According to Rasmussen, here are the reasons of the vote

[Mass]

http://www.rasmussenreports.com/public_content/politics/elections2/election_2010/election_2010_senate_elections/massachusetts/brown_wins_stunning_victory_in_massachusetts

78% of Brown voters Strongly Oppose the health care legislation before Congress.

· 52% of Coakley supporters Strongly Favor the health care plan. Another 41% Somewhat Favor the legislation.

· 61% of Brown voters say deficit reduction is more important than health care reform.

· 46% of Coakley voters say health care legislation more important than deficit reduction.

· 86% of Coakley voters say it’s better to pass the bill before Congress rather than nothing at all.

· 88% of Brown voters say it’s better to pass nothing at all.

Now, they dont ask why they oppose the healthcare reform, but my guess would be that it is perceived cost.

How the vote went (which correspond to what the map of results shows)- Now, this is not an exit poll, but the revenue issues correspond to the repartition of votes. It was already striking when the results came.

* Brown leads among middle-income voters ($40,000 to $100,000).
* Coakley leads among those at upper and lower end of income range.

[Blaukraut]

1. Yup, because they listened to Howie Carr, Severin, et al

about how Obama and the Dems are going to spend us into oblivion, blah blah. That shows that the repub propaganda is working.

[TayTay]

2. Government involvement

Most people do NOT want a heavy government hand on their health care.

On the surface.

Unless it's Medicare, which is so successful that it is not perceived as a govt program.

Go figure, but true.

[beachmom]

7. Sorry but that is illogical. Mass. has the plan that is before Congress already.

They already have it. I am going to put out there what really happened:

Angry white males showed up to vote. All other demographics showed up in lower numbers.

Angry white males always screw over everyone else, and the only way to stop them is for everyone else to show up.

The only time things changed was in 2008 when Barack Obama inspired an incredible swell of African Americans and other minorities plus young people out to vote. Normally, they don't turn out in those kinds of numbers.

How can Mass. voters be opposed to a health care bill which mirrors their own health care system? They are white males listening to sports and talk radio.

Coakley failed to inspire people out to vote. If Dems want to do well in '10 and beyond, it is their job to get THEIR people out to vote. And I don't mean base Democratic voters as much as I mean the broad Obama coalition built in 2008. That coalition could still have whipped Brown in this election. But they didn't vote either due to complacency, lack of enthusiasm for Coakley OR (the unthinkable), they didn't even know there was an important election.

[TayTay]

9. They can be opposed to it because it doesn't do anything for them

The national health care plan is LESS generous than what we already have. Brown noted that.

Make no mistake about it, this was an angry vote. Change elections on the Repub side are almost always negative votes. They are about money, rage and a "screw you" attitude. This is what happened in MA, as I have said before.

Obama's voters didn't show up. We never made the case to those voters that there was a reason for them to do so.

This race was lost in the week after Christmas. It was lost when the Democrats gave up. There is a lesson in there. The angry white guys are always there. They don't always win because they don't always form coalitions with the independents. This is what happened.

Blame them all you want, but it does no good.

[cadmium]

36. I agree. There is the added

ingredient of excitement in young people and Browns media connections. Brown's daughter is a big local media star as a singer (American Idol) and as a starting basketball player with Boston College. His wife Gail Huff has been a well liked and respected news anchor in Boston for 10-15 yrs. All the demographic "white knight" ingredients combined with total dominance of Brown support in ALL CORNERS of Boston media, plus the intense Republican ground game was pretty hard to beat. I was surprised that the result was so close.

[Luftmensch067]

38. Wow, good points! n/t

[Noisy Democrat]

3. Interesting "insider politics" diary on DKos

I'd be curious to hear what Tay and any other long-time Bay Staters think of this. I'm too much of a newbie to know, but it does kinda sound like the Massachusetts I've come to know so far.

http://www.dailykos.com/story/2010/1/19/827160/-My-Mom-is-a-Democratic-machine-operative-in-Bostonheres-her-explanation

[sandnsea]

4. Very interesting

Tay said the other day that there was a lot of inside Mass unrest involved. She didn't say anything like this, that I recall. It's hard for me to believe they'd lose this seat over insider power.

[wisteria]

5. It may explain one aspect of this loss. n/t

[Mass]

6. I think part of it is true, but it would be dramatic is the party ignored the full message.

Her campaigning skills, party infighting, and party corruption have to do with her defeat, but looking at a map will also tell you that the middle class is very frightened and was totally ignored. And people said loud and clear why: jobs and taxes (we have healthcare, why should we pay for the rest of the country's healthcare was kind of prevalent in a population who is already suffering).

Looking at a result map is very frightening, but also very instructive, and I am sure that looking at a precinct map will be as well.

[rox63]

8. This sounds entirely possible

It's exactly the way Mass politics works.

[TayTay]

10. Ahm, this is what I said last weekend

"There is no deeper national implication. This is not a death knell for the Democratic party or Obama. This is a story of a domestic spat between "parochial divisions" in Massachsetts."

I have seen this movie before. I have no idea how many times I have written that this was also a family-fight in MA. I have spent years trying to explain what goes on in Massachusetts.

"There really are two parties in MA, the Democratic Party and the Democratic Party."

Believe it or not, one Dem Party smacked the other down yesterday. This means a town/gown fight, a rich/poor fight and a deep desire to punish people who seem out of touch. This is an ongoing thread in MA history. (The American Revolution itself in MA had elements of this. The Know-nothings movement in 1850 MA had elements of this. Ed King's truly ugly win in 1978 for MA Gov had massive elements of this and that race is eerily similar to what happened yesterday.)

There were also elements of suburbs versus city. Western MA versus inside Rt 128. Yup, all of that is in there. (What part of this have I not spent years talking about?

Sometimes we lose a house in a bad storm. The winds and waves blow down the structure. At first we mourn it's passing. Then we remember that the structure was rotting and ripe to fall and we ignored that for years and years. We can either leave the rotting pile there or rebuild on a more solid foundation with new strong walls and new strong materials. It's up to us what we do with this opportunity.

[MonteLukast]

11. That's a very mature perspective...

... and it gives me some needed grit, without which I couldn't deal with this at all. Thank you TayTay.

[TayTay]

12. Hon, we are all in this together

VENT THE ANGER. Get it out there. Acknowledge it, rant against it, let 'er rip. Feel it, goddamn it, feel it. There is zero wrong with feeling anger over this election. Hell, it is the correct response.

There is something deeply wrong with those who will use this loss as an excuse to retreat into doing nothing. I have to battle those folks at home. You guys battle those folks in your areas and states all the time too.

Sometimes it sucks to be me. This is one of those times. Boo hoo, feel sorry for me. Or don't because I have the will and desire to fight back. And we will fight back. The fight to take that seat back from that teabagging fraud starts today. That is my task. I accept it. And anger is my friend in that respect. I will use the gift of this anger well, I promise you that.

[YvonneCa]

13. Tay...question for you and...

...others here with WAY more political experience and knowledge than me:

What kind of NATIONAL leadership do we need going forward on this? How should/could President Obama and other prominant Democratic leaders (JK?) succeed in turning things around?

What I mean by that is that we don't debate the individual vs. community needs problem in a way that could unite us and provide solutions to some of our biggest problems (health care, immigration, education, etc.).

I have long felt that this country has a 'selfishness' problem. People only vote for what they personnally want and rarely consider their neighbor's plight. People haven't been able to use empathy in deciding how to vote.

I think empathy can be taught by our leaders. But HOW?

[ObamaKerryDem]

14. "I have long felt that this country has a 'selfishness' problem.

... People only vote for what they personnally want and rarely consider their neighbor's plight." EXACTLY. :(

[TayTay]

15. Democrats wake up everyday thinking about jobs

and housing and how hard this recession/depression has been on working people. Those folks who work hard should not have to worry that some banker is going to sell their future off.

We are The Party of The People. Dammit, be the Party of the People.

IT's not rocket science over here. Stop conceding the argument on national security to the Repubs. Stop letting the friggin bastids who screwed us over in the financial situation tell us what we did wrong. Call the friggin bastids who are fattening up on these bonuses out. Call them out!

And stop, for God's sake stop, with the bloodless policy discussions. I am a born wonk, but most people are not. They want to know that people wake up every day thinking about them and their problems. They want to know what people are doing to fix the horrible job market. They want to know that someone understands the despair involved in losing everything you ever worked for in your life and being powerless to stop it. Mr. President, spread your arms out and take these people on your back. They are the ones who need the help and the ones who will respond.

They need to know that someone gives a damn. Please, please, please Democrats, do this. Be the Party of The People. Or suffer the consequences.

[Luftmensch067]

16. THIS is the message that is being sent

No way as eloquently as you put it and with way too much anger and pettiness and bile, in my opinion, but this is what the People are saying, loud and clear!

[TayTay]

17. To be sure, in MA there is a Repub message that is about revenge

This is the State that gave the nation Grover Norquist. (I have warned about MA Repubs before, really I have. They are the most vile form of political life in the nation. Half a brain is indeed a very dangerous thing. Half a brain lashed to a selfish goal is scary.)

The Repubs in-state don't give a damn about anything but dumping Democrats. They are mean spirited people who care for nothing. Past anger change elections have spun themselves out without lasting effect because the MA Repubs can't produce. (Actually they can't produce, it is a logical impossibility. They are proposing things that they themselves oppose. We do come back to our senses here.)

[fedupinBushcountry]

18. Tay, you are spot on

if anything this election should fire Dems up, get off their duffs and stop trying to please a few and forgetting about the many.

[YvonneCa]

19. Oh, thank you, THANK YOU ! That was...

...cathartic! :7 I feel EXACTLY the same way. I enjoy the policy details...most of the time. (That's one reason I come here, to be with like-minded souls. :) ) But the majority of people I know don't take the time.

I would hope our leaders do both...because educating those who need to know the 'why' about policy is still important. But I agree with you that demonstrating empathy by being DEMOCRATS would be heaven.

Thank you for your answer. BTW,I'm really glad your mom is improving. :hug:

[Inuca]

20. Tay...

you are wonderful, you truly are.

[TayTay]

21. Ah, I have some great inspiration to work from

Wonderful, caring people who truly do give a damn.

How could I not be fired up? I "work" here with the best there is.

[Noisy Democrat]

28. Someone on DKos thought it was all about health care

He said he couldn't believe it mattered so much if Coakley only did 19 campaign events to Brown's 66. He asked, who votes based on how many campaign events there were? I wrote:

Have you ever been to Massachusetts?

People in Massachusetts absolutely do vote based on whether the person cares enough to be visible, to stand in the cold shaking hands with voters, to show up. And they vote based on whether people they respect and have known for years are behind the candidate.

I'm originally from California, then lived in Michigan before moving to Boston. Massachusetts is different. It would never in a million years occur to me to bitch because I've never seen Barbara Boxer in a Dunkin' Donuts in Silicon Valley. It never occurred to me to ask "How come I've never personally met Debbie Stabenow?" But Massachusetts is much smaller, and the people care much more passionately about the personal touch, and they get really, seriously cranky when they feel that politicians aren't personally accessible. John Kerry knocked himself out to meet and talk with people in the small towns of Massachusetts when he was up for reelection in 2008. He had to. That's how Massachusetts is.

If Coakley didn't bother to get out and shake hands, and the Powers That Be in the Boston area didn't pull out all the stops for her -- there goes the election. Not saying health care wasn't a factor too, but you really can't dismiss these other factors.

I think some people outside of MA have no idea.

BTW, then some guy posted that this was BS because he lived in Springfield for 3 years and JK only visited twice. I wrote --

I know that Kerry campaigned all over the state

because I was video-blogging a lot of it. I went to events everywhere, including Western MA, including Springfield. But the fact that you feel he hasn't been out there often enough just proves my point that MA voters notice and care about these things. If you ask a California voter whether Barbara Boxer or DiFi visits his part of the state much, he'll probably just say, "Huh? Never thought about it."

Anyone from CA or MI who cares to disagree with me, feel free. But this is my perception, after having lived 29 years in CA and 15 in MI, and not nearly as long as I still want/intend to in MA.

[TayTay]

29. Very true

We live in a geographically small state. We know our pols by their first names. Every knows who John is, who Barney is and who Niki is. Often times, first names are enough.

Scott Brown is still Scott Brown. Don't know if that will change or not. Too early to tell.

[Mass]

30. Very true. And it is true everywhere where distances make it easy to travel.

On an anecdotal view, President Jacques Chirac was very well known for winning votes just by shaking hands and kissing babies. It is not that he had anything to offer (same kind of phony RW populism we see here with Brown), but he was known as very accessible. He perfected his skills when he was running in my very rural part of France (think hilltowns or Berkshires), and was known to walk in suit and dressed shoes in the field, to shake hands with farmers, asking about their kids or any other recent event in their life. Of course, he had a local aide knowing everything about everybody that tipped him just before, but people liked he cared enough to ask. He won the presidency against a much more capable guy, but that was seen as aloof and inaccessible. These issues are not only in the US and MA.

As for people in Springfield, it is representative of how people feel, not only about Senator Kerry, but about any politicians at a statewide level: they come when they need to be elected, do their event, jump on route 90, and go back to Boston. This feeling has existed since I've known Springfield (23 years).

What is amazing is that there are still politicians who do not understand that campaigns can be won/lost in the Western part of the state. Deval Patrick got a lot of support seeming to care about the development of this part of the state, did not deliver (not entirely because of it), pretty much ignored the state recently, and lost a lot of support showing he was another Boston politician. O'Brien lost there because of that. Mitt Romney seemed to care. Clinton did several events there and it certainly helped her win the primary.

What is puzzling is that Coakley had the advantage in this part of the race: she was not born in Boston. She used it during the primary, and her biographical ad was well received in that part of the state, particularly given Capuano did not seem wanting to be bothered campaigning out of 495. And, in the general, she dropped totally the ball.

Let me add that I hope Dems in MA will react quickly and well, by communicating. I listened to selected pieces of Brown's press conference yesterday. Yes, he is an empty suit, but he can communicate and look like an average fellow very well. It always work.

[Luftmensch067]

31. It's interesting

Because isn't this how the Democratic Party grew in the first place? By being the party that listened to and helped immigrant communities and the poor? Seems to me we were the party of the people at one point and the GOP was clearly seen as the party of the bankers.

[Mass]

32. This is true, but if you look at the history of the populist movements among time,

there are often some aspects that are not nice to see. It is always easy to get people to see their neighbor of a different group as the ennemy, the one that takes your job, your money, rather than allying toward a common enemy. And, if you read the founding fathers writing, they fought against the tyranny of a king that witheld power from them, but many did not trust the people either and were afraid of the mob. It seems now, in the way the Democrats are behaving, that they went back to this feeling: listening and talking to Harvard rather than Lowell, for example.

It is fairly common to see populist movements go to the far rights. Fascism in Italy was initially a populist movement. Populism in the early 1900s had often a streak of racism and sexism (white men fighting for their jobs). ...

In periods where people are afraid of the future, they tend to get entrenched in their positions and to become tribal. It should be the role of their leaders to show that different groups have common interest. Let just say that our leaders have failed terribly in doing that, because they do not show concretely what a bill will bring to people.

[Blaukraut]

33. Republicans scared Dems away from populism

by accusing them of class warfare and running on it. Maybe Dems should turn the tables now.

[Luftmensch067]

34. That's kind of what I'm thinking

Basically we need to force them to own their actions. I know everyone here knows that already. Like JK, we have to call them out as the Roadblock, the Party of No, as hypocrites and liars. And keep talking about how they don't want real pocketbook gains for the poor and the middle class. We have at LEAST 8 years of Bush-Cheney as evidence.

[cadmium]

37. There is also Pop culture, TV and radio bias vs

local people who think for themselves.

[cadmium]

35. Metro Boston vs the rest of the State is

Always an issue. It was starkly obvious in the Weld - Silber race. In that race quite rightly the suburbs, western ma etc were concerned about Boston sucking more $$ and power from them.

There are a lot of local factors. Beachmom is right about demographics and enthusiasm. People right about Coakley campaigns sluggishness. There is some blame on issues especially health care--but I think that is exaggerated. I dont believe the polls that indicate health care was the driver behind how people voted.

I think the major factor was that the media wanted Scott Brown to win and therefore he won.

[fedupinBushcountry]

22. Interesting conversation

that one of my son's FB friends who is republican started, these are all young adults in mid 20's to about 30. http://www.facebook.com/home.php#/andrew.pascal?v=feed&story_fbid=288656940118&ref=nf My son is Danny he has the last response.

Then my son posted this on his page:

Maybe we should just split in to two countries. One where the rich get richer and the poor get poorer. One where the rich get poorer and the poor get richer. In the meantime, us in the middle class will continually get screwed either way. Just send us the bill.

[fedupinBushcountry]

23. Look at this poll

http://act.boldprogressives.org/cms/sign/mapollresults/

[YvonneCa]

24. Wow. Democrats need to be...

...DEMOCRATS. Thank you for this.

[Mass]

25. I saw that, and there is no doubt we lost votes to Brown because of that.

Two things:

1/ No way to know the percentage of Obama voters voting for Brown. Brown got the same vote than McCain, basically. Certainly, some Obama voters are part of that, but is it 3 % or 10 % is not knowable.

2/ There is no doubt that some Democrats stayed home because they did not feel that their interest are taken care home. Of course, the candidate and the state party could have done a much better job addressing this. The results in Boston, Worcester, Springfield, among others, show that (and the snow does not explain everything).

[Blaukraut]

26. But the first thing Obama does is .... go for more bipartisanship

He is incredibly tone deaf.

[ProSense]

27. 2008 v 2010

here