What Massachusetts' Voters Want

There has been a lot of discussion since last Tuesday as to the meaning of Republican Scott Brown's election to the US Senate seat held for so long by Senator Edward M. (Teddy) Kennedy. The Washington Post did a poll to find out. Its results, as reported in an Associated Press story in the Boston Globe include:

Nearly two-thirds of those who supported Brown over Democrat Martha Coakley said their vote was intended partly to show opposition to the Democratic agenda in Washington, including the health care overhaul. Still, rather than just blocking proposals, three-quarters said they wanted to see Brown work with Democrats to get GOP proposals into legislation in general; nearly half said that specifically about the health care legislation.

In other words, Massachusetts' voters

1. really don't like the agenda of the Democrats' national leadership (elsewhere, it was said they also didn't like the dishonest way the leadership has been pursuing that agenda), and
2. they wanted a Senator who wouldn't be just an obstructionist, like this decade's Democrats when they were in the minority.