April 3, 2008
The Success of the Father
Not to pick on Linc, but it must sting somewhere deep down to know that, after years as a U.S. Senator, more years as an Ivy League professor, and now as an author with a new book out, his opinion remains of public interest more with reference to what his father's opinion would have been:
As the historic chances for passage of a bipartisan health-care-reform bill evaporated, Bernstein writes, "Hillary had earlier showed some willingness to compromise with Chafee, but when push came to shove, her unwillingness to compromise further undermined any chance of implementing real reform."For all her good intentions, Mrs. Clinton was unable to work with veteran friendly legislators and an opportunity was lost. Contrary to Ms. Rubiner's hypothesis I am confident my father would not have supported Mrs. Clinton's presidential candidacy.
Linc always brings to mind a great sentiment from Steinbeck's East of Eden, in which Samuel, the spiritual center of the novel, says of the protagonist that God makes some people rich because otherwise they'd starve.
Offspring like Lincoln Chafee and Patrick Kennedy (and before him, Ted Kennedy) certainly call into question the validity of Darwin's theory of evolution, now don't they? ;-)
Like Patrick Kennedy, Sheldon, De Ramel, Jerzyk, Segal, Donnis, Sissyline, Roberts, the Lynches and too many others to count, Linc would be manning the front desk of a Motel 6 if he wasn't a Lucky Sperm Club charter member.
Posted by: Mike at April 3, 2008 8:14 PM Oops - forgot George W. Bush.
We're getting a little desperate now if Donnis gets lumped in with the LSC.
Yeah, I gotta say, whatever his portfolio and views, Ian Donnis actually works for a living.
Posted by: Monique at April 4, 2008 12:20 AMI'll confess that I entirely missed Ian's inclusion on that list; now that it's been noticed, though, I have to say that I've never had any doubts that Ian's earned his current position.
Posted by: Justin Katz at April 4, 2008 5:22 AMI don't know how Sheldon Whitehouse didn't get mentioned.
I can't stand Cicilline,but he didn't get handed anything-he made it through college and law school by being intelligent and working hard-he turned out to be a miserable human being,but that's another issue.
We're having some fun here,but in all seriousness,who would hire a drug-soaked,alcoholic,mentally ill person with anger management problems to work for them in any capacity?Rhode Islanders have hired Patrick Kennedy for no other reason than his name.If his name were say,Willy Rumpelmyer,you think he'd be a Congressman?
Ian Donnis?Is he from a wealthy background?He does actually work for a living,even though he's a mouthpiece for the leftist cabal.
I heard Linc on Dan Yorke yesterday plugging his book. After his defeat, I would have thought it unlikely, to say the least, that he would have a chance at governor in 2010, but I'm not so sure anymore. He was pushing the fiscal discipline line. One thing you can say about the old Yankee republicans, they had a deserved reputation as skinflints. With our fiscal crisis, we will be electing a bankruptcy trustee as much as a governor. Chafee might be able to sell himself as that person.
Posted by: observer at April 4, 2008 7:30 AM--Chafee might be able to sell himself as that person.
He didn't go to the mat battling the unions while Mayor of Warwick (and his successor protégé is even worse).
He doesn’t appear to have any issue with RI’s “generous” welfare system.
Those two areas are the black holes into which almost all of the tax money goes. A politician not willing to take on the unions or welfare pimps cannot be fiscally responsible.
(When in the Senate Chafee’s idea of fiscal responsibility was to raise taxes to balance the budget, not reduce spending to match tax revenues.)
Empirical Joe would rather lob bombs and mischaracterize than taking the time to mull a more complex reality. Yes, we at the Phoenix were raging leftist mouthpieces when we endorsed Sue Stenhouse in 2006. Joe's black and white worldview is apparently ill-equipped for such inconvenient details.
Posted by: Ian Donnis at April 21, 2008 3:06 PM