Reader Z.K. emailed me to point something interesting from yesterday’s Meet the Press. Mike Allen, David Brooks, and E.J. Dionne were part of a wide-ranging roundtable with host Tim Russert. Allen, of Time Magazine, made this comment:
And, you know, the way they lured Democrats into this, before the president’s Annapolis speech, one of the strategists told me, “Every time we give an aggressive speech like this, the Democrats do something stupid to further box themselves in,” and that’s immediately after that is when you saw the bifurcation of the Democrats. Democrats are trying to find someone to respond to the State of the Union address. A lot of people obviously wanted Congressman Murtha. Democrats have decided that he can’t because he doesn’t speak to everyone. So now I would look for a new face, like Governor-elect Tim Kaine of Virginia to give that response.
(Emphasis mine.)
There was no further talk of this; it was just an aside by Allen. It’s not clear whether he was merely tossing out a suggestion or reflecting talk among Democrats. Either way, Kaine issuing the response to Bush’s State of the Union address is certainly a powerful idea. I hadn’t considered it, nor have I seen it suggested elsewhere. But I like it a great deal.
Kaine isn’t running for president, of course, which makes him a more palatable figure for Democrats than Gov. Mark Warner, Sen. Hillary Clinton, or anybody else with such ambitions. He’s a better speaker than either Rep. Nancy Pelosi Sen. Harry Reid, each of whom do a good job leading their respective groups but also do a piss-poor job addressing the nation. Kaine is a centrist Democrat, in the national sense, and is fresh off a big victory in a conservative state. Kaine’s victory is seen by many as a harbinger of things to come in the midterm elections — placing him on a national stage would be a thumb in the eye for many Republicans, and uplifting for many Democrats.
I think having Kaine deliver the State of the Union response is a great deal. Here’s hoping that Mike Allen’s comment represents a more widespread belief.
While Kaine would make an interesting choice for the Dem response, he and Warner have run as nonpartisans. On the campaign trail, Warner is not focusing on attacking Republicans; he instead is providing ideas for economic growth and so forth. It would not look good in a center-right state such as VA for its new governor-elect to issue a response to Bush, IMO.