Massachusetts Aftermath: ‘We the People’ and the Brown Revolution

22 Jan, 2010 by Robert Stacy McCain

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The Wall Street Journal reported today that Republican Scott Brown edged Martha Coakley among union rank-and-file in Tuesday’s Massachusetts Senate election. Why? I argue that it’s because liberals have ignored the pro-freedom message of the Tea Party movement:

But it’s not just Massachusetts, it’s everywhere nowadays. People are tired of the “insider consensus.” They’re tired of experts and intellectuals and politicians who don’t seem to understand: that “We The People” want meaningful input into the process of governance. . . .
My buddy Chris Cassone – the “Take Our Country Back” singer – was talking to one of his liberal musician friends. When Chris said he was performing at a Tea Party rally, the friend said dismissively, “Did those people ever figure out what they’re so: angry about?”
Of course, if you actually listen to Tea Party protesters, they’re quite specific about their grievances, especially the out-of-control deficit spending that is heaping debt on the heads of their children and grandchildren. . . .

Please: read the whole thing. It’s not just economic issues where liberals are out of touch with blue-collar voters. Martha Coakley’s adamant insistence on federally funded abortion — including partial-birth abortion — alienated lots of blue-collar Catholics I talked to last Sunday at St. Anthony of Padua Church in Fitchburg, Mass. And now, as Da Tech Guy reports, his hometown has become the frontline of a battle against federally-funded abortion provider Planned Parenthood:

Six members of the City Council voted Thursday to draft a resolution urging the Planned Parenthood League of Massachusetts to abandon its plan to locate in Fitchburg, after the organization announced plans to open an office on Main Street earlier this week. . . .
State Rep. Stephen DiNatale signed on to the late-filed petition calling for a resolution, and said he planned to sit down with Planned Parenthood officials and explain to them why Fitchburg is not the right community for them to come to. . . .
“We do not need them on Main Street,” DiNatale said.

There’s more background on that story, and keep in mind that Rep. DiNatale is a Democrat.: People are feeling empowered to speak out against this kind of abuse of taxpayers that: has become so commonplace during the Obama Age. Pundette notes how liberals are desperately trying to spin away the meaning of this election:

• The election of Brown had nothing to do with nationalizing healthcare, or anything at all to do with the Obama agenda. (NYT)
• Brown was elected to help Obama bring about Change (Donna Brazile on Nightline)
• A vote for Brown was a vote against stubborn Republican opposition to Change (Steny Hoyer)
• The people of Massachusetts wanted more Change! (Howard Dean)
• People are angry at Washington or something, but not at Obama (Gibbs & Axelrod)
• Coakley was the victim of residual but still incredibly potent anger at Bush (Barack Obama)

This spin is just so much whistling past the graveyard.: Adding the Massachusetts Senate campaign to the gubernatorial contests in Virginia and New Jersey, Democrats have now lost three consecutive statewide elections. There is a broad-based populist wave rolling through America,:  and Brown’s stunning victory in Massachusetts highlights the potential of this movement:

Like the 2004 Boston Red Sox who broke an eight-decade curse by winning the World Series, Brown’s victorious surge has inspired Republicans in Massachusetts and nationwide to believe that anything is possible. . . .
For weeks, Brown had described his quest to win this Senate seat — occupied by Ted Kennedy for more than four decades — as a battle against “the machine.” Tuesday night, he turned that phrase around, telling his supporters: “Tonight we have shown everyone — you are the machine!” . . .

This machine — a grassroots coalition broad enough to encompass even union rank-and-file and elected Democratic officials — has been disparaged by liberals and derided by the media: as “angry mobs,” “right-wing extremists” and “teabaggers.” In fact, it is the same powerful force describeed by the Founders in 1787 as “We The People.”

(Cross-posted at the Hot Air Greenroom.)