McCain's public weapon: Scott Brown

by Mark Silva

The first time that John McCain ran for the Senate in Arizona, a state where he had resided for just six years, four of them as a congressman, he made a joke about retired people that he quickly came to rue.

Addressing an audience in Tucson, McCain referred to Leisure World, a retirement golf community in Mesa, as "Seizure World.'' Ninety-seven percent of the residents had voted in the last election, he said, and "the other 3 percent were in intensive care.'' His rival turned the joke on McCain, who learned something about the art of rapid response and also attributed the line to his own irrepressible trait as a "wiseass.''

There's no more joking around in the district that McCain inherited in 1986 from Barry Goldwater. This year, the fourth-term senator faces a fight within his own GOP from a conservative challenger, J.D. Hayworth, tagging McCain as the ultimate insider.

This time, McCain is importing Scott Brown.

The Massachusetts Republican who won the Senate seat held for nearly five decades by the late Sen. Edward M. Kennedy -- one of McCain's partners in a career of bipartisan legislation in Washington -- is making his first campaign trip as senator.

His visit to Arizona today is a test of his popularity among Republican activists after he broke with the GOP leadership to side with Democrats in supporting a jobs bill soon after taking office and denying the Democrats of their super-majority in the Senate.

"As a nationally popular Republican representing a left-leaning state, Brown walks a fine line between pleasing his base and positioning himself for re-election,'' the Associated Press' Jonathan Cooper writes. "It's a challenge McCain knows well. Some Arizona conservatives have long been skeptical of the Arizona senator over his own work with Democrats in support of issues including campaign-finance and immigration reform.''

Brown's visit is supposed to help the senior senator from Arizona galvanize support on the right. Brown's victory gave Republicans the crucial 41st vote they needed to block Democratic legislation in the Senate. On his first opportunity to do so, however, he was one of five Republicans to prevent a filibuster and allow the jobs bill to advance. It later passed the Senate on a formal vote with support from 13 Republicans.

Brown is stumping with McCain in Phoenix today and Tucson on Saturday, with a fundraiser planned in Scottsdale. McCain was one of Brown's earliest backers in the Bay State special election at a time when he looked like a longshot for the Senate. Days after election, Brown recorded a phone call asking Arizona Republicans to support McCain.

Leaders of four key Arizona "tea party" groups have announced that they will not endorse any candidate in the race, a blow to McCain's GOP primary opponent, who has tried to define himself as the race's tea party candidate. Hayworth, former congressman and conservative talk-radio host, announced in January that he would challenge McCain.