If Ted Kennedy were still alive and serving in Congress—which is to say, if Scott Brown had never stunned the political establishment by winning Kennedy’s Senate seat—this month’s special election in Massachusetts between longtime Democratic Congressman Ed Markey and Republican businessman Gabriel Gomez might not get much attention. …
This year’s election, like the last one, features a doddering Democratic insider facing off against an upstart Republican outsider who might double as Mr. Massachusetts. But superficial similarities aside, Markey isn’t Martha Coakley, the incompetent Democratic candidate from 2010, and Gomez isn’t Brown. For one, Markey is actually campaigning and running advertisements. While that might seem a low bar, Coakley lowered it there. [cont.]
Nate Cohn, New Republic