Who Said Senators Can't Be President?

Never Before Have Two Sitting Senators Run Head To Head As Major Party Nominees

(The Politico)  This story was written by David Rogers.

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Fresh from laying claim to the Democratic presidential nomination, Barack Obama was back on the Senate floor Wednesday, crossing paths with the man he chose as his mentor as a freshman three years ago: Sen. Joseph I. Lieberman. 

A Connecticut Democrat-turned-independent, Lieberman is backing Obama’s Republican rival, Arizona Sen. John McCain, and even participated in a conference call attacking the Illinois Democrat on Wednesday. But the tug felt by the older man was evident on the Senate floor, and Lieberman didn’t hide his pride later in how far his onetime young charge had come. 

“I congratulated him and I said, obviously I’m supporting John, but I was proud of him,” Lieberman said. “This is a place where, over the decades, people who have disagreed have been able to maintain a relationship, and hopefully we can do that.” 

History has already left its mark on this presidential campaign, but for the Senate, the most important fact may be this: Never before have two sitting U.S. senators run head to head as the nominees for the two major parties. 

Politics doesn’t get more personal, as seen in the Obama-Lieberman encounter. In a single stroke, the contest wipes away the old adage that senators make ineffective presidential candidates, and it will almost certainly force some soul-searching among the 98 left behind. 

Younger senators of Obama’s generation looked around Wednesday and realized that whoever won, they would know the next president of the United States. “I think it’s pretty cool,” said Sen. Jon Tester (D-Mont.). “I look at it as an opportunity to take a relationship I had just started building in the Senate and build it even better with one of those guys when they get into the White House.” 

The more jaded warned that familiarity can also breed contempt. And for all the collective pride that the Senate had made it to the presidential finals, there was a clear-eyed understanding that McCain and Obama will spend the next five months running away from their old colleagues as much as seeking their support. 

“We’ve always had at least two running for president. We just haven’t had two who were successful,” said Senate Republican Whip Lamar Alexander, who ran for president himself while a Tennessee governor. “The country doesn’t want a Washington-based president. The country wants a change, ... and the success of McCain or Obama has to do with the fact that neither one looks like a typical Washington-based senator. 

“McCain is sort of the anti-senator senator, and Obama is young, African-American and new.”

That may be the greatest contradiction of this senator vs. senator election: a call for change by two members of the nation’s oldest political club. 

“It shows how much the political system looks at individuals and not the larger institutional context from which they come,” said Sen. Judd Gregg (R-N.H.). “The Founding Fathers intended us to be inert, and we’ve expanded that ability to a point where a single senator can block action.” 

But the forces unleashed may also change that club: “It could make senators bolder and more independent,” says Princeton University historian Julian Zelizer. 

And the two campaigns will certainly drag the Senate onto the national stage as a proxy battleground for McCain and Obama. 

The recent McCain-Obama skirmish over a greatly expanded GI education benefit for veterans of Iraq and Afghanistan is such a case. Obama won that round as Senate Republicans deserted President Bush and the Arizona maverick and supported the package, costing as much as $52 billion over the next 10 years. And Democrats could do the same after Labor Day by resurrecting a veto fight with the White House - and implicitly McCain - over health insurancefor the children of low-income families.

McCain, given his much longer record in the Senate, has to work harder than Obama to shed the Washington label. The continued controversy over former lobbyists in the McCain campaign illustrates this burden. Yet it can’t be ruled out that he will use the Senate floor as a place to counterpunch the better-financed Obama on tax and energy issues, for example.

After losing his run for the White House in 2000, the Arizona Republican threw himself back into the affairs of the Senate. And while often operating at odds with the Bush administration, he built close relationships with a cadre of younger members such as Sen. John Sununu (R-N.H.), who admits he is more excited by this presidential election than any other in his time in Washington.

Obama has far less history in the Senate and once likened the intrigue in the Senate to the Peloponnesian Wars. But he is also such a new, less-defined personality that part of his appeal is that so many senators can project their own ambitions onto his candidacy, whether in hopes of serving in his Cabinet or to advance some policy goal.

The most sensitive Senate nerve may be that of Nebraska Republican Sen. Chuck Hagel, who has been a rare Senate friend for McCain and remains an informal adviser without yet endorsing his candidacy.

Both Vietnam veterans, the two have very different views on Iraq, and Hagel was a key part of the Democratic victory on the GI Bill prior to Memorial Day. “Who Speaks Up for the Rifleman” is a chapter title in his recent book.

These strains have sparked suggestions that the Nebraskan, who is retiring this year, could yet endorse Obama, with whom he has worked on some modest bills and shares a berth on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee. This seems unlikely at this stage, though it can’t be ruled out that he could be part of a future Obama Cabinet.

Before this year, former senators have run head to head against one another, most recently Richard Nixon and Hubert Humphrey in 1968. But only two sitting senators, Warren Harding and John F. Kennedy, have gone directly to the White House, and neither had served long in the chamber.

The 19th century saw instances in which sitting senators ran unsuccessfully as regional candidates in larger presidential fields, such as 1836. And in 1824, Andrew Jackson, then a senator from Tennessee, won a plurality in a four-man field but ultimately lost when Henry Clay, who was the speaker of the House, finished poorly and threw his support to John Quincy Adams.

Both Adams and William Crawford, the fourth presidential candidate, were former senators, and the Washington intrigue was dubbed by some historians as the “Last of the Old Order.”

Four years later, Jackson came back and won outright, ushering in what some called the “Age of Jackson” or the “Age of the People.”

But in his history of the Senate, Sen. Robert C. Byrd (D-W.Va.) had a different label, which echoes now: “The Coming of Age of the Senate.”

[prinkamste]

Hillary Clinton did not win the popular vote, unless shady math is used! Some people will not vote for a black man, but would vote for a white woman. If you let race or gender be your guiding light you will stay blind. Hillary made some bad choices in her run for the presidency, that is clear. But no one stole it from her. I think these are birthing pains for the American people before we stand before the world to lead, and live up to our creed. Obama will help us to do just that if we open our eyes before it is to late. This can also be God''s blessing for those whites who can stand before the world an say " yes we can change". The choice is up to us. God bless America!

[libra127]

There is an interesting article on the relative electability of Clinton, Obama, and McCain in today''s NY Times. It is called "Vote by Numbers" by Op-Ed Contributer Neil deGrasse Tyson:

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/06/06/opinion/06tyson.html?_r=1&ref=opinion&oref=slogin

It analyzes current polls to show that Clinton would beat McCain, but McCain would beat Obama in the GE.

[ouronlyhope]

http://www.factcheck.org/elections-2008/the_budget_according_to_mccain_part_i.html

http://www.factcheck.org/elections-2008/the_budget_according_to_mccain_part_ii.html

McCain%u2019s budget isn%u2019t even a budget. It%u2019s just completely empty rhetoric, not even worthy of being called a budget. Did he have a high school student write his budget plan for him?

His method...cut taxes (especially for the wealthy) and then pray that money will come from somewhere.

It%u2019s such a crock that factcheck.org had to do a two parter on it!

[ouronlyhope]

Yes, I am MORE proud of my country today, than I have ever been in my adult life. It''s true, I have supported Sen. Obama ever since I started reading up on the candidates at the end of Feb. I wasn''t one of his first supporters...but I have been impressed over & over again at his high level of morality & his common sense approach to todays problems.

More than all else...I''ve been waiting for years for a candidate that is serious about limiting (or ending all together) the influence of special interest groups in Washington Politics. These groups represent huge amounts of money and only micro-numbers of U.S. Citizens. Yet they have historically gotten what they want time & again...limiting the effectiveness of bill after bill being passed in Congress. These ''political power plays'' have been pulling more & more of the focus off ''We The People'' while forwarding the interests of ''We the RICH''.

Sen. Obama is already showing his determination to stop the influence of Lobbyists & PAC''s...just as promised. He is proving that he can fill the shoes of a President for ALL U.S. Citizens...not just the wealthy.

BTW...I am a white female who, up until this year, had never voted anything but Republican

[jack3213]

Respect is something you earn, it is not an entitlement. Clinton has always projected a sense of entitlement and has not shown or given clearly enough respect to Obama over the last year for him to choose her as VP. He will not only appear weak he will lose, anyway, in spite of it.

[PulSamsara]

Barack Obama for President of the UNITED States of America.

[noloyalisti]

Hillary was not entitled to the nomination. It is beyond arrogance to complain now, Obama won fair and square. People are sick and tired of the same old politics of deception and arrogance and votes for invasion, occupation and killing. She can run but she can''t hide.

[nanging3]

Please sign to get Father Pfleger removed permanently.

http://www.thepetitionsite.com/1/removable-of-father-michael-pfleger

[nanging3]

Hillary owes nothing to Obama or the Democratic Party they swift boated her.
They allowed Obama to run TV ads in Florida against the agreement, and penalized Hillary.
She should have received full credit for all her votes.
It is quite obvious Dean hates the Clintons and had even thrown in the race card for measure. He was set on Obama from day 1.

[nanging3]

Please sign to get Father Pfleger removed permanently.

http://www.thepetitionsite.com/1/removable-of-father-michael-pfleger

[nanging3]

I would be willing to write in Hillarys name for the #1 spot-
But I would never vote for any ticket with Obama on it.
What ever you do vote, do not give the elction to Obama !

[nanging3]

Please sign to get Father Pfleger removed permanently.



http://www.thepetitionsite.com/1/removable-of-father-michael-pfleger

[jazzer9]

All Hillary voters-lets write Hillarys name in on the ballot!

[wogerwabbit]

Posted by jack3213 at 04:51 PM <-- an alien

[wogerwabbit]

Posted by p-syrus at 05:31 PM : Jun 05, 2008 <-- another one

[wogerwabbit]

Posted by TruUSA at 05:31 PM -- Neocon Troll

[p-syrus]

Frankly electing as president an individual whose SOLE government experience is in the legislative branch is ALWAYS a BAD IDEA.

NOBAMA: The Not Ready for Prime Time Player.

[jack3213]

HOW TO BE A REAL DEMOCRAT:

You have to believe that the only reason socialism hasn''t worked anywhere it''s been tried is because the right people haven''t been in charge.

You have to believe conservatives telling the truth belong in jail, but a liar and a *** offender belongs in the White House.

You have to believe that businesses create oppression and governments create prosperity.

You have to believe the NRA is bad because it supports certain parts of the Constitution, while the ACLU is good because it supports certain parts of the Constitution.

You have to believe that taxes are too low, but ATM fees are too high.