I get occasional e-mails from folks pointing out that Scott Brown is not a down-the-line conservative, a development that isn’t that surprising, as he’s representing a community in deep-blue Massachusetts. Here’s part of an e-mail recently forwarded to me:

Career politician Scott Brown is an 11-year Big Government Republican state legislator who regularly and repeatedly voted FOR bigger state government budgets, voted FOR expanded and new Big Government programs, voted FOR tax increases, and voted AGAINST tax cuts.
Before you freak out, we do NOT want you to stay home — or vote for Martha Coakley. You have a far better choice — a choice that gives your vote 100 times its normal impact. What’s more, if you choose this option, you will dramatically strengthen the Tea Party Movement — and radically increase the number of TRUE tax cut and spending cut candidates on the ballot this November.
We’ll go into Big Government legislator Scott Brown’s sorry record of the last 11 years, and offer you a powerful way to make the political establishment listen to the Tea Party movement, but first:
Who are we? What have we done to earn your attention? Why should you take us seriously?
We’re Carla Howell and Michael Cloud, Tea Party activists and the 2 most prominent Tax Cut activists in Massachusetts for the last 10 years. We co-sponsored and ran Ballot Question 1 to END the state income tax in 2002 and 2008. We are running this year’s Ballot Initiative to Roll Back the Sales Tax from 6.25% to 3%.
We know every single real tax cutter in Massachusetts. We know every major phony and fake friend of taxpayers. Every slick, smooth-talking chameleon who tries to blend in with tax cutters — while he VOTES FOR TAX HIKES, VOTES FOR PROPERTY TAX INCREASES (Prop. 2 ½ overrides), and CAMPAIGNS AGAINST and VOTES AGAINST A MAJOR TAX CUT.
Scott Brown is the worst fake tax-cutter in the Massachusetts legislature. And a fake ally is more dangerous than an open enemy.

So, just to review . . . we’ve got a Republican who is a member of the National Guard for 30 years and a practing attorney — how that translates to “career politician” is beyond me — who is actually within striking distance of winning Ted Kennedy’s seat. He would be the vote that restores the filibuster; Democrats are openly talking about his election meaning the end of Obamacare; with it would probably go cap-and-trade, card check, perhaps amnesty, the continuance of bailout nation, raising the debt limits, and so on. It would be the biggest psychological blow to big-government liberalism since the 1994 Republican Revolution, and probably trigger another slew of Democratic congressional retirements.

But he didn’t vote the right way every time, and so now we’re going to throw away the political upset of the century, and allow Martha Coakley to win with a plurality, because the third-party option polling in the single digits checks all the boxes on the checklist.

I don’t think that Joe Kennedy, the independent, is going to get enough votes to be a factor in the race. But if he does — and if conservatives voting for him over issues like this make the difference and put Coakley in the seat . . . well, at a certain point, you begin to wonder if your political movement has enough strategic sense to be worth participating in, or whether it’s all a waste of time.

The opportunity to “radically increase the number of TRUE tax cut and spending cut candidates on the ballot this November” sounds great, but some of us would like to #%*@$ stop Obamacare before then.