Running Mate Motives
Gov. Ehrlich admitted yesterday that he chose Kristen Cox as his running mate in part because she's blind. ""No, but do I think the fact that she cannot see, do I see that as part of a paradigm for what I want to represent? Yes," Ehrlich responded to a question about whether he picked Cox for her disability on Washington Post Radio's The Politics Program. "In my heart of hearts, I cannot answer honestly if Kris had sight, whether she would be the person I chose. I do not know that."
Ehrlich essentially admitted that he picked his running mate based on an intrinsic characteristic. Which begs the obvious: why did he angrily dismiss speculation that Lt. Gov. Michael Steele was picked for his race in the 2002 campaign?
It's no secret that candidates engage in symbolic politics when choosing running mates. Martin O'Malley was transparent about the fact that Anthony Brown bringd more than qualification and abilities; his address provides geographic balance and his blackness racial balance. Ehrlich is being honest about his motive behind the Cox choice.
Yet any suggestion that Steele found himself on the 2002 ticket because of race is vehenmously rejected as racism. Go figure.
from The League: Reassembled
Ehrlich essentially admitted that he picked his running mate based on an intrinsic characteristic. Which begs the obvious: why did he angrily dismiss speculation that Lt. Gov. Michael Steele was picked for his race in the 2002 campaign?
It's no secret that candidates engage in symbolic politics when choosing running mates. Martin O'Malley was transparent about the fact that Anthony Brown bringd more than qualification and abilities; his address provides geographic balance and his blackness racial balance. Ehrlich is being honest about his motive behind the Cox choice.
Yet any suggestion that Steele found himself on the 2002 ticket because of race is vehenmously rejected as racism. Go figure.
from The League: Reassembled
posted by The League: Reassembled at 12:31 PM
3 Comments:
Good point. I saw this as kind of non-story. But when you take Ehrlich's indignation over the Steele/race question, this story has some import.
It shows that Ehrlich is an amateur.
Cox to Ehrlich - "Why exactly did you just shiv me?"
Maryland to Ehrlich = "Are you stupid?"
Correct answer to question: "There is no doubt that her personal efforts and challenges in dealing with the inconveniences of being blind in a sight-driven workplace increased her talents and desirable traits as an executive - willingness to delegate wisely, a strong executive sense of priorities and raw hard-headed determination. Were she a sighted person, those positive qualities which I most admire in her would have to have been developed by, presumably, other challenges of equal magnitude, in her or in another candidate."
rfustero probably has KKT's reasoning down. I think she and her advisors thought that she had to move rightward to convince anti-Kennedy Marylanders that she wasn't some sort of crazed leftist.
At the time of selection, I thought it was a solid move. How wrong I was.
It obviously did no good and the party would have been better served, if not in 2002 for the long term, had she picked Leggett or some other African American officeholder.
Let's not kid ourselves; these are almost always cosmetic selections made for political reasons. It is rare that a candidate has the luxury to pick someone based only on his or her ability to assume the office.
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