Keep on Truckin’
Much has been made of Senator Scott Brown’s truck, much of it by the Massachusetts Republican himself. In fact, when he’s not being photographed in it or mentioning it on the stump, he’s working it into intimate nighttime conversation with his wife, even when the nominal topic is Todd Akin (senate contests another regular subject once the lights are low, as married couples can attest). As quoted in the New York Times:
“Gail and I were laying in bed last night and talking a little bit, as we do every night,” he said, “and I said: ‘Honey, can you imagine? Here I am, Scott Brown from Wrentham, and I’ve got a truck that’s got 238,000 miles on it and, you know, something like this comes up and I’m the first guy in the country to even bring it up and tell the guy to step down.”
Can you imagine, honey? 238,000 miles. Oh, yeah, Todd Akin—what a nut, am I right? But, wow, 238,000 miles!
Brown is running strong against democrat Elizabeth Warren, but truck-talk might not be the only reason. From E.J. Dionne’s latest column, now on our website:
Elizabeth Warren is the kind of person Massachusetts has always liked to send to the U.S. Senate. She would instantly become a national leader, which appeals in a state that has sent to Washington Democrats such as John and Edward Kennedy and Republicans such as Henry Cabot Lodge and Edward Brooke. …
So why hasn’t one of this year’s most exciting Senate candidates put the election away? The obstacle is a Republican incumbent who is making voters forget that he’s a Republican.
In Massachusetts, making voters forget you’re a Republican can be a good strategy, one for which there is significant precedent. But Brown has already traded on his truck to win one election. Maybe he’ll get some more mileage out of it by putting some more miles on. What do you say, honey – how about I go for 300,000?
For fifty bucks, I got a guy on Cicero Avenue who can put another 238K on the odometer.
Not mentioned in E.J.’s excellent column is that Elizabeth Warren is the kind of person Massachusetts has always refused to send to the U.S. Senate—a woman.
It’s also a state that’s always declined the opportunity to elect a female governor.
(Heck, it’s a commonwealth that’s had problems dealing with uppity women since 1637, when Anne Hutchinson was exiled.)
Is it just the Tall White Guy advantage?
@Margaret Steinfels (8/24, 10:17 am) I don’t think so. Ed Brooke got elected to the Senate. Noted Greek-American and Short White Guy, Michael Dukakis was elected governor three times. Noted Greek-American and Middling-Height White Guy Paul Tsongas got elected to the Senate. It’s more just a Guy advantage.
From E.J. Dionne: “Brown is a truly gifted retail politician and Warren will never out-personality Mr. Personality. But to win, she’ll have to link thoughts and ideas to feelings, a skill rarely demanded of law professors.”
I think this is true, but Warren also hurt herself to a degree when she did the geneological equivalent of resume padding, i.e., when she enhanced her Native American ancestry. The temptation for enhancement must be great, as it was when Richard Blumenthal of Connecticut misstated on several occasions that he had served in Vietnam. He eventually was elected, but in part only because thosse gaffes occurred early in the campaign and he was able to perform many mea culpas with veterans’ groups.
William Collier:
I wish you had not used the word “enhancement” about Margaret Warren’s resume. I am having some really bad connections in my brain with your use of the word (Scott Browne’s picture in Cosmo).
Correction:
I meant Elizabeth Warren and I misspelled Scott Brown’s last name.
Helen–
How about one of the following synonyms for the troublesome word to soothe the “really bad connections in [your] brain”: expansion, augmentation, inflation, amplification, magnfication, reinforcement, or strengthening?
Then again, perhaps not. ;)