Republican Senator Scott Brown swarn in by Vice President Joe Biden

Well now it is official. The state of Massachusetts now has a Republican U.S. senator, as Scott Brown was sworn in today by the president of the Senate, Vice President Joe Biden. No longer do the Democrats have a super-majority, by loosing the 60th Senate seat. So how does just one seat matter so much. First, it now will be the first time since 1972 when Senator Ted Kennedy became the Senate representative for Massachusetts, that a Republican held the state senate seat. Second, the loss of the super-majority by the Democrats with his election means that Obama will now not have the ability to just push major legislative priorities through Congress such as health care reform without a tuff vote. The Republican opinions and actions now matter. It is the opinion of this editor that there should have never been a thing called a Super-majority in either branch of Congress. When such a thing is in place, it appears as the Democrats has demonstrated the entire first year of Obama's first term that the Republican opinion and vote wouldn't seem to matter. As a Democrat myself, I do believe that it was too convenient for the Democrats to push legislation through the Senate.
Another fear of congressional Democrats is that the win in Massachusetts by Republicans may be only the beginning of a potential GOP landslide in November's midterm elections. If that happens and the Republicans gain an all out majority in the Senate, President Obama may be hard pressed to get any other legislation through congress that bears a liberalistic flavor to it. It in effect can make the President a 'lame duck' President in only his 2nd year of his first term. So it is important for the Democrats to keep the existing seats in the Senate and not loose not even one more seat. But what could happen instead would be the Democrats regain their seat in November. Then it would be super-majority time for the Democrats in the Senate, and President Obama can continue to push through his legislation as desired. Again, I don't believe that is necessarily a good thing, but still is possible down the road.

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A New Massachusetts Senator, Scott Brown (R), Martha Coakley (D) to be Named Within Hours

Within the next few hours, President Obama will learn whether or not the Democrats hold on to their 60-seat Senate super-majority or loose the race to give the GOP enough votes to block future Senate votes on health care and other White House priorities. But in the meantime, rumors leaking from the Democratic side of the house  claims that the present health care bill is "better than nothing," according to a 'CNN Politics' report. It appears that the House of Representatives is considering passing the more conservative Senate measure with no alterations. So what does this mean. It means that the Republicans will have attained a major victory in the war against President Obama's present agenda, and for agendas in the future. This can be devastating for the President, and who would have ever thought it would be because a Republican took the seat of the late Edward Kennedy, the one man who lived most of his 42 year Senate career trying to get a better health care package through Congress. This also goes to show you how powerful Senator Ted Kennedy was, and now after that many years, the state of Massachusetts may have a Republican Senator.

An update to this race will be posted right here on this website.

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Senate Race in Massachusetts Set for Tomorrow

Edward Kennedy, an icon who represented the Massachusetts Senate, can become the sole reason why the health care reform bill will not pass. You might consider that statement unthinkable, because he fought the majority of his long Senate career for promoting health care reform. But, now he is gone. His death last year left a vacancy in the Massachusetts Senate, and the Democrats and now trying to even consider backup plans, just in case the Democratic candidate Marthy Coakley looses the race on Tuesday. Tomorrow, the nation will know if the top White House aides may be engaging in contingency plans to try and save the health care reform bill.
President Obama has been campaigning with Marthy Coakley in Massachusetts on Sunday, and the goal according to a White House Spokesman is to pass the health care reform with 60 votes. It could even be done with a Senate vote as low as 51 votes, but this simple majority would require technical and procedural issues that would prolong the process for quite some time. Not even the Democrats want to prolong this issue into the new year. If the Republican Scott Brown is elected to the Senate the filibuster proof Democratic Senate dies. One option may be to get the reform bill pushed through before Brown takes office. But the unthinkable does happen. What if the health care overhaul dies? Democrats are afraid to believe that his health care bill will fail because they spent so much time in 2009 trying to get it passes, along with so much political capital by the President.

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