It just never ends, does it? First, Dodd and Dorgan retire, starting the day off on a bad note, and then, the New York Times reports that Tennessee native, Merrill Lynch banker and newly-minted New York resident Harold Ford, may just throw his hat in the ring against incumbent Senator and Senate newbie Kirsten Gillibrand.
Mr. Ford, 39, who moved to New York three years ago, has told friends that he will decide whether to run in the next 45 days. The discussions between Mr. Ford and top Democratic donors reflect the dissatisfaction of some prominent party members with Ms. Gillibrand, who has yet to win over key constituencies, especially in New York City.
About a dozen high-profile Democrats have expressed interest in backing a candidacy by Mr. Ford, including the financier Steven Rattner, who, along with his wife, Maureen White, has been among the country's most prolific Democratic fund-raisers.
Ford moved to this state after a defeat in a similar race to represent Tennessee in the U.S. Senate; he had previously represented a House district from that state. That seat had been held by his father, Harold Ford Sr., from 1974 until 1997, when his son was elected to succeed him.
Junior is perhaps best known - other than for that losing Senate bid, that is - for his leadership role in the rightwing Democratic Leadership Council . The DLC's most prominent member today is Joe Lieberman, the backstabbing McCain campaigner and RNC keynote speaker who single-handedly killed healthcare reform and any hope of a public option. The DLC, meanwhile, has rotted into irrelevance over more than a decade. And this not for lack of trying, one might add.
Per Crain's NY Business, Ford junior, as a Southern Dem, may be too far to the right of New York Democrats.
And the gay and abortion-rights communities in New York would back Gillibrand, who supports choice and gay marriage, over Ford, who has voted for restrictions on abortion and bans on same-sex marriage and benefits for same-sex partners. "Someone should inform the former congressman that ours is a pro-choice state and he will need to renounce his anti-choice positions if he wants to have any hope," says a NARAL Pro-Choice New York spokeswoman.
Ideology matters. And unless Junior undergoes a road-to-Damascus conversion, he's anti-choice and anti-equality. Those may be tolerable positions, if barely, in the old Confederacy. For the fabled Senate seat of Robert Kennedy and Daniel Moynihan, not so much.
Ideology and residency aside, what is most deeply irksome about this proposed run is this: of five statewide offices, only one is held by someone from Upstate. The governor, attorney general, comptroller, and the senior U.S. Senator all hail from the five boroughs or their suburbs, as do the leaders of both houses of the legislature. It defies credulity that the remaining seat, which is of course currently held by Paterson appointee Kirsten Gillibrand, should also to another Manhattanite.
Particularly one of such recent vintage.
[Update:]
And here's Junior calling on Democrats to run against President Obama, citing his home state of Tennessee as an example. Well done.
