Keller @ Large: Class Warfare A Theme In Senate Race
BOSTON (CBS) - After several days of feisty exchanges, it looks like U.S. Senate candidates Scott Brown and Elizabeth Warren will release some of their recent tax returns on Friday.
The back-and-forth over tax disclosure is just the latest example of a developing campaign theme: Class warfare.
WBZ NewsRadio 1030's Mark Katic reports
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Brown wants to cast Warren as a Cambridge liberal who wants to tax businesses and regular working stiffs like, allegedly himself back to the stone age.
And on the campaign trail in East Boston Wednesday, Warren is responding in kind.
Brown is quick to remind voters of Warren's Ivy League job and Hollywood supporters, casting himself as the Burger King to her 'Brie Queen.'
"He's called me an elitist about 100 kazillion times now, that's a technical count here," says Warren. "And all I've really tried to do is get out there and talk about what's happening to America's families."
But moments later, Warren proves eager to label Brown a warrior for upper-class interests.
"I got mine, the rest of you are on your own, that's real class warfare," she says. "The ones who say look, I'm gonna vote so that millionaires, and people making a million dollars a billion dollars year don't have to pay as much in taxes as their secretaries? That's really about protecting a tiny slice of the wealthiest and most powerful."
That may energize Warren's base. But some, like independent East Boston businessman Bob Vitale, are unimpressed.
"She likes to raise taxes but when she had the opportunity to pay an extra tax, she didn't do it," says Vitale. "It's a contradiction in my opinion."
That's a reference to Warren's disclosure that she did not opt to pay the higher income tax rate on her state tax return. Brown didn't pay it either, but he did vote against the so-called 'Buffett Tax' on millionaires that Warren referenced.
Both candidates hope those facts will help them paint their rival as a class of politician you really don't care to vote for.
