Afghanistan, Haiti, Yemen, nuclear disarmament and anything dealing with foreign policy will have to take a back seat since he must consolidate his base while overcoming a serious enthusiasm gap. If he doesn’t, he will be a lame duck President after only one year.
The people of Massachusetts have spoken. I am sure President Obama’s political advisors are working overtime on new strategies. I wonder how political advisors in Moscow, Beijing and around the world are calculating their strategies based on the Massachusetts results.
