Fit To Print

Swiftboat Redux

November 6th, 2008

The fact that it is being widely reported that Kerry is making a big push for Sec’y of State probably means one of four things:

1) He’s just not that clever about these maneuvers. No one wants it known they are actively saying, “appoint me”.

2) The Obama Team is floating his name to see if the reaction is overwhelmingly negative or just kind of negative.

3) Kerry was promised the appointment in return for his primary endorsement and doesn’t want Obama to reneg.

4) He was asked if he would take the post and wanted to say, “it depends”, but that had already gotten him in trouble. So he just said “yes”.

I actually have a lot of admiration for Kerry, and I’m almost postive I’ll prefer him to whoever else might get the job. But my feeling is that appointing Kerry would expend more political capital than it’s worth. And that’s a shame. You gotta feel some sympathy for the guy. He can’t quietly jockey for power, he can’t win outside of Massachusetts, and he can’t tell a joke to save his life. These are pretty important abilities for most pols.

Entry Filed under: Politics