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Warren in Coakley’s failed footsteps
Boston Herald ^ | 11/21/11 | Jennifer Braceras

Posted on 11/21/2011 10:39:40 AM PST by raccoonradio

The ad is a virtual portrait in sepia. It starts with photos from the candidate’s youth and highlights her working class roots and commitment to regular folk. It then contrasts her hometown values — honesty, responsibility — with the immoral values of self-interested Wall Street bankers. The candidate says she stood up to Wall Street and held big banks accountable.

The new Elizabeth Warren ad? No, a Martha Coakley ad from her failed 2010 Senate campaign against Republican Scott Brown.

Just photo-shop in a picture of Warren, and you will practically duplicate the ad that Warren released last week in her attempt to unseat Brown in 2012.

The Warren ad attempts to soften the Harvard professor’s image as a liberal elitist by portraying her as a folksy gal from working class roots who grew up to combat corporate greed.

The populist message didn’t work for Martha in 2010, and I doubt very much that it will work for Liz in 2012.

That is because, despite the claims of both women to speak for the middle class, both Coakley and Warren present as people who view themselves as better than the average voter.

Coakley famously looked down her nose at Brown for standing in the cold for hours as he shook hands with voters outside the NHL’s Winter Classic at Fenway Park [map].

Warren is unlikely to repeat such a dreadful mistake. Retail politics matter — that much she has learned.

But, like Coakley, Warren is prone to verbal missteps that demonstrate a cluelessness about the Massachusetts electorate.

Thus, Warren recently stated that Western Massachusetts is “not as landlocked as some parts of the state.” (Tell that to the folks in Westfield.)

And she famously bragged that she was going to capture the Massachusetts “hick” vote. (Putting aside the elitist nature of that comment, a real Bostonian would, of course, know that here in Massachusetts we don’t have hicks, we have “townies”.)

Perhaps even more damaging, Warren has allowed her campaign to drape itself in star power and to take on that aura of inevitability that voters clearly despised in 2010.

The early favorite of national Democrats, Warren used her Washington support to muscle out homegrown Democratic contenders and to raise gobs of money from Hollywood nobility like Danny DeVito and Barbra Streisand.

Yet, her sole credential to become U.S. senator is her 30-year career as a law professor. She has never run a business (at least not a business with any employees); she has never served in the military; she has never been elected to public office; and she is not even from Massachusetts.

But, say her friends, she is on the Harvard faculty! Yippee.

So what has she done other than teach and write books?

Well, she helped the Obama administration waste more taxpayer money by creating a new government agency — one that (surprise!) she was conveniently well-suited to lead.

When she was passed over for the post she created for herself, it only made sense that Warren would challenge Brown. (It is not many who, having sampled the appetizer of Washington power, can resist the call to dinner.)

Yet Warren’s friends insist that she is not an out-of-touch elitist. Really? Isn’t a Harvard faculty member and FOB (Friend of Babs) the very definition of elitist?

No doubt about it — Liz Warren is a smart lady. But brains aren’t always a sign of good judgment. And an office at Harvard Law School doesn’t guarantee that she won’t make the same mistakes as the last failed Democratic nominee for U.S. Senate.

Jennifer C. Braceras is a lawyer and political commentator.


TOPICS: Miscellaneous
KEYWORDS: elizabethwarren; scottbrown; senatema
Not into Scott Brown? You could always go for Dizzy Miss Lizzie, who originally hails from Oooooooooooooooooaklahoma where the wind goes sweepin' down the plains. So far nobody is primary-ing Brown. In late '09, he faced Jack E. Robinson, who managed to win one town (Heath) of the 351. Brown has a big warchest and is the most popular pol in the state. Good luck.

Sure he's a RINO but Brown is as good as we may get in this state. Any state that puts in Patrick, Kerry, Barney Frank, John Olver, John Tierney, etc. is going to be a bit to the left in every category anyway. We may have to take what we can. Or, as Judge Smails said to his grandson in Caddyshack, "You'll get nothing and like it!"

Or perhaps you'd like a Dem back in Kennedy's old seat. A moonbat to represent us term after term. Conservatives for Warren, unite.

1 posted on 11/21/2011 10:39:48 AM PST by raccoonradio
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To: raccoonradio
take note

>>So what has she done other than teach and write books? Well, she helped the Obama administration waste more taxpayer money by creating a new government agency — one that (surprise!) she was conveniently well-suited to lead. When she was passed over for the post she created for herself, it only made sense that Warren would challenge Brown.... Yet Warren’s friends insist that she is not an out-of-touch elitist. Really? Isn’t a Harvard faculty member and FOB (Friend of Babs) the very definition of elitist?

2 posted on 11/21/2011 10:40:48 AM PST by raccoonradio
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To: raccoonradio

One of my brother in laws is a devout liberal douche...On his Facebook wall he posted some Liz Warren diatribe about the concentration of wealth on Wall Street and it’s ability to buy political power. I replied that I backed her efforts and said she should go after this one family that made a fortune by manipulating the stock markets and then used that fortune to gain political power..In both the US Senate and the White House. She should really get after those Kennedy’s. He has since unfriended me...typical liberal baby...


3 posted on 11/21/2011 11:08:59 AM PST by Skip Ripley
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To: raccoonradio

I’ve threatened before to never vote for Brown again but what choice do I have?

I guess I’m going to have to vote for the lesser of two evils again.


4 posted on 11/21/2011 11:09:25 AM PST by donhunt (Certified and proud "Son of a Bitch".)
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To: raccoonradio

I still say she is gonna skate to victory over Scotty Brown.

Massachusetts is very, very blue. They are gonna eat up her class warfare rhetoric.


5 posted on 11/21/2011 11:14:40 AM PST by Buckeye McFrog
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To: Buckeye McFrog
I think you greatly misapprehend Massachusetts. A lot of the liberalism is from the HUGE education industry and all the out-of-state students who vote here. I think if you only included people who actually have lived here at least ten years we'd be WAY more conservative than New York or Wisconsin.
6 posted on 11/21/2011 12:02:15 PM PST by Lonesome in Massachussets (Ceterum autem censeo, Obama delenda est.)
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