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Nominate-best-2010

The X factor

By DAVID S. BERNSTEIN  |  November 24, 2009

Last chance
Punches may also be thrown in two televised debates that will kick off the last week of campaigning.

These back-to-back debates, taking place immediately after the holiday weekend, could be crucial. On Tuesday, WCVB will host a one-hour debate, while a consortium including NECN and WGBH will host one the following evening.

If Coakley's lead is solid, those debates should be largely irrelevant — as long as she doesn't screw up. But if there is an opening for a challenger to emerge and make this a competitive two-person battle, it will likely happen those two nights.

That could be the point when voters — who have seen plenty of Capuano and Pagliuca ads — first take notice of Khazei, who was deemed by many analysts to have performed well in the one previous televised debate.

Even so, Khazei could be hard-pressed to take advantage: he had only $500,000 cash on hand as of November 18. Capuano had $1.1 million, and Coakley had $1.9 million — while Pagliuca, with a personal fortune, presumably has as much as he wants at his disposal.

That means voters should be seeing plenty of the candidates' final pitches in the week after Thanksgiving — if they're not already distracted by their Christmas planning.

To read the "Talking Politics" blog, go to thePhoenix.com/talkingpolitics. David S. Bernstein can be reached at dbernstein@thephoenix.com.

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Related: Does Scott Brown’s victory mean doom for RI Democrats?, How Brown won, Chaos Theory, More more >
  Topics: Talking Politics , Massachusetts, Election Campaigns, Congressional and Parliamentary Elections,  More more >
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ARTICLES BY DAVID S. BERNSTEIN
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  •   ELEPHANT IN THE ROOM  |  January 27, 2010
    Platoons of state Republicans, energized by Scott Brown's stunning victory over Democrat Martha Coakley last week, are setting their sights on November.
  •   DISASTER, THEN DÉTENTE  |  January 25, 2010
    From the first days after the earthquake struck Haiti — long before anyone knew how dire the situation was, let alone how the US government would respond — pundits were wagging their tongues about the potential political implications. A poor response, they said, would invite comparisons to the Bush administration's bungled handling of Hurricane Katrina in New Orleans.
  •   HOW BROWN WON  |  January 22, 2010
    As the Massachusetts US Senate election unfolded yesterday, all that the pols and pundits wanted to talk about was how Martha Coakley managed to lose the race. And there is plenty there to dissect. But there is another part of the story, and that is how Scott Brown managed to win it.
  •   READY TO RUMBLE  |  January 13, 2010
    Last summer, the upcoming race that got most Bay State politicos salivating was the run for governor.
  •   CHAOS THEORY  |  January 08, 2010
    In less than two weeks, when Massachusetts voters elect Martha Coakley to the US Senate — let's not pretend that Republican state senator Scott Brown has any chance of pulling off the monumental upset — they will trigger a massive domino effect that has the state's political class buzzing with anticipation.

 See all articles by: DAVID S. BERNSTEIN

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