Petri Statement On MA Senate Race

Rep. Tom Petri offers the following comments on the stunning election yesterday in Massachusetts of Republican Scott Brown to the U.S. Senate:

"I think it was nearly unprecedented.  You had an underfunded, unknown candidate elected to Teddy Kennedy's seat in Massachusetts, a heavily Democratic state.  That couldn't have happened if people weren't very, very concerned about the direction the country is going in and the fact that, despite their expressing concerns at town meetings all across the country and on talk radio and any other outlet they could find - chat rooms and the like - no one seemed to be listening at the White House or in the leadership in the House and Senate.

"This is a real wake-up call.  I just hope people respond and we get down to more seriously working together here in Washington in a sensible way on our nation's problems."