One Hand Clapping

Boston, Sept. 20—Three down, one riding high. In his preprimary analysis of the Massachusetts races (NR, September 15), Richard Brookhiser pointed to the maddening paradoxes in this “most liberal state,” concentrating on four prominent conservative candidacies. The morning after, following a private visit with a still shaken Senator Edward Brooke in his hotel suite, I find myself, despite 15 years of watching politics here, nearly as puzzled as Brookhiser. We wake today to a repudiated governor, Michael Dukakis, replaced as the Democratic candidate by a big labor/ big business conservative, Edward J. King; to a Republican-“designated” gubernatorial candidate, Edward F. King, defeated by a patrician leader, Francis (Frank) Hatch; to the former acting director of President Nixon’s Office of Economic Opportunity, Howard Phillips, pulling an insignificant vote at the lower end of the five-man Democratic senatorial roster; and to the darling of the anti-busers, former media personality Avi Nelson, barely deprived of the GOP senatorial nomination by incumbent Ed Brooke.

The Duke is dead, long live the King: we’ll be hearing that already shopworn ditty for the next two months, and the Dukakis people may never understand what happened to their champion. The Governor, touted in 1975 and 1976 as something of a neo-conservative—Dukakis always disdained the description—was considered unbeatable even one month ago. He appeared to have an ally in Mother Nature last February, when the worst blizzard in modern times hit the state. Assuming near-dictatorial powers to ease Massachusetts out of the catastrophe, Michael Dukakis earned everyone’s praise, dominated the TV screens for a week, and conveyed the impression of total confidence, complete efficiency, benign authority. He faced an opposition party perilously close to extinction (18 per cent of the state’s registered voters are Republicans), and a pack of potential Democratic challengers nibbling at him from the Left.

DB

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David Brudnoy

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Boston, Sept. 20—Three down, one riding high. In his preprimary analysis of the Massachusetts races (NR, September 15), Richard Brookhiser pointed to the maddening paradoxes in this “most liberal state,” concentrating on four prominent conservative candidacies. The morning after, following a private visit with a still shaken Senator Edward Brooke in his hotel suite, I find myself, despite 15 years of watching politics here, nearly as puzzled as Brookhiser. We wake today to a repudiated governor, Michael Dukakis, replaced as the Democratic candidate by a big labor/ big business conservative, Edward J. King; to a Republican-“designated” gubernatorial candidate, Edward F. King, defeated by a patrician leader, Francis (Frank) Hatch; to the former acting director of President Nixon’s Office of Economic Opportunity, Howard Phillips, pulling an insignificant vote at the lower end of the five-man Democratic senatorial roster; and to the darling of the anti-busers, former media personality Avi Nelson, barely deprived of the GOP senatorial nomination by incumbent Ed Brooke.

The Duke is dead, long live the King: we’ll be hearing that already shopworn ditty for the next two months, and the Dukakis people may never understand what happened to their champion. The Governor, touted in 1975 and 1976 as something of a neo-conservative—Dukakis always disdained the description—was considered unbeatable even one month ago. He appeared to have an ally in Mother Nature last February, when the worst blizzard in modern times hit the state. Assuming near-dictatorial powers to ease Massachusetts out of the catastrophe, Michael Dukakis earned everyone’s praise, dominated the TV screens for a week, and conveyed the impression of total confidence, complete efficiency, benign authority. He faced an opposition party perilously close to extinction (18 per cent of the state’s registered voters are Republicans), and a pack of potential Democratic challengers nibbling at him from the Left.