#MASen Update: Elizabeth Warren’s DNC Speech Falls Flat, Hit in San Fran., Miss in Mass

In Massachusetts, today’s lead in the Boston Globe says it all about the state of Professor Elizabeth Warren’s campaign — Elizabeth Warren used a national audience Wednesday night to deliver a campaign message that has hit a roadblock back at home.

Added to Warren’s problems, the New York Times reports that real Native American Democrats in Charlotte this week are continuing to hold Warren’s feet to the fire on her bizarre claim that she is a minority.  Karen Geronimo, a member of the Mescalero Apache tribe in town for the Democratic convention, knows what she wants from Elizabeth Warren, the Senate candidate from Massachusetts: a blood sample.  “Someone needs to make her take a DNA test,” said Ms. Geronimo, whose husband, Harlyn Geronimo, is the great-grandson of the legendary warrior Geronimo.  The still-simmering controversy over Ms. Warren’s self-proclaimed American Indian heritage has chased her from the campaign trail in Massachusetts to the convention hall, resonating with a small but vocal constituency: American Indian Democrats.  During her academic career, Ms. Warren, a Harvard Law School professor, identified herself as a minority, citing her one thirty-second Cherokee blood, a fact that Republicans pounced on to try to portray her as an opportunist and a fraud. The line on her résumé does not seem to set well with some Indian members of her own party.  “If you’re going to be Native, don’t just be Native on paper,” said Lexie LaMere, a Nebraska delegate and member of the Winnebago Tribe of Nebraska. “What’s troubling is that she’s shown nothing in her history of being involved in Native American issues.”

Over at Reason’s Hit & Run blog, Garrett Quinn says Elizabeth Warren’s DNC Speech Falls Flat. Warren’s speech was an Us vs. Them argument even though her opponent, Sen. Scott Brown, is doing a better job of making it a non-partisan one-on-one contest. Indeed, Warren never mentioned Brown in her DNC speech. As a Republican, Brown has huge institutional disadvantages in Massachusetts that range from registration disparity to the stunning incompetency of the state party to organize at the hyperlocal level. Rocketing to stardom after launching her campaign but struggling since, Warren has somehow managed to fail to meet expectations in a state that is overwhelmingly Democratic. Her enduring a scandal about her reported American Indian heritage and often being outmaneuvered by the Brown campaign has not helped her either.

Michael Patrick Leahy at Breitbart concurred citing Warren Speech: Hit in San Fran., Miss in Mass. They loved Elizabeth Warren’s DNC speech in San Francisco: ELIZABETH WARREN: Sensible. She projects “sensible,” but don’t mistake that for a lack of passion, or a lack of political instinct. She also projects “relentless.” Warren took a crowd ready to fall in love and sealed the deal. She showed why Scott Brown is in the fight of his brief career. But in Boston they wonder why she failed to mention Scott Brown. But if you passed up the football game to watch it, Warren’s speech had one somewhat curious omission – any mention of her opponent, Scott Brown. And that she is more interested in the national spotlight: She spoke in Charlotte rather than campaign in Charlestown because she wants to nationalize the race and portray Scott Brown as a Republican yes-man who will thwart the Obama agenda. But Brown has an independent voting record. And unlike Warren, Brown didn’t speak at his party’s convention to add volume to their national agenda. If anything, by speaking in prime time last night Warren proved that if elected she would be a “hell, yes” woman for the national Democratic platform, no matter how much the independent majority of voters in Massachusetts thinks it out of step with their views.

Meanwhile, continuing his ongoing dialogue with voters during the DNC convention this week, Scott Brown writes in the Boston Herald today, Unfortunately, my opponent, Elizabeth Warren, subscribes to this way of doing business. She says she will “throw rocks” at people she disagrees with, and that she would prefer “plenty of blood and teeth left on the floor” than compromise. She makes wild accusations against people who simply don’t see things her way.  I have strongly held views, but I recognize others have different ideas, and I trust they believe what they do for the same reason I believe what I do — because we think our ideas will lead to a better America for ourselves and future generations.

Finally, continuing to undercut the Democrats’ attacks on him, the Boston Herald reports, Republican Sen. Scott Brown crossed the aisle this morning to join in a chorus of praise for first lady Michelle Obama, who addressed the Democratic National Convention last night.  “We’ve met her obviously and Gail has spent more time with her than I have. She’s a striking woman, hard-charging and an exceedingly dedicated family person,” Brown said.