Cape Cod Times My View
"When I consider how my light is spent" was the
opening line of "On His Blindness" by the poet John Milton. That
introductory line speaks profoundly to me today politically as I
consider the light and dark political theater that blunts our lives
daily. It metaphorically represents the fall from grace that
Massachusetts has experienced under Sen. Scott Brown. Brown appears to
be a nice man, but vacuous and with no social conscience at all, a stark
reality from the passion of the late Sen. Ted Kennedy.
The box score on the last Senate election is now in. It is Karl Rove's Republican conspiracy, 1/Massachusetts, 0.
There was never a doubt about Kennedy's love
for our state; his intelligence; his dedication to social welfare; or
his willingness to confront adversaries. The enigmatic quality of his
personal life, however, periodically created a long-term and seemingly
inexhaustible supply of ammunition for his critics to gleefully attack
him for decades.
We watched the highlights of
his career and the morbid pressures of losing two brothers to assassins.
We remembered Chappaquiddick and we remember the trembling eulogies for
his assassinated brothers. We remember his sailing off Cape Cod and we
remembered his stirring speech at the Democratic convention in the '70s.
We remember the good times and the bad times.
So
what do we have now in our "blue" state? An imposter, perhaps? Scott
Brown, a decent guy to have a beer with, watch a Sox or Patriots game
with? Maybe. But he is a senator who is apparently delusional, if his
misquotes about frequently meeting with "kings and queens" and his
self-reporting of how the sitting president and the secretary of state
frequently seek him out for votes are true. He's a junior senator, for
heaven's sake, catapulted into certain committees by Karl Rove to give
the former Cosmopolitan nude male model some gravitas.
His
home life is peachy, according to the TV spots that Karl Rove's PACs
pay for, which show him making eggs for his wife and grown daughters and
folding towels by the laundry. Nice touch, but not important in the
fall election. We all make breakfast and fold our laundry, Karl. What we
want is a senator whose modus operandi is in alignment with our sense
of our senator "doing the right things," not just "doing things right."
His
highly touted National Guard career, most of which is spent in
interpreting military law, not planning military tactics, has recently
come under scrutiny. With no significant active duty in National Guard
Col. Brown's record, Karl Rove positions him as everyman. No evidence of
an ethical conscience however, as evidenced by his recent
under-the-radar transfer to the Maryland National Guard so he could
advise the chief counsel of the National Guard. No heavy lifting in that
assignment, just building up his fully taxpayer-supported military
pension.
Ted Kennedy did his Army service as a
private, not as a National Guard lawyer. There is a difference. Ted was
a U.S. Army veteran. Scott Brown is not!
Certainly
Brown does not have the vibrancy or the ethical courage to advocate for
social justice that Ted Kennedy had. He is a Karl Rove-supported
placeholder. Unfortunately for Massachusetts, while in the Senate, his
loyalties are with Mitch McConnell, John Boehner and Karl Rove, not the
unemployed or the women whom he has casually written off through his
voting record.
He is a Republican after all,
and the Republicans have, as their primary goal, to discredit and
demonize the sitting president, while blocking any effort to pass
legislation that would make the president look good in an election year.
That is their plan! Scott Brown goes along with that plan, but keeps
that support under the radar as well, with the help of Karl Rove's
moles.
From his delusional narcissism to his
loyalty to the Republican leadership, his transferring to the Maryland
National Guard in an under-the-table sweetheart deal to his repugnant
votes supporting the Republican slash-and-burn political philosophy, he
is clearly not one of us. He supports the Republican Party line 75
percent of the time as a partner to their negativism.
To
know that the Commonwealth of Massachusetts is aiding and abetting the
national Republican agenda through an elected office is stunning. It
needs to be changed.
I prefer Elizabeth Warren
to Scott Brown, Karl Rove's candidate, to be my next senator. With
Elizabeth representing our interests in D.C. at least we'll have skin in
the game, be it of alleged Cherokee origin.
I hope you feel the same way.
Thomas P. Johnson lives in Harwich Port.
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