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March 12, 2004

Who Really Cares About Endorsements?

It seems that every labor union, special interest group, newspaper and magazine spends a lot of time deciding on who they will endorse for everything from Dogcatcher to President.

Personally, I don't make up my mind on who to vote for based on an endorsement by the National Society for the Prevention of Trashy Trailer Parks or an endorsement by the New York Times. I can't imagine that most people do that.

Candidates seem to believe that every autoworker in the country will vote for them if they get the autoworkers union endorsement. It's not like every autoworker gets to vote for who their union endorses. Labor unions are not exactly democracies when it comes to endorsements. The big shots get to decide these things, not the worker on the assembly line.

And now, Kerry seems to be hinting that he has the endorsement of several foreign governments. (I say aruhhh to that - think of Scooby Doo's little noise when he is confused - the one where he cocks his head to one side- that is what aruhhh is).

Now, I think Kerry is a little wacko if he thinks that Americans in general are going to vote for Kerry because some foreign government wants Kerry in power. Most of us, at least I hope most of us, would rather that we decide who governs us, not France or Germany, or even our pals, England and Australia.

Of course, these 'endorsements' of Kerry's can't be verified. He won't even say which foreign governments want him to beat Bush. Could they be the endorsements of governments who don't like the fact that the US is defending itself from terror attacks under Bush?

What concerns me even more is the thought of a candidate talking to foreign leaders and saying bad things about the Bush Presidency - to me, that just seems wrong, it gives the appearance of pandering to foreign governments, and maybe even being an agent of foreign governments. Some people might even consider it close to treason - but I suspect that is going a little too far.

I just don't see how making such claims will help Kerry's campaign.

Cori Dauber and Scott Deatherage of Rantingprofs (and they are actually University professors) have an excellent post about Kerry's foreign endorsement claims.

Here is an excerpt:

at what point did it become appropriate for a candidate for office to have contact with foreign leaders? Doesn't Kerry realize the damage that can do? If he leads any foreign leader to believe that he'd be more sympathetic to their arguments and interests -- which clearly he's done -- how isn't that a signal to those countries to hold off any dealings with this administration in the hopes it will soon be sent packing and they'll be able to do better? And if that's the case, then why isn't Kerry now interfering with American foreign policy in a way that could potentially benefit him (by reducing the level of success this administration can chalk up between now and the elections since at least some leaders will be stonewalling hoping for a better deal)? No doubt some of that kind of stonewalling is likely with other governments during any election season -- should Kerry be explicitly encouraging it?

By the way, I am adding Rantingprofs to my blogroll. It's an excellent blog.

Posted by Beth at March 12, 2004 10:28 AM