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What Makes Chris Dodd Run?

Concerning the strike authorized by CBS News writers this week, four questions quickly rise to the surface:

1) Will the Democrat candidates for president support the strike by refusing to cross picket lines? Yes. Who among the candidates has lent their support to the unionists? Hillary Rodham Clinton, Barack Obama, Bill Richardson, Chris Dodd and John Edwards all have pledged their support, though it may be a measure of the esteem in which Connecticut’s own Dodd is held that the story from Politico, “CBS strike could put debate in disarray,” mentions Dodd only fleetingly. Dodd has yet to rise much above 3% in most polls, and his coverage in the national media is correspondingly slight.

2) Will the strike and the reluctance of leading Democrats to cross picket lines affect the debates? Yes. Clinton, the front runner, has issued a statement that said, “It is my hope that both sides will reach an agreement that results in a secure contract for the workers at CBS News, but let me be clear: I will honor the picket line if the workers at CBS News decide to strike.”

3) Does anyone care about the debates? Sort of. Mediafolk care about them, but, the general public is snoozing through the so called “debates,” which seem to them more like glorified news conferences than anything they remember from their American History classes.

4) Qui bono? Who will the strike help most? Hillary. Her pants were put on fire during the last debate, and she could use a “time out.”

5 Will anything help Dodd? No. People in Connecticut still can’t figure out why he entered the race in the first place.

Speculation, though, is rife:

a) Dodd may have wanted to boost sales for his book, a compilation of letters his father wrote his mother while facilitating the Nuremberg trials of Nazi war criminals.

b) Dodd may be restless; after 23 years in the senate, one tens to develop rust spots.

c) Dodd is running for president of DailyKos and MoveOn.org. The senator remembers – mostly because he participated in the process – how his fellow Democrat sidekick Sen. Joe Lieberman was roughly treated by homegrown Kossack wannabes, and he is determined not to suffer the same humiliation. Dodd's defection from his long time friendship with the senator after the Connecticut primary, which Lieberman lost to liberal heart-throb Ned Lamont, was like watching Don Quixote stand by as bandits kicked the tar out of Sancho Panza. The major media in Connecticut is supinely liberal, and with few exceptions has not opened fire on Dodd for having, among other things, developed a too cozy relationship with campaign contributors he is regulating as chairman of the senate Banking Committee.

d) He’s yearning for a spot on the ticket of the next Democrat president, possible Hillary or Barack Obama.

e) It may be time for the senator to cash in his chips. Now in a new marriage, Dodd is the father of young children who tend, when they grow up, to be expensive propositions. A cushy job among friends in the financial sector may ease the economic pain.

f) He's listened too many times to the song, "I Gotta Be Me."

Some candidates for president run to be president; others run to make a point. Dodd’s point, as concerns foreign policy, is not much different than the talking points made in the usual Democrat campaign literature: War is bad, peace is good; the war in Iraq is unwinable; the troops should be brought home at the earliest possible date. Dodd has suggested March as a non-negociable withdrawl date. The surge commanded by the denigrated General David Petraeus appears to be working, but hopeful signs in Baghdad and other badlands of Iraq that suggest the local population, both Sunni and Shiite, have joined in the fight against al-Qaeda leave Dodd cold.

Comments

Anonymous said…
I think he is bored.

Or he wants to be Sec of State, notice how nice he is to Hillary?

Either way, we can do better for a Senator, like one that shows up for work!!!
Anonymous said…
I vote "e" - that and the fact that Chris knows he can keep every unspent dime of his campaign fund. Perfect for furthering his retirement fund.

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