Even with a shiny new Barack Obama glow emanating out of the White House, I can't shake the passing strange sensation that a trio of governors we've gotten to know lately on the national stage have been as truly weird as the three witches in MacBeth.
Consider the evidence: Governors Sarah Palin of Alaska, David Paterson of New York (not to mention his tawdry and disgraced predecessor, Eliot Spitzer) and of course, Rod Blagojevich of Illinois. Wow, who knew what human dramas, complexes and perhaps perfidies lurked behind the doors of these governor's mansions?
All owe their newfound fame to the presidential election of 2008. Now we know too much, yet the mystery remains: why have we have we here three whacked-out governors in a row?
You could not make some of this stuff up. Let's take Palin first, she who swooped into our collective psyche last September as Sen. John McCain's chosen one for the Republican vice-presidential nominee. Somehow her plain speaking pattern, upswept hair, glasses and supreme self-confidence electrified the body politic. Love or fear her, she and her small-town ways could not be ignored. She was charming when she chose to be, with her winks and aw-shucks, doggone-it lines, but it wore thin when asked about foreign policy or how she intended to "be in charge" of the U.S. Senate. Sarah Palin also showed a smiling mean streak out on the campaign trail.
Substance was not her strong point and we never got an answer to Katie Couric's question: what in heck does the lady from Alaska read, anyway? Stay home up there near Russia and the North Pole, and chill out, Governor. You have delighted us in the Lower 48 long enough.
Less amusing was the daft and drawn-out performance of the New York governor, who botched his chance to appoint the U.S. Senate successor to Hillary Clinton. Paterson had the gift of two political plums in hand, either a Kennedy or a Cuomo, but he picked a first-term congresswoman named Kirsten Gillibrand, an unknown outside of New York. The daughter of the late president, Caroline Kennedy, an author and a civic do-gooder, and Attorney General Andrew Cuomo were shunned and treated shabbily, especially Kennedy. The governor curiously saw fit to let his aides tear her down as she withdrew from the agonizing endgame. This is an unelected governor who only got the job because of the spectacular downfall of the former governor, Eliot Spitzer. The perverse Paterson gave new meaning to "amateur hour" in his handling of a decision that should have been a swift and easy political win for him.
Now comes Blagojevich, who seems to tickle some funny bones on the media circuit as he peddles his own form of legal defense. Indictment and impeachment hanging over his well-groomed head seemed not to faze him one bit as he defiantly went ahead with making his own choice for the U.S. Senate seat vacated by Obama. It is sobering to realize that Illinois gave us Obama, but also elected this scary character, Chicago-born from a Serbian family, in the same space of time. While he has not been convicted of charges that he tried to sell the Senate seat to the highest bidder, Blagojevich's self-deluded public conduct is so far from dignity and reality that "Nixonian" is really the only word that does him justice.
Just to be safe, let's stick to electing senators to the presidency for a long time to come.
One could go on but let's just suffice it to say. Among America's governors... the immigrant bodybuilder and hee-man action star ...
he's one of the better ones...
Please, someone Talk Me Down.
2. The polls made it clear that the voters did not want Caroline to be our senator. If Paterson had hastened the process -- as Mayor Bloomberg and Caroline's allies started to demand -- the people of New York would have been stuck with an appointee they clearly did not want. So it might have been a political win for what's left of the Kennedys, but would have looked like a Blago deal to the rest of us.
3. Gillibrand is a second-term congresswoman, not a first-term -- as you claim. She was elected to her seat twice.
4. Paterson said repeatedly that he would have preferred that the seat be filled by a special election. Under NY State law, that was not a possibility.
5. Paterson cannot be held responsible for supposed anonymous leaks from his aides -- especially if it's a disreputable and dishonest rag like the New York Post that supposedly received those leaks. Furthermore nothing was said about Caroline that had not already been said many times here on HuffPo by me and by others.
It seems no one likes Gillibrand but you and Paterson.
Paterson is indeed responsible for news leaks, its his office. He is just plain incompetent. The best thing that can happen is Coumo runs against him and Kennedy against Gillibrand.
That would would be just desserts.
If I were you, I wouldn't bet on Caroline doing anything further in politics. She made it pretty clear by her demeanor throughout her so-called campaign that she was repelled by the entire process. Aside from that, the polls showed that the voters of New York simply did not want her. She'd have to grow herself a completely different personality in order to make herself acceptable. If she challenges Gillibrand, she will lose. There may be candidates who could beat Gillibrand, but Caroline Kennedy and Carolyn McCarthy are not among them.
I'm not a Gillbrand fan, but I resented the fact that Kennedy and Cuomo were instant contenders because of their names. (Of course, that's how Hillary Clinton got elected in the first place...)
Maybe governators get their own category of weirdness...