RUSH: Turning now to the Massachusetts special election on Tuesday. Yesterday we told you the story of how Mike Meehan pushed down John McCormack to the sidewalk and a metal railing in full view of the candidate and Attorney General Martha Coakley, and how it was reported that he ‘slipped’ and so forth and then Meehan went in there to ‘help him’ out. It turns out now that Michael Meehan has publicly acknowledged that he acted too aggressively during that incident with a reporter. He said: ‘Last evening I was a little too aggressive in trying to help the attorney general get to her car and catch a flight.’ He said he had called the reporter, John McCormack of the Weekly Standard, this afternoon to apologize.’
However, the apology and acknowledgment runs contrary to Martha Coakley’s own statement earlier yesterday in which she blamed the incident on Republican stalkers. ‘Bay State Attorney General Martha Coakley blamed GOP ‘stalkers’ today for triggering tensions outside a Washington, D.C., fund-raiser last night where a Weekly Standard reporter said he was roughed up by a Coakley campaign volunteer. ‘I know there were people following, including two from the Brown campaign who have been very aggressive in their stalking,’ Coakley told reporters during an appearance at Kit Clark Senior Services in Dorchester. ‘I’m not sure what happened. I know something occurred, but I’m not privy to the facts. I’m sure it will come out, but I’m not aware of that.” She watched it, and the pictures show her looking exactly at the reporter as he’s on the sidewalk. She is the state’s number one law enforcement officer. She stood by. She did nothing. She let it happen. She claims it now to be stalking. So will she retract her statement? Will Martha Coakley retract her statement blaming Republican stalkers now that her goon, Michael Meehan, has fessed up?
Somebody needs to fax this down to Barney Frank. This is from the Associated Press: ‘Massachusetts’s top election official says it could take weeks to certify the results of the upcoming US Senate special election. That delay could let President Barack Obama preserve a key 60th vote for his health care overhaul.’ And Barney Frank said (imitating Frank) ‘This is inth’ane! This couldn’t possibly be happening, can’t possibly happen!’ And everybody has been writing about how it’s going to happen. ‘Secretary of State William F. Galvin, citing state law, says city and town clerks must wait at least 10 days for absentee ballots to arrive before they certify the results of the Jan. 19 election.’ Okay, that’s January 29th. ‘They then have five more days to file the returns with his office.’ That’s February 2nd, which happens to be the day Obama wants to do his speech. ‘Galvin bypassed the provision in 2007 so his fellow Democrats could gain a House vote they needed to override a veto of then-Republican President George W. Bush, but the secretary says US Senate rules would preclude a similar rush today.’
Now, this is Public Policy Polling. This is Tom Jensen. This is a liberal bunch in North Carolina that we follow here. They had a post yesterday: ‘Obama and Coakley.’ He says, ‘I’m sure the main reason Barack Obama’s not going to campaign for Martha Coakley is that either a) the White House isn’t that worried about her or b) they want to minimize the extent to which the President gets blamed if she does somehow manage to lose or only wins by a small margin.’ Obama did do a commercial. I don’t know if it’s a phone commercial or if he’s producing a TV commercial or whatever but I just saw it moments ago. He is going to do a commercial. This is good news, folks. It’s good news. He’s going to be part of the campaign. This is excellent news.
‘What’s interesting to note,’ says Public Policy Polling, ‘in the poll that we did on the race though is that Coakley is actually more popular than Obama. She has a 50% favorable rating while he has a 44% approval rating.’ Whoa! ‘Now certainly you can make the argument that the reason for that is the conservative lean of likely voters at this point, and that if Obama showed up and changed the electorate he would have better approval numbers among those planning to go and vote. But his visits in Virginia and New Jersey never did put any dent in the poll numbers — in fact Chris Christie and Bob McDonnell saw the polls move slightly in their direction after Obama’s visits to their state,’ and let’s not forget that in the state of Virginia. They threw Creigh Deeds under the bus before they election. They blamed him for not following Obama’s campaign tactics. They blamed him for not using Obama enough. So PPP says ‘there’s an argument to be made that an Obama visit could actually have had more of a negative effect on Coakley than a positive one. But at this point it’s academic.’ No, it’s not. Not if he’s going to show up in a commercial.
And here’s a headline from the Investor’s Business Daily: ‘Bay State Jobs Threatened By A Coakley Win — One tax hike that is causing heartburn for bill supporters is a new levy on medical device manufacturers. The scuttlebutt on the Hill is that, next to the ‘Cadillac plan’ excise tax, this new tax on medical device makers is causing the most consternation among vulnerable Democrats. What hasn’t been fully explored yet in the Massachusetts Senate race is how much this new tax impacts the Bay State. … If elected to the United States Senate, it’s no secret that Martha Coakley would become the deciding, 60th vote in favor of the Reid-Obama-Pelosi government-run health care bill. To pay for this expansion of state power, the bill relies on 18 new tax hikes. … Massachusetts relies heavily on the medical device manufacturing industry (which makes everything from wheelchairs to pacemakers) for jobs. According to a 2007 study by AdvaMed (the industry trade association), 22,000 Massachusetts workers punch a clock every day at a medical device plant. This is one out of every 150 workers in the state. Their annual paychecks amount to about $51,000 (far higher than the average Massachusetts wage of $42,000).’
So these people who work in substantial numbers at medical device manufacturers understand that huge tax increases are coming on their companies, and that’s going to have a definite effect on their eventual employment — certainly on raises, compensation — that could redound in a very negative way to them. The polls are tightening in this race but still people don’t know what to make of it and the reason they don’t know what to make of it is that most people cannot get their arms around the fact that in a state with a million more Democrats than Republicans — and the Ted Kennedy seat! — people just can’t get their arms around the concept a Republican could win this. So polling data is within the margin of error in a number of polls. Other polls show a 9- to 15-point landslide for Martha Coakley. And pollsters, they’re not even confident because of the variance from one poll to the other.
The one thing that we can draw from this conclusively is the Democrats are scared to death. They are in panic mode. The Democrat Congressional Campaign Committee is sending money. The House campaign committee is sending money to Martha Coakley in a Senate race. Now, technically that’s not allowed, so they had to change their wording here. They’re saying, ‘We’re making an expenditure for her,’ rather than a campaign contribution. I don’t know what the expenditure is going to be. But the reason they’re concerned about it in Pelosi’s office is because the House is more out of touch with the American body politic than the Senate is. They are so far out of touch it’s laughable. They know they need 60 votes in the Senate to get Pelosi’s agenda done. Forget Obama’s. Pelosi has her own and they need 60 votes in the Senate to get it done. If they don’t have 60 votes in the Senate then they’ve got huge, huge problems. That’s why the House is getting involved in this as well.
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RUSH: Here’s the latest ad, the Chamber of Commerce ad for Scott Brown in Massachusetts.
ANNOUNCER: The Washington politicians continue to fail us. More spending and fewer jobs. But it’s not too late to get our economy back on track. Scott Brown believes in fiscal responsibility. Scott Brown supports measures that hold spending, cut taxes, and help businesses invest in new jobs. Scott Brown’s plan empowers businesses, not politicians. Call Scott Brown, thank him for supporting a plan to fix our economy. The US Chamber of Commerce is responsible for this advertising.
RUSH: US Chamber of Commerce. That’s their first ad on behalf of Scott Brown in Massachusetts, as that race continues to tighten.