BAGnewsNotes

What Was 60

This picture of vulnerability -- by friend of the BAG, Yana Paskova --is currently leading NYT.com.

After the Coakley blow out and a party fretting all night on cable news about circular firing squads, wither the Democrats?

(caption: Martha Coakley and her husband, Thomas F. O'Connor Jr., walked off the stage after she conceded the election.)

Scott Brown: The End of the End

Out of all the photos of Ted Kennedy's memorial service, funeral and burial, this rose above the rest. One reason for that is because, although the commemoration went on for days, this picture -- at the Arlington burial -- seemed to mark the end of the end.

But, not true. That happened tonight.

(Reuters: Doug Mills/Pool. Arlington Cemetery, August 30, 2009.)

Brown/Clavin vs. Coakley/Obama (Or: Where Everybody Knows Your Name)

If you're measuring by: "the-guy-you'd-most-want-to-have-a beer-with" test, Scott Brown's PR strategy on Sunday to counter-program the Obama, Kerry and Victoria Reggie Kennedy event with Coakley at Northeastern might not have been much of a contest.

Brown's campaign replied with a rally at Mechanics Hall in Worcester featuring no political luminaries, as far as I could tell. Instead, the gathering -- aiming square at the heart of independent voters and die-hard Boston fans -- featured local sports legends Curt Shilling and former quarterback Doug Flutie. And notice, by the way, how thoroughly dressed down people were, especially "the stars" -- in another contrast with the "suits," the connected, the well heeled, the party-branded, and, really, anyone who either works or is from -- hint, hint -- out of town.

Perhaps the most clever slice of local populism, however, came in the person of John Ratzenberger.

Real Men for Brown

Shades of the '08 Pennsylvania primary?

Catching this tweet this morning, and noticing this photo on the newswire, it feels like a gender (manly-man) and class (hard hat) bias is playing through the Brown - Coakley contest in Massachusetts. The photo also amplifies a sense of chest beating patriotism with the USA on the hat with the flag almost seeming to be stuck to it.

It'll be interesting to see what impact Obama (showing up now) has for Coakley ... as opposed to how successfully the right/TeaParty (1, 2) can combine the '08 elitist themes with the attack on Obama (D-Washington).

(photo: Steve Senne/AP. caption: Mike Doherty, of Hanson, Mass. , front, shouts slogans at passing cars in support of Mass. State Senator Scott Brown, R-Wrentham, before the start of a campaign rally in Plymouth, Mass. , Saturday, Jan. 16, 2010. Brown is running against Democrat Martha Coakley and Joseph Kennedy, a Libertarian who is running as an independent, in a special election to fill the U.S. Senate seat left empty by the death of Sen. Edward M. Kennedy, D-Mass.)

Model Candidates

See a pattern?

Boston.com's Scott Brown slideshow expresses how much national candidates, in our infotainment culture, look straight out of central casting.

I'm not saying the GOP's Massachusetts hopeful is a lightweight, but his particulars (both he and his TV wife are former models; he's well remembered as the Cosmo stud; he's a long time, and oft-photographed National Guardsman; his daughter -- a visible campaign presence -- was an American Idol finalist) have "eye candy" writ everywhere.

Of course, the media has been fully collusive in these affairs. For example, just consider today's NYT coverage of carpetbagger Harold Ford's potential NY Senate run. The pic above (left) was on today's front page, and the shot on the right accompanied the continuation, and the on-line article.

With an almost unintelligible Sara Palin joining FOX news yesterday, call it the fashion of the times.

(NYT photos: Ozier Muhammed)

First Senator From the Tea Party?

Is Marco Rubio -- the potential "First Senator From the Tea Party" -- that fearful and paranoid (way away, pressed to the corner, and protecting his privates like that in his own headquarters)?

If you wade through the almost 8k word article, you see that the single interview Leibovitch held with Rubio was extremely clipped and Marco, the otherwise forceful former high school quarter cornerback (the author says he delivers a speech like a "jackhammer"), was highly cautious with a leg that wouldn't stop shaking.

In this photo of the guy Huckabee calls "our Barack Obama but with substance," did the photographer capture the natural paranoia of the radical fringe, a heady guy fearful of an ambush, or maybe something of both?

NYT Mag article preview.

(12:45 pst - Extended)

(photo: Nigel Parry for The New York Times. caption: Marco Rubio at his headquarters in Coral Gables, Fla. Mike Huckabee says he may be the face of the future of the Republican party.)

Dodd Scrapped

(Click for full size)

In this photo from last July, we see Senator Harkin gripping the arm of Senator Dodd while the two men study pictures of themselves back in the day.

With Dodd hanging it up last night to prevent a Democratic loss in Connecticut where his re-election bid was listing badly, this "falling on the sword" seems designed  to prevent the '08 Democratic surge from hitting the scrapbook, as well.

(photo: Senator Chris Dodd, July 15, 2009)