Stupid Columnists

There must be a publication out there where Maureen Dowd's column from yesterday's NY Times would fit quite nicely.  Vogue, Readers Digest, O, or maybe even GQ itself.  But the Op-Ed pages of the NY Times isn't the place I would expect to find such fine political analysis and advocacy in favor of making Caroline Kennedy the junior U.S. Senator for New York:

I found it bizarre that when Caroline offered to use her magic capital — and friendship with Barack Obama — to help take care of New York in this time of economic distress, she was blasted by a howl of “How dare she?”

People are suddenly awfully choosy about who gets to go to the former home of Jesse Helms, Strom Thurmond and Robert Torricelli.

First, nobody "blasted her" by a howls of how dare she.  If she cares to look at the polls that came out in mid-to-late December after she expressed interest and started campaigning/lobbying for the position you'll see that a plurality of the people were willing to give her a chance:

New York State voters split 40 - 41 percent on whether Caroline Kennedy is qualified to be a U.S. Senator, but they expect by a 48 - 25 percent margin that Gov. David Paterson will name her to the Senate seat being vacated by Hillary Clinton, according to a Quinnipiac University poll released today.

Offered a choice, 33 percent of voters say Gov. Paterson should name Ms. Kennedy, while 29 percent say Attorney General Andrew Cuomo should get the nod. Another 4 percent pick Albany-area U.S. Rep. Kirsten Gillibrand, while 24 percent want someone else and 10 percent are undecided, the independent Quinnipiac (KWIN-uh-pe-ack) University poll finds.

 Emphasis added.  But she just mismanaged her roll-out as a "candidate."  Her biggest drawback is that she doesn't have a political track record, which means that nobody knows what she believes in or why, what type of experience she has that makes her the best person to fight for the interest of New York in the Senate, and what her priorities would be.  Then she went on a statewide "tour" where she really didn't offer much to address these issues.  The reason she's referred to by some as "Senator You Know" is a reflection of her failure to prepare for this.

The results are clear and unsurprising:

Raleigh, N.C. – Caroline Kennedy’s popularity has taken a major hit as the result of her public campaign to be appointed to Hillary Clinton’s Senate seat, the newest survey from Public Policy Polling finds.

44% of the state’s voters now say they have a lesser opinion of Kennedy than they did before she started vying for the position. 33% say it’s made no difference, and 23% report now having a more favorable opinion of her. A plurality of Democrats, Republicans, and independents all say that her efforts have caused them to view her less favorably.

When it comes to whether they would prefer to see Kennedy or Andrew Cuomo appointed, 58% now prefer Cuomo to 27% for Kennedy. Cuomo is favored by 65% of Republicans, 59% of independents, and 54% of Democrats. A PPP survey conducted a month ago showed Cuomo as the top choice for just 23% of Democrats, compared to 44% who wanted Kennedy.

“When Caroline Kennedy was first mentioned as a possible Senate appointee there was a lot of enthusiasm among New York Democrats about her,” said Dean Debnam, President of Public Policy Polling. “Her reputation has taken a pretty clear hit over the last month, and if Governor Paterson does end up appointing her she’s going to have some work to do to overcome this bad first impression she’s made on New York voters.”

Emphasis added.  The last highlighted phrase says it all; she had a good reputation in New York, which caused a lot of Democrats to feel good about her as the pick.  You could argue that she may have had to deal with unreasonable expectations, or at least higher expectations than other candidates would have faced.  But she should have seen that coming.  And she didn't.

But there's more to Dowd's idiocy:

Congress, which abdicated its oversight role as the Bush crew wrecked the globe and the economy, desperately needs fresh faces and new perspectives, an infusion of class, intelligence and guts.

And how exactly will Caroline Kennedy translate her "fresh face," "new perspectives" (if they really are new since we still don't know real well what she stands for), "class," "intelligence," and "guts" into meaningful and effective policy and legislation that would benefit her constituents and the Country as a whole?  And, btw, not once in the article did Dowd addressed what's so "gutsy" about Caroline.

People complain that the 51-year-old Harvard and Columbia Law School grad and author is not a glib, professional pol who knows how to artfully market herself, and is someone who hasn’t spent her life glad-handing, backstabbing and logrolling. I say, thank God.

I don't think people worry too much about the glad-handing, backstabbing, and logrolling.  But what Dowd calls glib, professional pols who can market themselves is, essentially, a candidate's ability to communicate and to connect with his/her constituents.  I don't think anyone would call Obama a "professional pol" since one of the biggest obstacles he had to overcome during the campaign was his lack of experience.  But boy did he know how to market himself and his message.  That's what didn't come through during Kennedy's "campaign."

The press whines that she doesn’t have a pat answer about why she wants the job. I’ve interviewed a score of men running for president; not one had a good answer for why he wanted it.

First, note how she creates a "gender issue" where there isn't one.  Or does she claim that Hillary and Sarah Palin had good answers to that question but all the men didn't?

Second, not only is it important to have at least a plausible answer about this issue.  It is even more important for someone like Caroline who has no experience as a candidate and has chosen to live her life as privately as possible given her father and her family's history.  I've never run for public office - and I don't think I ever will.  But if I did, wouldn't you want to know what made me pursue it?  It's a fair question to ask of anyone.

Robert Duffy, the mayor of Rochester, complained that when the would-be senator visited the Democratic headquarters there recently, she did not respond to pictures in a conference room of her father, mother, brother and herself as a little girl. Isn’t it creepy to expect her to emote on cue? Isn’t it more authentic to want to keep some of your most private feelings to yourself?

Emphasis added.  If you want to run for public office, you should be prepared to have your private sphere reduced significantly.  Besides, the issue here wasn't that she didn't react emotionally to the photographs.  It's that, apparently, she didn't acknowledge them at all.  That may be weird or that may be Caroline.  I don't think it's a big issue in and of itself.  But it seems to me that she was confronted with a situation to which she didn't know how to react.

Of course, trying to be objective wouldn't be Dowd's forté anyhow.

Comments

[La Ventanita]

Dude, Dowd is an idiot and a baiter.

For obvious reasons I don't like liberal columnists, but I appreciate that many write Opeds based on some facts and some level of rationality...

This Dowd chick is off the radar. I read that Oped yesterday and nearly choked.

[El Loco]

I've never paid much attention to her writings because they seemed . . . "intellectually challenged" (yeah, that's a good term for it). But she makes Ruben Navarrete sound good - and I have precious little good to say about him.