Blessing in disguise

THE PEOPLE’S SEAT - JEFF JACOBY

By Jeff Jacoby, Boston Globe Columnist January 20, 2010
http://www.boston.com/bostonglobe/

IT REALLY is the people’s seat, and yesterday the people took it back.

But in electing Scott Brown instead of Martha Coakley to replace the late Ted Kennedy in the US Senate, Massachusetts voters did more than hand the GOP its most improbable and thrilling come-from-behind victory in a generation. They did more than embrace a charismatic, upbeat Republican and reject a dour, gaffe-prone Democrat. And they did more than prove that no political party has a permanent lock on any state’s electoral loyalties.

They also gave President Obama and the Democratic left a blessing in disguise - if only they are wise enough to recognize it.

Brown ran explicitly against Obama’s domestic agenda, above all the radical healthcare overhaul that the president has made his priority. Not long ago, such a strategy would have been dismissed as suicidal. But the harder the administration and congressional Democrats have pushed their health legislation, the more unpopular it, and they, have grown. In Boston on Sunday, it spoke volumes that Obama made not a single direct reference to the healthcare bill he champions - and that Brown promises to oppose.

Politically, ObamaCare has backfired. Much of the goodwill with which the president entered the White House has been squandered, and any effort to try to force a health bill through Congress now will drive what’s left of that goodwill over a cliff.

But Brown and the voters of Massachusetts have killed ObamaCare. In so doing they have provided the president a priceless second chance to adjust his political course, move toward the center, and deliver at least some of the bipartisan cooperation that was at the heart of his once-enormous appeal. If Obama seizes the opportunity that Massachusetts and its senator-elect have given him, the brightest days of his presidency may be still to come.

Jeff Jacoby can be reached at jacoby@globe.com.