Dems cast blame at each other over Senate campaign AND THE GOP

WASHINGTON – The buck stops ... Well, it was hard to tell just where the buck stopped Tuesday when it came to the Democratic party's loss of the Massachusetts Senate seat that had been held by Edward M. Kennedy for nearly half a century. Days before Republican state Sen. Scott Brown officially captured the seat over Democrat Martha Coakley, Washington to Boston began dodging blame and pointing fingers at each other. Cool-headed analysis of what was driving independents from Coakley to Brown? No. The issue was who botched Democrat Martha Coakley's Senate campaign more: her state people or national Democrats. Most spoke the classic Washington way, under the cloak of anonymity. But President Barack Obama's senior adviser took precise, public aim at Coakley's camp as Brown closed in on the late Sen. Edward Kennedy's seat. "I think the White House did everything we were asked to do," David Axelrod told reporters. "Had we been asked earlier, we would have responded earlier." But the signs had been there. In the bluest of blue states, the election was seen, at least in part, as a referendum on Obama, on health care reform, on the Democratic majority that had controlled two of three branches of government for a year. And the Republican candidate was surging. What of Obama himself? "Surprised and frustrated," reported White House spokesman Robert Gibbs, promising more presidential reaction Wednesday. "Not pleased."