Free Republic

Politics: With the Massachusetts Senate race in a dead heat, the Service Employees International Union makes a massive ad buy for a Democrat raising money from lobbyists. Sorry, Sen. Kerry, but the tea party's coming. Having received a tsunami warning, the purple shirts of the SEIU have sprung into action with a major ad buy trying to pull the Senate candidacy of Massachusetts Attorney General Martha Coakley from the jaws of defeat. The buy size of $685,000, extracted from the union dues of not-always-willing workers, is one of the biggest of the election. The ads note that Republican Scott Brown...

Following the MA Senate debate on Monday, Martha Coakley was off to Washington DC where a big fundraiser was being held for her. Per the Washington Examiner, "17 of the 22 names on the host committee are federally registered lobbyists. Fifteen of those 17 have big health care clients such as Pfizer, Merck, Amgen, Sanofi-Aventis, Eli Lilly, Novartis, Astra-Zeneca, Blue Cross/Blue Shield, Cigna, Humana, HealthSouth, and United Health among many others. In addition, among the other five hosts there are direction connections via marriage and/or direct professional ties to the health care industry." After the fundraising event, Coakley took two...

As you may have heard, a Dem staffer helping the Martha Coakley campaign was caught on video shoving a Weekly Standard reporter, prompting an explosion of outrage from national Republicans and the right-wing media, who alleged bullying and intimidation. Now the staffer, Michael Meehan, sends over a statement admitting error (though not conceding bullying) and saying he also apologized directly to the Standard reporter, John McCormack: