Former Mass. Dem Party Chief: ‘Dangerous Situation for Democrats’
EmailABC News’ Rick Klein reports: Whether Democrats win or lose today’s Senate race in Massachusetts, the contest is serving as a wakeup call to party leaders in the Bay State and far beyond. On ABC’s “Top Line” today, Phil Johnston, a former chairman of the Massachusetts Democratic Party, told us that the “clear surge” for Republican candidate Scott Brown has “transformed the race” in a way that all Democrats should not ignore. Johnston said that while he’s still confident Democrat Martha Coakley can win, the fact that the race is so tight so soon after Coakley coasted to the Democratic nomination suggests a difficult 2010 for the party across the country. “She won that [primary] race by 19 points, and that was only a little over a month ago. And so one has to wonder what happened in that short period of time,” Johnston told us. “I think there are these undercurrents in the — among the voters right now, which we’ve seen and we see today out there. I mean, I’ve been at the polls this morning and there’s just a lot of anger about the quote, ‘establishment,’ because the Democrats are in charge both here in Massachusetts and in Washington. I think the anger is being directed towards us, and so it’s a dangerous situation for Democrats right now.” While local factors have played in to Coakley’s slide in polls, Brown’s attempts to tie her to the status quo in Washington and at the State House in Boston were helped by the fact that she’s the incumbent attorney general, Johnston said. “I really think that the typical voter now thinks that everyone who is in power is in the tank — is in the tank to the financial interests of the country. And I think the bailout, the Wall Street bailout — bailouts had a very negative impact on people,” he said. “So I think it’s a wakeup call, whether Martha wins or loses tonight. I think what’s happened in the last few weeks here is a wakeup call for the Democrats both here in Massachusetts and around the country. And I think that people will wake up, and we’ll be okay in November. So that’s a silver lining to all of this.” As for how President Obama should respond to a setback, Johnston said he should choose a path of aggression instead of humility: “I think this is a fight, and I think that Barak Obama’s on the right side of the fight. And I think that he needs to continue to push even more strongly his populist agenda, which is to take on the banks, take on the special interests, take on the health the health issue, and don’t drop the health reform issue. … It would be a disaster if we didn’t have some success in that. So I think he needs to keep doing what he’s been doing, but doing it even more aggressively.Watch the interview with Phil Johnston HERE. We also checked in with GOP strategy Kevin Madden, who prescribed a much different course for the president, should the Republican win the Senate seat in Massachusetts: “I think there has to be a level of humility,” Madden said. “There has to be some sort of recalculation that you’ve lost the center, and what is it that the center is so frustrated with? Well, they’re frustrated that Washington has become very partisan, they’re frustrated that it’s not solution-oriented and they’re frustrated about this seeming disconnect. I think the most important thing for anybody with a thumping like this, be they Republican or Democrat is to acknowledge that there’s disconnect and set forward some sort of metric, some sort of concrete plan to reconnect with voter anxieties and get back to solution-oriented politics.” Watch the discussion with Kevin Madden HERE.
Gulf of Mexico to Become Gulf of America? 
Can Mitt Romney Win Conservatives Back?
Its kind of a dare you to ignore the will of the people, we will vote you out even in your most treasured places if you keep thinking you know whats best for us. We the voteing public are not the idiots you take us for, get rid of this 2000 page pork barrel and lets have some real health care reform without bribes and behind closed door deals. Voted for you and can vote against you.
Posted by: earl | January 19, 2010, 2:31 pm 2:31 pm
An awakening. A day late and a dollar
short.
Posted by: wis134 | January 19, 2010, 2:34 pm 2:34 pm
I have seen the word “danger” used so many times over the last few days..”Dems in danger” “Healthcare in danger” “Obamas agenda in danger” The language the press is using reveals their liberal bias. I can only imagine the words they would be using to describe the Democrats staging a political uprising against Republicans!(OH YEAH! I don’t need to imagine it at all! DUH! the 2008 presidential election, and the 2006 congressional elections!! wo, I just got a chill right up my leg!)
Posted by: cindy | January 19, 2010, 3:20 pm 3:20 pm
“ignore the will of the people”, right.
The “will of the people” was clearly to put Democrats in charge, seeing as they won huge majorities in Congress along with the presidency.
Posted by: gary | January 19, 2010, 3:35 pm 3:35 pm
1. Its the economy, stupid.
2. He who walks away from his political base should expect the base to walk away from him. He who aggressively attacks various factions of his political base should expect to lose next time around.
Posted by: jan | January 19, 2010, 4:58 pm 4:58 pm
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The American people are speaking loud and clear that they do NOT support the radical liberal agenda of President Obama, Nancy Pelosi and Harry Reid. If these politicians can’t hear the roar of their own constituants, they must be deaf and dumb.
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Posted by: N Waff | January 19, 2010, 5:04 pm 5:04 pm
It’s not so much the Democrats but the tactics of the Conservative Right. One thing is for sure. They aren’t Christian. They are fraudulant in their approach to the Christian lifestyle. Anyone person who calls themselves Christian then takes off all his or her clothes in front of a photographer they don’t know who is taking pics for a cender nude piece is an antiChrist. It’s not art at all except exploiting the secular body for sex. Christ didn’t ever take off his clothes in front of strangers and have a nude centerfold to be remembered. Scott Brown has given the enemy one more notch to show Christians like Scott Brown are frauds and fakes. I can’t believe any Christian would lower him or herself to this level and still say they are a good Christian person. Wrong. Wrong. Wrong. They need to start a secular meeting place for their kind of religion, which again, isn’t Christian. Shame on Scott Brown. I don’t want to belong to his kind of “Christianity” that’s for sure. Shame on him, and if his minister is any king of Christian minister, he should point this out to Mr. Brown, who is just an airbrushed fraud and fake, just like his politics. It’s all fake. If the people of Massachusetts pick Brown over Coakley, then there are many more people like Brown out there — fraud and fake, pretending to be what you aren’t.
Posted by: Elle | January 19, 2010, 6:11 pm 6:11 pm
Only a fool keeps making the same mistakes over and over. The people have spoken last summer and the dems decided they did not need to listen then and they still think that now. Like I said, only a fool.
Posted by: billy bob | January 19, 2010, 6:11 pm 6:11 pm
Shame, shame, shame on Scott Brown for giving Islam one more reason to point out the differences between living the Christian lifestyle versus lying about being a Christian. Shame on Scott Brown and the Republican GOP Tea Party Activists. Shame on all of you who supported these lack in right versus wrong just for a vote. That’s evil in itself. Shame on you Scott Brown and your liberal following.
Posted by: Elle | January 19, 2010, 6:18 pm 6:18 pm
Scott Brown is a member of the secular religion, who worship the body, not the soul. Scott Brown just made Christianity a joke, a lie. Shame on you Scott Brown for giving Islam reasons to say Americans aren’t good moral people. You just made a huge mistake in defying Christ. Shame on you Scott Brown and your airbrushed lifestyle.
Posted by: Elle | January 19, 2010, 6:20 pm 6:20 pm
“As for how President Obama should respond to a setback…I think that he needs to continue to push even more strongly his populist agenda…”
“Insanity” definition: repeating a failed agenda but expecting a different result “next” time.
Posted by: TeaPartyPatriot | January 19, 2010, 6:28 pm 6:28 pm
Scot Brown is the type of politician that uses people that gives Christianity a bad name, votes who would actually vote for a republican even after they have witnessed what has happened in the last, I don’t know 8 or 10 years, I lost count it’s been so bad. What does it take to wake you so-called Christians up? If someone told you a true Christian sells their own people down the river would you do it? Oh, wait a minute a lot of you already have. Yea, I’m a Christian, a real Christian, I am a Christian who actuallys cares about other people and what may happen to them, I vote to help people not just to help myself or to feel smug because your only comfortable if everyone is like yourself. Get your heads out of your own rump and actually see others and what this Country of ours needs and I don’t mean a bunch of self rightous phonies who only cares about what things look like not how they really are. Shame on you all for that, for the narrow mindedness and the laziness of someone who can’t look outside the box to actually see someone besides themselves. Shame on you all, I beg Jesus to show you the light, I beg him.
Posted by: Donna Hess | January 19, 2010, 6:47 pm 6:47 pm
The American people have gone from being leary, to plain scared, of obamas true intention, of striping us of our basic freedoms, and placing us in the yoke of socialist puppets. High taxes, a lower standard of living, and invasion of our private lives, is the price he thinks we should pay to lift third world nations, through spreading the wealth. A lot of this feeling has fueled the attitudes in Mass., and this election. American people will always refuse to be subjugated, especially by the likes of obama and his radical agenda.
Posted by: WZ | January 19, 2010, 7:01 pm 7:01 pm
gary the will of the people was not to push socilaism like this bunch has. IF MR OBAMA RAN ON THE AGENDA HE IS PUSHING HE WOULD HAVE LOST TO MC CAIN. HE LIED AND IS NOW REAPING WHAT HE SOWED. WHERE IS ALL THAT TRANPARANCY?NO LOBBYISTS? NO EARMARKS? NO PORK? VAN JONES ETC…..FRAUD
Posted by: catman | January 19, 2010, 7:41 pm 7:41 pm
Congrats to Senator Scott Brown.
Thanks to the people of Massachusetts we will get our country back.
Obama stumping for Coakley just couldn’t cut it..
Posted by: NewIndependent | January 19, 2010, 10:00 pm 10:00 pm
Obama’s transparency has brought one thing to light. We have known that politics are corrupt, but ever turning a blind eye to the process we kept on electing scoundrels to public office.
With Obama’s brand of Chicago politics, there is no longer a “blind eye” to turn; bribery, threats, deals and political arrogance are clearly visible.
The deals may be made in the dark, but even a liberal media scrambling for something to report is bringing it to main street. Even a liberal media is beginning to hammer on Obama’s campaign LIES!
Harry Reid comments to the effect that deals are expected in politics. And deals are all that Obamacare seems to offer.
Alexis de Tocqueville said it quite prophetically, “The American Republic will endure until the day Congress discovers that it can bribe the public with the public’s money.”
So, what has Obama accomplished in just one year? He has birthed a movement of unity in America that is growing by leaps and bounds, though it be a unity against his corrupt and arrogant march into socialism and government takeover.
We can thank Mr. Obama for awakening the unquenchable American spirit of independence and freedom. A spirit that will prevail until the foundations of a democratic republic are re-established.
Brown just happened to be the man of the hour not America’s sweetheart, this was a vote against Obamacare clear and simple! Obama and HIS congress should read the polls on Obamacare and face the truth, their agenda stinks!
Posted by: Ed Taylor | January 20, 2010, 9:57 am 9:57 am