Bob Kerrey

Kos is wrong on the question of whether to support Bob Kerrey.

Kerrey is likely to run for the Nebraska Senate seat if Chuck Hagel retires, as is increasingly likely. Kos provides a useful summary of Kerrey's strengths and weaknesses. He is really bad on the war and social security. He is much better on gay rights and abortion rights. He's a mixed bag, no question. He's better than the other, nominally Democratic, senator from Nebraska, Ben Nelson.

But Hagel has been a leading Republican critic of the war. That makes Kos wonder whether progressives should support Kerrey.

He's not sure they should and I don't know why. It's Nebraska people. Bob Kerrey would almost certainly win. Do we really think we are going to get a better Democratic candidate in Nebraska? Sure, he sucks in a lot of ways. But he's going to vote with the Democrats most of the time. That most of the time is a hell of a lot more than any wingnut Republican who is likely to win the Republican nomination.

Kos concludes:

The alternative would be a Republican whose support we'd have on absolutely nothing, but who wouldn't make a habit of undermining our party from within.
Quite the dilemma.

Um, no it's not. The key is to get enough of a majority that Kerrey's pro-war votes don't count. Maybe he will come out publicly for the war, but I can live with that. I would rather have him voting for the war than a Republican doing the same and also voting against every other thing I believe in.

The larger lesson here is that we have to keep the war in perspective. Should it be the biggest issue Democrats campaign on? Yes. But it's not the only issue. Kerrey is good enough on enough other issues that he does deserve at least a level of neutrality among Democratic activists.