Scott Brown votes in favor of the jobs bill

  As everyone knows by now, Scott Brown voted for cloture with the Democrats on Harry Reid’s $15 billion jobs bill. Being in New Hampshire and listening to Boston talk radio over the last two days, people are wondering why Scott Brown turned on them so quickly. His biggest supporters are extremely disappointed in this vote and he has been called Benedict Brown among other names.

  I don’t blame them for being a little upset, but I think they are being just a little premature. One only has to remember what the alternative was. If Martha Coakley was elected, Obamacare would already have been passed and signed. She would have fallen in line with all of Barack Obama’s proposals.

  Scott Brown ran as being an independent voice for Massachusetts, while Martha Coakley tried to paint Scott Brown as being in lockstep with George Bush’s policies even though as a state senator he was never in a position to vote on a Bush bill.

  The biggest issue that he ran on was his opposition to the healthcare reform bill, but he also ran as a tax cutter and as being tough on terrorism– promising to fight against civilian criminal trials for terrorists. We will be watching to see if he remains true on these issues– I believe he will.

  I also feel that this was a politically calculated move. The cloture vote passed 70-28, it would have passed handily even if he had opposed it. I think that he saw this as an opportunity to “prove” that he was independent and would not fall in lock step with the Republicans, keeping a campaign promise while not helping a bill pass that would have otherwise failed. This will help him when it comes to votes on the issues of healthcare reform and terrorism, the Democrats will not as easily be able to paint him as just another member of the party of no. I wouldn’t be surprised if the Republican party “authorized” him to vote in favor of this bill for these very reasons.

  This is not meant to be a defense of his vote, but just my analysis of the vote. I do not agree with Scott Brown’s vote on this bill– I wish he voted against it– but I think there was more to it, and that is what I have stated above. I think that everyone who voted for Scott Brown needs to take a deep breath and realize that this vote did not change the outcome of this bill and in fact that may be why he felt it was okay to vote for it. Political gamesmanship? Yes, but it could help him down the road.

  However, we will continue to watch him to make sure that he does what he promised to do. On its face, this vote is concerning and disappointing, but it is only one vote and the big votes are still to come.