Irvine511
Blue Crack Supplier
[q]Posted on Fri, Nov. 11, 2005
Bruce ready to run (for Senate)?
DEMOCRATS IN New Jersey have a big problem.
Sure, Sen. Jon Corzine's easy election as governor on Tuesday was their latest win in the increasingly blue state.
But Corzine's first decision when he takes office in January is a real doozy — appointing a Democrat to fill the last 11 months of his term and likely run for a full six-year term next November.
But most of the obvious choices reek of political hackery, even by Jersey standards. U.S. Rep. Robert Menendez, most often mentioned, is weighed down by ties to machine politics. And the others — South Jersey U.S. Rep. Rob Andrews, U.S. Rep. Rush Holt, and acting governor Richard Codey — are seriously lacking in star power.
In fact, you could say that Corzine's choice is like a highway jammed with broken heroes on a last-chance power drive.
Any of them would have a tough time defeating the up-and-coming golden boy of Garden State politics with that unbeatable family name, Republican state Sen. Tom Kean Jr., the ex-governor's son.
Nationally, the Dems must hold New Jersey if they have any hope of regaining the Senate, but to do that they will need to find someone from outside the bland political tried-and-true.
New Jersey's new senator should be — and could be — a person who has demonstrated, over a lifetime, a commitment to social causes and to those in need.
Corzine can choose a person who advocates causes that are unpopular but just — someone who spoke out, for example, in favor of the Dixie Chicks and free speech on the eve of the Iraq war.
In January, Corzine could pick someone whose compassion for the victims and survivors of 9/11 is unparalleled, yet who realized the insanity of the Iraq war from Day One, and was not afraid to risk his considerable reputation in opposing it.
Yes, he'd be another millionaire — but a self-made one, someone who can speak to blue-collar voters and can relate to minorities, in spite of his own personal success.
Corzine should appoint Bruce Springsteen to the U.S. States Senate.
Crazy? No more so than an Austrian-born action-film star running California, a pro wrestler in Minnesota's statehouse, or an Irish rocker in line for the Nobel Peace Prize.
The downside is small. In fact, most politicians should want their personal life as clean as that of Springsteen, who says he's never used drugs and whose one "mistake" in life — quickly jettisoning a first marriage to raise a family with the woman he truly loved — isn't much of a mistake.
In 1992, a group of Ross Perot acolytes urged Springsteen to run for the Senate as an outsider. The Boss laughed it off. But a lot has changed in the last 13 years.
Back then, he was a musical artist wary of being co-opted by any politician. But in 2004, he was one of a handful of folks who — sizing up the threat posed by four more years of President Bush to the country he loves — stepped up to the plate, or, as he might say, tried to make it on a stand.
And now, at age 56, with his musical legacy established and his own kids growing up, he might be convinced to stake out a new direction, for the good of the U.S.A.
This time, Bruce, don't let the screen door slam.
www.philly.com
[/q]
Bruce ready to run (for Senate)?
DEMOCRATS IN New Jersey have a big problem.
Sure, Sen. Jon Corzine's easy election as governor on Tuesday was their latest win in the increasingly blue state.
But Corzine's first decision when he takes office in January is a real doozy — appointing a Democrat to fill the last 11 months of his term and likely run for a full six-year term next November.
But most of the obvious choices reek of political hackery, even by Jersey standards. U.S. Rep. Robert Menendez, most often mentioned, is weighed down by ties to machine politics. And the others — South Jersey U.S. Rep. Rob Andrews, U.S. Rep. Rush Holt, and acting governor Richard Codey — are seriously lacking in star power.
In fact, you could say that Corzine's choice is like a highway jammed with broken heroes on a last-chance power drive.
Any of them would have a tough time defeating the up-and-coming golden boy of Garden State politics with that unbeatable family name, Republican state Sen. Tom Kean Jr., the ex-governor's son.
Nationally, the Dems must hold New Jersey if they have any hope of regaining the Senate, but to do that they will need to find someone from outside the bland political tried-and-true.
New Jersey's new senator should be — and could be — a person who has demonstrated, over a lifetime, a commitment to social causes and to those in need.
Corzine can choose a person who advocates causes that are unpopular but just — someone who spoke out, for example, in favor of the Dixie Chicks and free speech on the eve of the Iraq war.
In January, Corzine could pick someone whose compassion for the victims and survivors of 9/11 is unparalleled, yet who realized the insanity of the Iraq war from Day One, and was not afraid to risk his considerable reputation in opposing it.
Yes, he'd be another millionaire — but a self-made one, someone who can speak to blue-collar voters and can relate to minorities, in spite of his own personal success.
Corzine should appoint Bruce Springsteen to the U.S. States Senate.
Crazy? No more so than an Austrian-born action-film star running California, a pro wrestler in Minnesota's statehouse, or an Irish rocker in line for the Nobel Peace Prize.
The downside is small. In fact, most politicians should want their personal life as clean as that of Springsteen, who says he's never used drugs and whose one "mistake" in life — quickly jettisoning a first marriage to raise a family with the woman he truly loved — isn't much of a mistake.
In 1992, a group of Ross Perot acolytes urged Springsteen to run for the Senate as an outsider. The Boss laughed it off. But a lot has changed in the last 13 years.
Back then, he was a musical artist wary of being co-opted by any politician. But in 2004, he was one of a handful of folks who — sizing up the threat posed by four more years of President Bush to the country he loves — stepped up to the plate, or, as he might say, tried to make it on a stand.
And now, at age 56, with his musical legacy established and his own kids growing up, he might be convinced to stake out a new direction, for the good of the U.S.A.
This time, Bruce, don't let the screen door slam.
www.philly.com
[/q]
interesting.
i have no idea.
