Massachusetts Senate Race is Proxy War over Health Care

As public support for President Obama's Health Care Reform Bill craters (as it rightfully should), the race to fill the late Ted Kennedy's Senate Seat has become a proxy battle over the bill itself. Forces nationwide, both for and against the bill, are aligning themselves with the Democrat or Republican candidate in hopes of confirming or defeating the legislation.

The vast majority of the population oppose the bill as it has formed in Congress. I don't believe there is a single state where supporters outnumber opponents. And this includes the great state of Massachusetts.

The nation has determined, quite correctly, that this bill is a disaster that will likely destroy the budget, the struggling economy and, most assuredly, health care as we have known it in the United States. Liberal states have determined the bill harms Union contracts and threatens traditional Medicare, especially Medicare Advantage, which the bill virtually eliminates. Medicare Advantage is especially popular in Massachusetts.

So poor Democrat Martha Coakley, who ought to have been a shoo-in for Ted Kennedy's seat is facing the battle of a lifetime against ruggedly handsome and articulate Scott Brown, a Republican who only weeks ago had no chance of winning.

Coakley has fallen into line and supports Obama's Health Care Plan. There is absolutely no doubt in my mind she would win in a landslide if she only had the courage to oppose the bill. But, alas, she is stuck with supporting a bill no one with an ounce of integrity would ever endorse.

I don't care how good you are, you cannot do anything but look like a sock puppet when you support this bureaucratic nightmare of a bill.

Last night Scott Brown easily raised 1.3 million dollars on the Internet in just a few hours after his brilliant performance in a debate against Coakley. And national Republicans who wouldn't have bothered the answer his phone calls just two weeks ago and scrambling over each other to endorse him and campaign with him on the stump.

It helps that Brown is a moderate and not a reactionary conservative, but he still agrees with most Republican positions.

I still don't think he can win in Massachusetts but it helps that he is on the right side of the Health Care Debate.