Sen. Scott Brown (R-Mass.) took a break from obsessing over Elizabeth Warren's (D) American Indian heritage to release a new, positive campaign ad this week. You'll notice it makes no reference to Brown's party, and it doesn't mention the senator's record or position on any issue whatsoever.
The name of the spot is "Independent," a word that appears twice in the ad, along with Brown touting the benefits of "working together."
As vague, substantively-meaningless campaign commercials go, there's nothing especially offensive about the Republican senator's ad, but the timing of the spot could be better -- the release of Brown's ad coincided with an analysis that belies the senator's main argument.
Republican Senator Scott Brown touts his bipartisan voting record on the campaign trail, but a study published Monday by a progressive advocacy group makes the case that Brown has failed to reach across the aisle at key moments.
ProgressMass identified 53 bills that had the support of at least 50 senators but lacked the 60 needed to break Republican filibusters and bring the measures to up-or-down votes.
On these bills, the study found, Brown sided with his party 76 percent of the time.
Note that Brown has shifted as he became more nervous about his prospects -- the same analysis found that on 32 identified bills before Warren became a candidate, Brown voted with Republicans 30 times. As Warren's prospects improved, Brown's fealty to the GOP line waned. Imagine that.
Still, the larger point is hard to miss: Brown's rhetoric doesn't line up well with Brown's reality. On Capitol Hill, he's a fairly reliable partisan, siding with his fellow Republicans on key votes; in campaign ads, Brown's an "independent" voice, willing to "work together."
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Not quite the same stature as Richard Mourdock who promises, when elected senator from Indiana, to work together and accept compromises by democrats; as long as compromise is defined as democrats conceding 100% to what he wants. Probably not a whole lot of democrats ready to vote to abolish the EPA like Mourdock wants.
So ProgressMass, a progressive group cherry picks 53 liberal bills with a minimum 50 democrat senators and Brown voted with the dems 24% of the time opposed to his republican party - seems pretty independent to me. Nothing to see here, move along.
@Hank - that's "Democratic" senators. As for Brown, please re-read this again:
"ProgressMass identified 53 bills that had the support of at least 50 senators but lacked the 60 needed to break Republican filibusters and bring the measures to up-or-down votes."
That is not the same thing as voting with Democratic senators 24% of the time. That is voting a quarter of the time to simply allow a vote on a bill - I've got to say that again - that is voting only a quarter of the time to *not* filibuster a bill. Color me unimpressed with Brown's mavericky-ness.
He's a republican and did not vote with his party in lock step 24% of cherry picked 53 bills of a liberal group to get to this slanted! Are you so blind that you don't see how ProgressMass is manipulating the data to fit their message?
and since When did this Opinion page be so f'ing concerned about grammar and punctuation? Do you correct twitter, facebook or opinions of those who agree with your positions june?
@Hank - why wouldn't you want to know what the proper name of the Democratic Party is? Republicans have certainly succeeded in their effort to deteriorate "Democratic" into phrases like "the democrat party" and "democrat senators."
Voting to not filibuster a bill is not the same as voting for a bill. That's as concisely as I can put it.
Please send this man back to his modeling career!
Brown is an unimaginative Senator who tows the party line. Thanks for nothing Scott Brown.
Brown is trying to run away from his political party, but he won't succeed. When the campaigns get underway after Labor Day, Dems will insure he gets painted with the radical label like the rest of the Republicans based on his votes. All of these ads are merely skirmishes before the big battle when PAC money starts really spending for ads.