http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/post-politics/wp/2012/12/28/john-kerry-supports-ed-markey-for-senate/?hpid=z4
The Democratic establishment inside and outside Massachusetts is quickly lining up behind Rep. Ed Markey (D) in the likely special election for Sen. John Kerry’s seat. Kerry himself is supporting the longtime House member; so is the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee, and Vicki Kennedy, the widow of the late Sen. Edward Kennedy.
. . .
Kennedy quickly chimed in. “I believe that Congressman Ed Markey is the best person to continue in the tradition of John Kerry,” she said. “He will be a superb senator for Massachusetts.” Some Democrats were hoping Kennedy herself would run.
Sen. Michael Bennet (D-Colo.) followed with a statement as chairman of the DSCC, calling Markey “exactly the kind of leader Massachusetts needs in the U.S. Senate.”
. . .
A Kerry aide says that the senator will be voting for Markey. But in a nod to his likely future as an apolitical statesman, the statement never uses the word “endorse.”
It looks like the Dems are doing everything in their power to avoid a fractious primary, and to present a united front against Scott Brown.
Charlie Pierce was a step ahead of them:
http://www.esquire.com/blogs/politics/massachusetts-senate-race-122812
So, it appears that, up here in the Commonwealth (God save it!), come next June, we're going to elect ourselves our third U.S. senator in the past two-and-a-half years. This assumes, of course, that the Republicans don't put John Kerry through the Benghazi blender and send him back to us as a tasty puree. (Not bloody likely, as the Republicans with this story are simply a dog with a new chew-toy. They don't really have any serious concerns. They just want to take the Benghazi back out into the yard and play with it some more.) Anyway, Congressman Edward Markey has announced that he's in, and good for him. There are other members of the delegation making noises -- notably Steve Lynch and Michael Capuano -- and I wish to god they weren't. . .
. . .(Markey's) positions on issues from telecommunications to climate change are strong and progressive, and he has $3.1 million to spend in his campaign accounts. (My own experience with him is through Markey's yeoman work on Alzheimer's Disease, and the issues relating to it, a fight in which I have a particularly nasty personal dog.) And, in his announcement, nicely timed on a slow news day, Markey came out swinging.
plus bonus of zingy commentary from Pierce on Scott Brown.
It is anticipated that the Republican nominee will be soon-to-be-former senator Scott Brown. This has been the subject of some hilarious nightsweats on the part of pundits from outside the state as to Senator McDreamy's formidability. He's certainly still convinced of his own world-historical status. In his farewell address in the Senate, he joked about seeing people soon. And then, earlier this week, possibly after extensive consultation from various kings and queens, he threw up a post on Facebook announcing that he was going back to Washington to work on a "deal" that the president had proposed. There was, alas, no deal of any sort for him to study. This was at the root of why he tangled himself up so badly in losing to Elizabeth Warren. The man really bought all the punditastic stroking that he got after his fluke win over Coakley about how he was a pivotal figure in a new American political age. He spent most of the early part of his re-election campaign massaging his own ego, and acting as though the very fact of Warren's challenging him was an affront to history. That's why he fell so easily onto the cheap, nasty, and ultimately futile campaign that not only was unsuccessful, but also severely damaged his good-guy centrist brand, perhaps beyond repair.
This fall, Pierce described Brown's Senate job as "about two sizes too big for him". Yup, that nails it.
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