The Massachusetts Election

Media people scrambled to find new words to describe Scott Brown’s victory in Massachusetts special election last night. Ted Kennedy had held the seat for 47 years, which made the election of a Republican even more surprising. Democrats tried to downplay the significance, blaming everything from the weather to their candidate, to the old standby, George Bush. Republicans tried not to crow too loudly as they spun this as a referendum on Obama and government health care. Both sides miss the point.

Tuesday’s election provided a rare example of the two biggest drawbacks of a 2-party political system.
1: Conventional Washington thinking says: “If our side got more votes, it means the voters support what our party is doing”. Wrong. Sometimes voters have to choose between a poke in the eye or a punch in the gut. Choosing to avoid a punch in the gut does not mean they want a poke in the eye, it just means they can’t find a better option. And in the Massachusetts election, voters chose an unknown, relatively green candidate not necessarily because they believe in (or even understand) what he represents, but instead because they don’t want another politician who is more interested in the party line than their state’s own economic crisis.

Washington is so immersed in party politics that everything has to be red or blue. There are only 2 sides of the aisle, and if you aren’t on one side you must be on the other. Voters are tired of this. And sometimes we throw our congressmen out on this principle alone.

2: All elections have 2 parties. I don’t mean democrat and republican, but incumbent and challenger. The challenger always has the same message: “Your life sucks and is getting worse”. The economy is in the toilet, you’re going to lose your job (if you haven’t already), your kids will be on welfare, we aren’t safe from our enemies, and the earth will melt. “Can we stand x more years of this?” is a staple phrase in every challenger’s campaign. Challengers don’t have to tell you how they will fix things, or why their plan is better, or even if they have a plan. If they succeed in making you depressed and fearful enough, they will win by default as ‘the other option’. Given our nonstop campaigning and 24x7 news cycles, this constant bombardment of negativism can’t help but demoralize our country and destroy national pride. If voters had three choices, candidates would be forced to differentiate themselves. Simply being ‘the other guy’ would not be enough anymore because there is more than one ‘other guy’ for voter’s to choose from. Challengers would have to come up with a positive agenda rather than simply trashing their opponents and the country.

But these subtleties escape most politicians. They are tone deaf to the American people they claim to represent and try to cast everything into the template of their party politics. The Massachusetts vote was not about rejecting Obama, rejecting healthcare, or even a vote against democrats. The one voice that I’ve heard who seems to get it is Obama himself. “The same thing that swept Scott Brown into office swept me into office," he said. "People are angry and they're frustrated –“. Yes. The voters are frustrated. They are angry at elected officials who don’t pay attention to their electorate. In 2008, incumbent party voters stayed home in droves, challengers had an easy time convincing people they were miserable, and the mushy middle liked the idea of Hope and Change, which sounded so much better than More of the Same. This week, Massachusetts voters followed a similar score. Incumbent voters either stayed home or voted against a candidate who seemed blind to the unemployment and tax problems in their state. Challengers smelled blood in the water and got worked into a frenzy. Independents voted for something to change.

The Massachusetts election is a bellwether for 2010, not for Democrats or Republicans but for incumbents and challengers. The party who understand this best will find new jobs in D.C this fall.