It didn't have to be like this. Senator Scott Brown could have run for the Senate based on his high personal-approval ratings, and on what was once considered a winning personality, and on his perceived status as an independent voice in an increasingly polarized national legislature. He could have taken the high road in his election against Elizabeth Warren because, quite honestly, the road wasn't all that high. It was within reach even for someone who didn't have Brown's hoops-honed vertical. It would have been easy to do.

Instead, almost from jump, Brown determined to run as a not-particularly-bright evening drive-time AM radio host. He latched onto the nothingburger of Warren's Indian ancestry and went into it all the way back to his molars. He wouldn't shut up about it. Alternately, he tried to make an issue out of the fact that Warren had worked for companies going through bankruptcy, including Travelers Insurance, which was dealing with the whopping awards granted to the people whom the asbestos industry had poisoned and killed. This might have worked — to understand what Warren did required a knowledge of bankruptcy law beyond most people who are not Elizabeth Warren — except that Warren marshalled the lawyers for the plaintiffs in those suits, and the surviving members of the victims' families, and they all went very public about how much Warren's work had helped them and their families. Some of them appeared in a very powerful television commercial called "Ashamed," in which they criticized Brown for politicizing their private tragedies in such a reckless way. That, people could understand.

At which point, Senator McDreamy decided to double down the way you would if you were, say, Sean Hannity, and somebody got through the call screeners....