Boston Globe Is Right, Kennedy Should Resign
Aug 24, 2009 Political
Jeff Jacoby has a great article up at the Boston Globe indicating that Ted Kennedy should resign his seat in the Senate.
Kennedy is asking the Massachusetts legislature to pass a bill that allows the Governor to appoint Senators should their seats become vacant. This is very convenient since Kennedy’s seat will be vacant when he eventually succumbs to his terminal brain cancer.
However, Kennedy is the reason that the Governor cannot appoint successors. When Romney, a Republican, was Governor and John Kerry was running for the presidency Ted Kennedy asked the legislature to pass a bill requiring a special election in the event of a Senate vacancy. He did this to prevent Romney from being able to appoint a Republican to the seat, should Kerry have won. Ted Kennedy was instrumental in having the rules changed from what he now wants them to be.
You see, there is now a Democrat in the State House and Kennedy is using this lame excuse of saying people of Massachusetts deserve to have two votes in the Senate and the delay of a special election will keep them from having just that.
Too fricking bad.
Kennedy was not worried about having two votes when he asked for the law to be changed last time. He was only concerned about keeping the seat in the hands of the Democrats. I understand the partisan politics but let’s not pretend that this is all about having two votes for the state because it is not.
As Jacoby points out, Kennedy has missed all but a handful of Senate votes this year so Massachusetts does not have two votes even with the seat occupied.
Jacoby goes on to point out that if Kennedy is really concerned about the two votes he should resign so that he can be replaced and put the second vote back in the Senate.
For well over a year, Massachusetts has not had the “two voices . . . and two votes in the Senate’’ that Kennedy says its voters are entitled to. Sickness has kept him away from Capitol Hill for most of the last 15 months. He has missed all but a handful of the 270 roll-calls taken in the Senate so far this year. Through no fault of his own, he is unable to carry out the job he was reelected to in 2006. As a matter of integrity, he should bow out and allow his constituents to choose a replacement. Boston Globe
The problem with this thinking is that Jacoby indicates that Kennedy should step down “as a matter of integrity.”
Ted Kennedy had NO integrity. If he did he would not try to push for changes to the law that circumvent the democratic process of allowing the people to put a person in office. If Kennedy had integrity he would have resigned after his diagnosis and an election would have already taken place.
Kennedy has a career that is nothing but a lack of integrity.
Of course this would be a moot point if the Constitution had not been changed. Senators were appointed by state legislatures until the Constitution was amended.
That was a mistake.
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Tags: cancer, integrity, resign, ted kennedy
An Example of Clinton’s Lack of Integrity
Nov 10, 2007 Political
Hillary Clinton’s campaign admitted today that it had been caught planting a question from an audience member at one of her campaign stops in Iowa. Clinton called on a young college student who asked a question about global warming and Clinton responded that she gets these kinds of questions all the time from the young people. My question is, if she gets these questions all the time why the need to plant it? Surely if she gets them all the time she would get it at this event.
There are many troubling items in the story. The story indicates that she did not know which questioners she would be calling on so why plant the question? How likely is it she would pick the plant unless she knew who it was? The article indicates:
“But the source of the question was no coincidence — at this event ‘they wanted a question from a college student,’ Gallo-Chasanoff said.” Fox News
The campaign is in defense mode because this might offend Iowans for whom “the caucus is held sacred and the impromptu and candid style of the town hall meeting is held dear, Clinton’s planted question may come as a great offense to Iowans.”
I realize that there are supporters of Clinton who will comment that all candidates do this. I am sure many of them do though she is the only one caught. More importantly, she is supposed to be presenting herself as a different choice for the voters. If she is doing the same thing as everyone else, how different is she?
I imagine there are even those who will say this is not wrong to do or that it is no big deal. I agree that it is no big deal but if I were running I would just address the issue without the questioner. But then again, the Clinton campaign wants to look like it is addressing the everyday concerns Americans (and the Chinese and Europeans) have. I have suspicions that she is not asked this all the time. If there is any doubt that it was viewed as wrong, even by the campaign, they pointed out that they believe it was when they stated:
“…it would not happen again.”
Of course, they might mean they won’t get caught again or they might mean not again as in Bill will not molest women again.
Despite the claims made by others, integrity does not seem to be held in high regard in that camp. Consider this post an example to support the claim (that she lacks integrity).
Tags: caucus, fox news, global warming, Hillary Clinton, honor, integrity, lies, planted questions