On Friday I observed:
What is actually more interesting is that the Tea Party and their allies seem to have learned from NY23, because it could be argued that Republican Scott Brown is a RINO by Tea Party standards, yet they have decided that maybe winning is more important than ideological purity (which was not the approach in NY23).
In regards to Brown’s ideological positions, Boris Shor of the University of Chicago provides some empirical evidence:
I can estimate Brown’s ideological score very precisely. It turns out that his score is –0.17, compared with her score of 0.02. Liberals have lower scores; conservatives higher ones.
Brown’s score puts him at the 34th percentile of his party in Massachusetts over the 1995-2006 time period. In other words, two thirds of other Massachusetts Republican state legislators were more conservative than he was. This is evidence for my claim that he’s a liberal even in his own party. What’s remarkable about this is the fact that Massachusetts Republicans are the most, or nearly the most, liberal Republicans in the entire country!
This is interesting and it stands to reason, at least in terms of how a Republican could be competitive in Massachusetts.
It also makes perfect political sense that persons opposed to health care reform would throw their lot in with Brown (and heavily). Indeed, if the Republican Party in general wants to grow (and do things like control the House and/or the Senate again), it will have to embrace candidates like Brown (especially in New England). The irony is, of course, that a lot of actors who are vociferously supporting Brown at the moment have also spoken in the past about wanting to drum RINOs out of the party, including New England Republicans (like Snowe and Collins) out of the party (and were more than happy to see Arlen Specter go).
January 17th, 2024 at 4:22 pm
I have a better idea. Rather then take the short term approach and electing people who don’t get it, how about teaching the people in New England why they have been wrong all these years and why they should elect conservatives instead of liberals? If we keep electing the same type of morons in the name of “running somebody who can win,” people who have nearly bankrupted this country, then we will stay on the path to bankruptcy and financial collapse.
January 17th, 2024 at 4:43 pm
Dan,
Is it not possible that, for any number of reasons, that the people of Massachusetts have an honest set of preferences for more liberal politicians (just as, say, folks in Utah have honest policy preferences for more conservative politicians?).
January 18th, 2024 at 8:03 pm
Is it not possible that sixty years of social/financial experiments have shown that at least some portion of liberal policies lead to bankrupt states (California, New York, Michigan, etc.)?
I’m perfectly fine to allow that people in San Francisco and the Bay Area have shown their preferences for high taxes, massive corruption, and no discernible benefits (other than trolleys). I’m also perfectly fine with California’s upcoming series of municipal bankruptcies. I’m not fine with the Feds stepping in to “save” a system that is based on multiple logical fallacies and which cannot ever work. And I would second the notion that Massachusetts needs education more than it needs Rockefeller Republicans and a federal bailout.
There was a time I favored keeping Social Security and Medicare solvent. I’m no longer convinced that’s a good idea. Especially if some of the revenue generating ideas floated recently are the only way to do it ($90 billion tax on banks without a clue of where the banks will get the money — hint: higher banking fees — and requiring some portion of 401(k) contributions go to annuities, which are generally backed by Treasury Bills, which would guarantee the Feds’ ability to borrow money after teh Chinese get cold feet).
January 18th, 2024 at 8:24 pm
I suspect that every voter in the land could use additional knowledge and education, although some more than others. Nevertheless, I find the blanket notion that if people only thought “the right way” that all these problems would be solved is not only rather simplistic, but honestly a bit offensive (even if, by the way, I hardly count myself as ideologically simpatico with the median voter in Massachusetts).
That having been said, I am unaware of any place that is a perfect model for public policy success at the moment (or, really, ever). I live in one of the lowest tax (and most conservative) states in the country and it isn’t exactly a policy paradise, let me tell you.
I would note that you have thrown an awful lot out in your comment, much of which is vague and rather difficult to directly address. For example, yes I am opposed to an awful lot of what has passed for governance in California for a long time (I lived there for a while, and still have significance connections to the state). Perhaps it can all be blamed on liberals and lack of adequate political education, but then again, perhaps it is more complicated than that (I would go with the latter, by the way).
Back to my basic point, and why I really thought that Dan’s point was a non sequitur (or perhaps just a fantasy): one may want everyone to think a certain way, but the bottom line is that they don’t (and they won’t) and wishing it were so is a pointless exercise. Beyond that, and to the point of the post which was pretty straightforward: the only way a Republican can win in Mass is to be a liberalish one. Further I was arguing (perhaps unclearly) that the notion that the Republicans are ever going to be both an rigidly doctrinaire conservative party and a majority force is a rather fanciful one.
January 20th, 2024 at 6:16 pm
[...] race in Florida). Interestingly, the Tea Party types became more willing to endorse a RINOesque candidate (so to speak) in the Brown-Coakley race, so perhaps that is an evolving [...]