MA-Rasmussen: Tied race

[Attorney General, LGC Speaker, and Former PPT Dwarven Dragon]

CoakleyLOL.

Meh, I think this race was Toss-up or Lean D with or without Coakley.

Yeah, not having Coakley wouldn't make this Safe D. According to hypothetical polling, the democrats having Berwick, Kayeem, or Avellone as their nominee would have actually made this a Likely R race. With everyone else, it'd be a tossup, or at the low end of Lean D/Lean R. The only democrat that looks they would have defeated Baker easily would be (congressman) Joseph P. Kennedy II.

MA is purple-blue when it comes to gubernatorial elections. Democrats have their huge registration advantage, but the right sort of republican can still do quite well.

[Attorney General, LGC Speaker, and Former PPT Dwarven Dragon]

If Brown wanted to be a senator he probably should have stayed here too; it's not like Markey is super-popular, and if he lost he could always come back, whereas if he loses after carpetbagging to NH his career is over.

I do have to say that I found his move to NH pretty mystifying.

Scott Brown wants to have a seat that can be kept long-term much easier than one in Massachusetts. It's much easier to get reelected as a republican in NH then it is as a republican in MA. The problem is that the act of getting the office in the first place is hard when you're up against a popular senator and are carpetbagging. Hillary Clinton could do it because NY is deeply blue and Lazio was a mediocre candidate - and even then, she ran significantly behind Al Gore. Unfortunately for Brown, NH is not deeply red, and Shaheen remains a formidable candidate.