Free Republic

Martha Coakley’s campaign had originally planned on spending less money in the general election against Scott Brown than it had spent winning the Democratic primary, its chief strategist said in an interview today. Many people had expected the four-way primary to be tougher than the general election against Mr. Brown, a little-known Republican state senator. So the Coakley campaign, which spent roughly $5 million to win the Democratic nomination, entered the general election with only about $450,000 left and plans to spend only about $1.8 million against Mr. Brown in the final stretch, which was less than two months long....

Politics aside, you can count Google as a clear supporter of at least one aspect of Republican Senate candidate Scott Brown’s campaign — the use of online media. “He has definitely run a model campaign,” Google spokesman Galen Panger said in an interview with Digits. “He has really adopted every single tool in the Google arsenal.” There’s been a lot of news out today about how Mr. Brown has used social networking tools to help his campaign against Democrat Martha Coakley for a crucial Senate seat in Massachusetts. But amid all the talk of Twitter and Facebook, a slightly less...

BOSTON--Election Day dawned in Massachusetts with temperatures at freezing and light snow falling across much of the commonwealth. Predictions called for the snow to continue intermittently and mix with rain as temperatures rose, creating what weather forecasters called "a mushy inch or two." The worse the weather, the larger the question of voter motivation looms over the race for a successor to Ted Kennedy in the United States Senate. Democrats are trying to motivate a base of loyal voters alerted--by sinking polls and the 11th hour visit of President Obama on Sunday--to the possible loss of what was widely regarded...

“As expected, Coakley wins the Senate seat by more than 10%.” That would have paraphrased the lead paragraph of most Wednesday post-election news stories about the Massachusetts Senate election to permanently replace Ted Kennedy. Boring. Why not make it fun, a close race, a man-bites-dog story? Not a problem when you have fraudulent Rasmussen polling to stir the pot, and the usual collection of idiot news anchors and political commentators. This is a good test of my thinking. Am I looking at politics and thinking about this election rationally, or am I just being an optimist, hoping that voters are...

First is this poll, which I hope has a 0% margin for error (though we know it doesn’t) Better yet is this response, and I have to ask, is that really your answer to the question???? Read the transcript here…. And just in case you were wondering about ‘qualifications’ or resume and achievements…. Read up.

Scott Brown has surged at just the right time, the latest polling from Massachusetts reveals. Brown was once thought by many pundits as nothing more than a speed bump on the way to the coronation of the "US Senator from Massachusetts, Martha Coakley" for the seat vacated when Edward Kennedy passed away. However, with only hours left in the race, it is hard to find a Massachusetts senate poll with any good news for Coakley and the headlines are stunning. "New poll: Martha Coakley in freefall," reports Politico. If the numbers they have are even close to being the correct...

Click on the above link

One more for you: A new InsiderAdvantage poll conducted exclusively for POLITICO shows Republican Scott Brown surging to a 9-point advantage over Martha Coakley a day before Massachusetts voters trek to the ballot box to choose a new senator. According to the survey conducted Sunday evening, Brown leads the Democratic attorney general 52 percent to 43 percent. "I actually think the bottom is falling out," said InsiderAdvantage CEO Matt Towery, referring to Coakley's fall in the polls over the past 10 days. "I think that this candidate is in freefall. Clearly this race is imploding for her."

It’s looking up again today for Scott Brown, the Republican candidate in the closely fought special election for the U.S. Senate in Massachusetts. A day before Bay State voters go to the polls — and a day after President Barack Obama headlined a Boston rally for Democratic candidate Martha Coakley — political analyst Stuart Rothenberg switched his rating of the race to “Lean Takeover” from a “Toss Up.” Until two weeks ago, Coakley, the state’s attorney general, was expected to easily defeat Brown, a state senator, in the special election for the seat held by the late Sen. Edward Kennedy....

I can't believe I haven't figured this out yet. The closeness of the race in Massachusetts is not just a function of the dreadful Martha Coakley and right-wing hostility to health insurance reform. It's also about the Kennedys. This Senate seat was held warm for Ted decades ago, when he was parachuted in and stayed there for ever. Part of the revolt is based on the fact that Coakley seems to be the ultimate Kennedy clan crony, and was also plopped in by a tiny number of primary voters, and seems to imbue the arrogance of the Democratic party elite....

Late Friday night Pajamas Media posted a poll taken for PJM by CrossTarget in the Brown-Coakley race to fill the Massachusetts Senate seat of the late Edward Kennedy. The poll created some controversy because it was an outlier, the only public poll so far to show Brown ahead by double digits- 15%. It was even questioned on this site by the highly-respected polling expert Charlie Cook of the Cook Political Report. (Some private polling by the candidate evidently has had similar results, at least placing the lead in double-digits.) Polls are, of course, a snapshot in time. Much has happened…...

Boston Mayor Thomas Menino has told a largely black congregation that if Democrat Martha Coakley loses the U.S. Senate race in Massachusetts, it will be a victory for people who want President Barack Obama to fail. Coakley, who's Massachusetts' attorney general, is in a tight race against Republican Scott Brown. The special election Tuesday is being held to fill the seat left vacant by the death of U.S. Sen. Edward Kennedy. Menino appeared with Coakley at a Sunday morning prayer service in Boston's Dorchester neighborhood for victims of the Haiti earthquake. Coakley praised Obama for trying to lead the nation...

The impulse was so obvious that Republicans in Massachusetts wondered what took Democrats so long to indulge it. Everyone knew that Vicki Kennedy, the widow of late Senator Ted Kennedy, would eventually make a public pitch for Martha Coakley as the true, legitimate heir to the “Kennedy seat.” What no one could have predicted is that it would backfire (via Jules Crittenden): Big-name Kennedy endorsements for Martha Coakley appear to have been little help to the Democrat in the U.S. Senate race – and may have even hurt her with some voters, a new Suffolk University/7News poll shows. The late...

President Obama is steaming into the Bay State on a high-stakes mission to rescue Democrat Martha Coakley’s stranded Senate bid from a GOP wave that could sink his landmark health-care reform bill as well. “It’s white-knuckle time,” said Democratic operative Phil Johnston. “This is an election we have to win. It’s key to everything the Obama administration wants to do. The stakes are high.” A recent Suffolk University/7 News poll that showed Republican underdog Scott Brown pulling ahead in Tuesday’s election, combined with similar results in her internal polling, sent the already panicked Coakley campaign into a frenzy yesterday, according...

Yesterday, the President released an urgent message. Obama put out an S.O.S. message to liberals nationwide informing them that winning the Senate race in Massachusetts is absolutely critical to his government healthcare takeover and the rest of his “progressive” agenda. “By replacing Ted Kennedy with her Republican opponent, they’ll be in a position to tie up the Senate and prevent a vote on health insurance reform,” said Obama. Funny, that’s what I’ve been saying. It’s not often that I agree with the President, but on this I know he’s right. The entire nation is watching what happens four days from...

Reporting from Beacon Hill: Scott Brown is up by 4 points, 50-46, in the new Suffolk University poll. This is big, and the culmination of the hottest streak in Massachusetts since the Red Sox stole four straight from the Yankees in the 2004 ALCS. Brown is winning independents by a 35-point margin. And all of this comes from Suffolk, one of the best, if not the best, Bay State poll. Up here in Boston, the high fives are flying amongst conservatives. I just ran into Rob Eno, publisher of Red Mass Group. He tells me that the "momentum is with...

Political Insight and Analysis From The Wall Street Journal's Capital BureauPresident Barack Obama weighed in today on the surprisingly close special election contest to fill the seat of the late Sen. Edward Kennedy, saying in a video to supporters that the fate of his agenda rests on one vote, the new senator from Massachusetts. Democratic Senate candidate Martha Coakley shakes hands while visiting a senior center in Boston Wednesday. (AP Photo/Gretchen Ertl) Although the Democratic National Committee dispatched some former Obama campaign aides to Massachusetts and former President Bill Clinton is scheduled to join the Democratic candidate, Martha Coakley, on...

Organizing for America is blasting this video out to its Massachusetts list, recorded by the president on Martha Coakley's behalf.Obama frames it with a recognition of the incredibly high national stakes: "It's clear now that the outcome of these and other fights will probably rest on one vote in the U.S. Senate," he said, referring to battles over health care, financial reform, and climate change. "That's why what happens Tuesday in Massachusetts is so important."Coakley, he says, will be "your voice and my ally." Brown, who goes unnamed, is backed by "opponents of change."

Yep, it sure was a great idea for Martha Coakley to leave Massachusetts last night and come to Washington for a fund-raiser. I'm sure she needs money. But there are plenty of surrogates in Washington of all cities who could have spoken in her stead. It happens all the time here. So she leaves the state a week away from an election in which she's maybe just barely ahead, and which has a helluva lot more riding on it than the career of Martha Coakley, which few people beyond the Coakley household actually give a fig about. And what happens?...

"Climate Change is Brown"