Bottum on Brown

Joseph Bottum has some interesting thoughts’s about the election in today’s On the Square article. This observation in particular seems to be exactly right:

The person who handed Scott Brown his victory? Ted Kennedy. Oh sure, Brown campaigned brilliantly, Martha Coakley campaigned foolishly, and the national interest in the race worked with perfect timing for the Republicans: Early enough to bring good money in for Brown, but late enough that the national forces didn’t have time to destroy him.

But Kennedy was the key. As a friend pointed out to me in an email yesterday, the possibility of defeat for national health-care reform is the fault of its biggest champion. If he hadn’t insisted on holding onto his Senate seat until his death—if instead he’d resigned and thrown his weight behind his own choice of successor—the Democrats wouldn’t have lost his seat.

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