The Latest

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— Olbermann cries racism

— CNN can only see negative factors in Brown’s win

— CBS not happy with the results

— Brown 2012? Blame Paddy Power, not us

— NOW, on to the next battle: when will Brown be seated?

— BREAKING: Rush Limbaugh reacts to Brown victory

— Globies call it for Brown – can you imagine the long faces in that newsroom?

— Maddow holds back tears as she reports AP projection that Brown would win, minutes after other networks report Coakley has conceded the race

— Maddow’s making cracks about Scott’s truck, what a sore loser

— Rachel Maddow is alleging all kinds of fraud- robocalls for Joe Kennedy, filled in ballots for Brown (these concerns have already been dismissed)

— Not sure where Martha would make up her deficit at this point – half of Boston’s already in

— MSNBC / Dean blaming Coakley loss on “partisanship” and BUSH!!!

— MSNBC: Dem party leadership pounding Coakley for her “Caribbean vacation” – easy scapegoat, isn’t she?

— From RCP: 8:51pm For what it’s worth, Bostonian Howie Carr says on Fox that Brown is a lock to win. – Tom Bevan

— GLOBIE WEBSITE SUCKS! It is down, down, down

— Maddow links robocalls for Joe Kennedy to voter confusion, then why does Joe have only 1% of the vote

— Another unwatched MSNBC host, Rachel Maddow appears to deliver the bad news

— Chris Matthews is rambling on about Haiti and “wars”, have another drink, buddy

— Brown winning Quincy is huge, that’s not GOP territory, it’s a fairly large city

— some of Brown’s best suburbs on the North Shore have yet to report

— It looks like a funeral at MSNBC right now, Chris Matthews looks glum, am I the only person watching?

— Brown not doing as badly as one would expect in Boston, but it’s a bit early there

— Brown wins several outer / lower Cape towns that went for Obama in 2008

— Brown winning Plymouth, Obama won there in 2008

— Very difficult to reach Herald and Globie websites, isn’t it?

— Just returned from last-minute sign-waving outside the precinct. Brown supporters upbeat, one die-hard Coakley backer there as well. Lots of friendly waves and honks…

— State-run media still obsessed with Camelot

— Will the Scott Brown stock market rally continue?

— MSNBC / Chris Matthews turn against Mass voters

— Looks like Martha’s banking on placing a cloud over the election with her crazy tampering allegation. But who will believe that the GOP has fixed the election in Cambridge and Brighton? Isn’t that a joke?

— WaPo hacks can’t figure out why race is so competitive

— RNC’s Michael Steele arriving in Boston to celebrate potential win. But if Scott wins, it will be despite the national party’s efforts, not because of it.

— Scott hopes to get a chance to drive his pickup truck to Washington. Beltway snobs are aghast.

— What kind of national role will Scott Brown play? Once again, underestimating Scott is a big mistake.

— McCain redux: Brown owns too many houses

— Coakley’s pointing fingers right back at the DNC and White House

— WSJ tries to fathom how this could be a close race

— Who knew Coakley could be such a laff riot? She’s alleging voter irregularities in Cambridge and Brighton

— RCP: Another disturbing incident between Coakley’s people and a reporter

— WTKK reports heavy suburban turnout

— GLOBIES CALL IT FOR MARSHA? Yes, it’s a practice page, but you’ve got to love their wishful thinking

— I’m hearing from a number of listeners who are baffled as to why WRKO would preempt Rush Limbaugh at such an important time. Sure, local talent is filling in, but Rush is talking about Massachusetts! So why the switcheroo?

I believe this is Entercom’s way of sticking it to Limbaugh’s syndicator ahead of a likely move to Clear Channel’s new talk station, scheduled to debut here in April. Expect more petty silliness between now and then.

In my area, however, this isn’t a problem: WXTK-FM offers a excellent alternative.

We’ll cover the issue more after the election is sorted out.

— As you head to the polls, think about the Amiraults

— A lot has changed since December 8, hasn’t it?

— Marsha predicts victory

— Is this election fraud?

BREAKING: Another Coakley Screw-up!

In a Senate campaign that has re-written the textbook on political self-destruction, Democrats have blown it yet again. An anti-Brown smear piece was apparently created by someone who was unaware of what occurred on September 11, 2001. Red-faced Dems have since pulled the spot.

The Politico has more:

A new ad from the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee uses an unlikely symbol of Wall Street greed: the World Trade Center.

The image in the attack on Scott Brown for his alleged closeness to Wall Street pictures the Trade Center and the destroyed Marriott Hotel on its western side.

A National Republican Senatorial Committee spokesman, Brian Walsh, attacked its use.

“Using the image of a site where over 2,700 Americans died in a terrorist attack to distort Scott Brown’s position on regulating Wall Street is both distasteful and disrespectful. Martha Coakley should immediately renounce this ad and call for it to be removed from the airwaves,” he said.

BREAKING: SHOCK POLL SHOWS BROWN AHEAD OF COAKLEY

An incredibly busy weekend for campaign-related developments continues, this time with eagerly-anticipated results of the Public Policy Polling survey that is the first to show Republican Scott Brown with a lead over Democrat Martha Coakley for the open US Senate seat.

Bloggers are jumping on the news, which adds to recent momentum strongly in Brown’s favor.

As PPP has a relatively good track record in political polling, the results are seen as credible. But Brown’s one-point lead makes the race a virtual tie when the margin of error is considered:

Buoyed by a huge advantage with independents and relative disinterest from Democratic voters in the state, Republican Scott Brown leads Martha Coakley 48-47.

Here are the major factors leading to this surprising state of affairs:

-As was the case in the Gubernatorial elections in New Jersey and Virginia last year, it looks like the electorate in Massachusetts will be considerably more conservative than the one that showed up in 2008. Obama took the state by 26 points then, but those planning to vote next week only report having voted for him by 16.

-Republicans are considerably more enthusiastic about turning out to vote than Democrats are. 66% of GOP voters say they are ‘very excited’ about casting their votes, while only 48% of Democrats express that sentiment- and that’s among the Democrats who are planning to vote in contrast to the many who are apparently not planning to do so at this point.

-Brown has eye popping numbers with independents, sporting a 70/16 favorability rating with them and holding a 63-31 lead in the horse race with Coakley. Health care may be hurting Democratic fortunes with that group, as only 27% of independents express support for Obama’s plan with 59% opposed.

-In a trend that’s going to cause Democrats trouble all year, voters disgusted with both parties are planning to vote for the one out of power. Perhaps the most remarkable thing about Brown’s standing is that only 21% of Massachusetts voters have a favorable opinion of Congressional Republicans…but at the same time only 33% view Congressional Democrats favorably. And among voters who have a negative take on both parties, who account for more than 20% of the electorate, Brown leads 74-21.

-Because he’s basically been untouched so far, Brown’s favorability spread is a remarkable +32, at 57/25. For some perspective on how good those numbers are, Bob McDonnell was at a +20 spread with Virginia voters in our final poll there before going on to a 17 point victory.

PPP also includes constructive advice for Coakley, should she choose to turn the race around in her favor, but time is running out. At this point, her party’s best hope will be a last-minute smear campaign against Brown, most likely utilizing the Boston Globe or other area media outlets. Count on desperate Democrats to go this route.

ELSEWHERE: William Jacobson recounts his day spent at Scott Brown’s campaign headquarters.

NEXT: we await results of the Herald and Globie polls. Early word has the Herald portraying this as a horse race, while the Globies show Coakley with a comfortable lead. The latter survey would actually help Brown’s cause if it lulls panicked Dems back into a sense of complacency.

ALSO: building anger over the Dem plan to stall Brown’s swearing-in and leave unelected cockroach Paul Kirk in office.

Even The Globies Aren’t Fooled By Martha’s Cheap Ploy

When you’re a Massachusetts Democratic Party nominee for the US Senate, it’s not easy to run afoul of the Boston Globe, a partisan newspaper of the first order. Glowing tributes, followed by the inevitable endorsement, can be expected without fail.

That’s why today’s editorial is especially damning: did Martha Coakley really believe her childish ploy wouldn’t be seen as transparent? Her sudden concern for including “all candidates” in upcoming debates means a phony “Kennedy” on the ballot would participate and shield cowardly Coakley from a real one-on-one showdown.

From the Globie editorial:

Yet a one-on-one debate would be a microcosm of the political environment awaiting the next US senator – an intensely partisan climate in which Democrats and Republicans are forever jockeying for advantage – and give voters a look at how Coakley and Brown would hold up in it.

Kennedy, a libertarian who isn’t related to the most famous family in Massachusetts politics, deserves a spot in some debates. It’s easy to see, though, why the third-party candidate’s presence at all debates would be so helpful to Coakley. For one thing, it would pit Brown against another candidate who might appeal to conservative voters.

Furthermore, multicandidate debates helped the attorney general in the Democratic primary race. As rivals Michael Capuano and Steve Pagliuca duked it out, Coakley stayed serenely above the fray – a posture that’s much harder to maintain with only one other opponent on the stage.

But WRKO’s Howie Carr believes Coakley’s making a strategic error for a different reason: it’s not wise to promote the fact that a “Kennedy” is on the ballot. From his column:

But Martha’s problem is, with a Kennedy on the ballot – any Kennedy – any damned thing can happen. Back in the 1950s, three times Massachusetts elected a treasurer named John F. Kennedy, the F being for Francis, not Fitzgerald. The other JFK probably could have gone on having it made, except he decided to run for governor in 1960, the same year the real guy was running for president.

The other JFK finished fifth. Two other John Kennedys ran for treasurer. They lost too. Three other John Kennedys ran for office that year too – two for state rep and one for Norfolk County treasurer. I think they lost too.

Back in 1986, Joe Kennedy – Joe P., not Joe L. – was running for Tip O’Neill’s seat. I knew a guy working the polls on primary day in Medford – Ed Markey’s congressional district. All day, the guy said, old ladies would go into the voting booths and then come out, waving their ballots.

“I came down here to vote for Kennedy,” they’d yell. “Why isn’t Joe Kennedy’s name on the ballot?”

In those days the electorate was befuddled by beer. Now, I would venture to guess, most of Martha Coakley’s potential voters are addled by powerful prescription meds. Does anyone seriously think the electorate is shrewder than it used to be?

Giving Us The Middle Finger

Thanks, Rose Kennedy Schlossberg, for so accurately representing your family’s sentiments toward the little people of Massachusetts.

That middle finger aimed out the window during Ted K’s motorcade perfectly sums up the situation: we’ll behave any way we like, while you will continue to reward us with eternal political power, all because of our “royal” surname.

Now that the circus is over, the focus has shifted toward political fallout. Harry Reid has already admitted that Ted’s death was really about boosting the party’s fortunes in Congress, while here at home, the local media is ready to assign the seat to crooked Joe Kennedy.

Though The Globies and their apologists are ready to turn the US Senate into the House of Lords, with its former tradition of hereditary peerages, opposition researchers representing a number of candidates will be pounding away at Joe’s shady background.

For its part, talk radio has a chance to be relevant: it may not be able to revitalize a moribund GOP, but it could easily stop Joe with a bit of effort.

Also in target range: Beacon Hill’s Corruptocrats. Caroline Kennedy Schlossberg’s ill-fated, clumsy “run” for the vacant Senate seat in New York helped to damage Governor Paterson’s public standing beyond repair. Ultimately, he was stuck in a lose-lose position and made a different selection.

How our legislature and governor proceed from here could absolutely imperil their respective political careers as well. Let the implosion begin!