The U.S. Senate seat in Massachusetts that long had been held by the late Sen. Edward M. Kennedy was generally considered to be a “safe” seat for Democrats.
Massachusetts also was an “Obama state.”
All of that was very important because the Senate needed to keep its 60 Democrats — including two Democrat-leaning independents — to be sure Republicans could not extend Senate debate to hamper any of the congressional program of President Barack Obama.
The Democrats’ choice for the Massachusetts Senate position, Martha Coakley, entered her race against Republican nominee Scott Brown with a great deal of confidence, and with fairly recent polling indicating she had a lead of about 15 points, pointing toward a comfortable win.
But there was a great surprise Tuesday.
A big turnout of Massachusetts voters gave a substantial margin of victory to Mr. Brown to fill the unexpired Kennedy seat till 2012.
That was important for Massachusetts, and also very important for the whole country.
What happened?
Mrs. Coakley voiced the usual liberal line, but not very well, with some of her unsound comments and overconfidence causing her early lead to melt away.
Meanwhile, Mr. Brown voiced decidedly conservative views, calling negative attention to the trillion-dollar-plus ObamaCare socialized medicine plan pending in Congress, pointing to the 10 percent national unemployment figure, expressing alarm about huge national budget deficits, noting the Wall Street bailouts, and more.
So even though Democrats usually have a 3-to-1 lead over Republicans in Massachusetts politics, many voters were uneasy. Lots of independents wanted to express their serious concern about the Obama-Coakley direction.
So a Republican senator will be sworn in to represent Massachusetts.
But when? Will there be Democrat shenanigans to delay the swearing in of Sen.-elect Brown so he won’t be in the Senate in time to cast a vote on the being-rushed ObamaCare plan? Or will Sen. Brown be sworn in before the ObamaCare showdown? What will be the national effect in either case?
The victory of Sen.-elect Brown is very much more important than just filling a major U.S. Senate seat. It is a substantial rebuke to President Obama and his liberal majority in Congress.