Like more than one local blogger (Michael Bouldin and Dan Millstone come to mind) I recently discovered that post-election malaise is not restricted to the bad years. To top it off, I recently encountered Facebook and found the ability to connect with 30 years of my history in one night more addicting than heroin. The last time a site (Jdate) had such an impact, I ended up a husband and father in less than a year and a half.
This time, by the time I came to, my brilliant idea that Abner Mikva should be made caretaker Senator from Illinois had already been used by Michael Tomasky (we won’t even talk about the consequences of my failure to advise Malcolm Smith). It seems a good time to get back to work.
There is a crucial selection to be made soon in New York politics that will impact all of our lives for the years to come. But Page Six is infinitely more fun than page one, so forget the Majority Leadership (is that what they’re still calling it?) and talk about Dancing With The Stars.
I’ll be the first to admit that the waterfall of Caroline Kennedy bashing amongst many in New York’s political chattering classes has its ludicrous aspects.
Residents of the Bronx yowling about such an appointment would render us into a third world banana republic; supporters of Carolyn Maloney complaining about people greasing their career in politics with the acquisitions of ancestors and relatives; supporters of Andrew Cuomo complaining about political primogeniture (sure to be a powerful and compelling argument to be made to the son of Basil Paterson); supporters of Kristen Gillibrand clucking their tongues about the crimes committed by unsavory ancestors; supporters of Liz Holtzman (who though she preceded Chuck Schumer in his Congressional seat and shares with him an Assemblywoman and Councilmember, does belong to an entirely different Park Slope Synagogue) complaining about how such an appointment wouldn’t address diversity issues; supporters of one time candidate Nydia Velazquez complaining about how a candidate’s personal identity shouldn’t trump their accomplishments.
Let’s be fair, Caroline Kennedy has a great legal mind, right? So brilliant, in fact, that she’s had no need to endure the onerous requirement that she spend one hour per month on continuing legal education. And so what? If such failings won’t stop one from becoming a judge, why would they stand in the way of a US Senator? Why not be impressed by her personal characteristics? Caroline is the one member of her Kennedy generation who is both capable of passing the bar without practicing and passing a bar without entering.
Surely, comparisons with Sarah Palin are unfair. While both needed to be shielded from reporters' questions during their campaigns, the reasons are quite different. Palin needed to be kept from reporters for fear she’d say something, while Caroline needs to be shielded for fear she’d say nothing. And Caroline has written more books than Palin’s read (and who would ever accuse a Kennedy of using a ghostwriter?)
It is times like these when I yearn for a US Senator whose father worked as an exterminator (Of course, I then realize that we already have one and come to my senses).
But even I will admit that this is hardly a matter which will reflect very negatively in a body containing a Murkowski, Dodd, Bayh, Landrieu, Casey and Rockefeller, not to mention another Kennedy and two Udalls.
There is one significant difference though between Caroline and those legacies, as well as those of departing Senators Clinton, Dole & Sununu, not to mention Andrew, David Paterson, Yvette Clark, the Weprins, the Crowleys and the entire political class of the Bronx. The others may have all started on third base believing they’d hit a triple, but all got to home base on their own strength. Some of them even had to work hard for it and learned a few things in the process.
If New Yorkers are ready for Caroline, and Caroline is ready for New York (and I don’t discount the possibility that, after a campaign in which she will be given a full-body cavity search by our local media, she may turn out to have what it takes) they’ll put her in themselves.
In the meantime, I have graciously expressed my willingness to my the great sacrifice of serving as a caretaker until G-d and the voters can sort out which dynasty they prefer to elevate in our local War of the Roses. Not surprisingly, the idea has already attracted support on the web.
It is only a matter of time before someone launches a Facebook page on my behalf. Nonetheless, I would be remiss if I did not point out that the idea of using Room 8 to launch a campaign for one of its regulars is not an original one.
The 2006 effort by this writer to ignite a web-driven write-in campaign supporting video-blogger Adam Green for State Comptroller was an attempt to follow in the footsteps of a time-honored American tradition of joke candidacies, which included the Presidential campaigns of humorists like Will Rogers (1928, 1932), W.C. Fields (1940), Gracie Allen (1940), Pat Paulsen (1968, 1972, 1992, 1996) and Steven Colbert (2008), cartoon characters like Walt Kelly’s Pogo (1952, 1956, 1960, 1968), and Dennis Kucinich [a dead ringer for Roger Rabbit, right down to the wife–even Sarkozy is jealous](2004, 2008), and swine like Pigasus (1968) and Ralph Nader (1992, 1996, 2000, 2004, 2008) . The Citywide ticket of Norman Mailer and Jimmy Breslin (1969) also comes to mind, although they ended up serving the serious and laudable purpose of preventing Herman Badillo (Liberal Democratic hero turned conservative Republican hero; crusader for virtue turned land use lawyer for hire–politics changed; arrogance, moral certainty and sense of superiority exactly the same) from becoming Mayor.
So, all of you screaming about how repealing term limits tramples upon democracy (not to mention all those who believe that term limits tramples upon democracy), how about it? Should a choice that is inherently ours be made behind closed doors and given to someone unqualified, based upon their connections and money, when we as voters have already demonstrated we are capable of making similar selections ourselves?
To me, the solution seems to be to hurry up and wait. Meantime, let’s have some fun.
Governor, until last weekend, you were renown for your sense of humor. Now your well earned reputation for intentional (and unintentional) levity has been damaged by your uncharacteristic reaction to a sketch on Saturday Night Live–Why not use this opportunity to show the nation you can take a joke and deliver one as well?
GATEMOUTH FOR US SENATE