Politics in Mass.

In 2004, the Massachusetts Democrats passed a law to require a special election as the only means to fill a vacated seat in the U.S. Senate. Prior to that, the governor could appoint an interim senator to fill the seat until the election took place. The bill was specifically aimed at preventing Mitt Romney from making such an appointment in the event that John Kerry won the presidential election.

In 2009, Ted Kennedy is looking more and more unlikely to be able to finish his term. We have a Democratic governor, and there's a push on for changing the law to allow the governor to appoint an interim senator.

Nothing hippo critical about that, is there?

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