Wednesday, July 9, 2008

Pride before the Fall

It's not nearly so bad as the poll numbers Dodd turned in during his absurd run for the presidency, but Dodd's popularity in Connecticut is waning.

This fact is probably as a direct result of that presidential bid, during which he abandoned Connecticut, began to live in Iowa going so far as to enroll his daughter in school there, combined with revelations that he was given a special mortgage deal because of his powerful position.

The July 1st Quinnipiac poll showed Dodd losing nine points in job approval, putting him at 51%. The Day has a write up on it today. Interestingly, 6 in 10 voters polled believe the Dodd mortgage arrangement deserves more investigation, but Q Poll director Doug Schwartz insists that Dodd's failed presidential race hurt him more. Perhaps. Dodd did miss most of his Senate votes while trying to become president.

Dodd is up for re-election in 2010, and that is a long way off. But if more comes out about this sweetheart deal Dodd received, he could actually be in real jeopardy. Then it won't matter how many FISA speeches he gives.

Retirement beckons.

1 comment:

mccommas said...

I have noticed over and over again that this always seems to happen with senators after they run for President.

Their own states get pissed off and they have to make double time to get re-elected to the lowly position they wanted to abandon for Pennsylvania Avenue just a little while ago.

I think more than anything else its because they lost and they look like losers. Old enemies want take advantage of their weakness to get rid of them.
By running for President, (even one that has a chance), the candidates necessarily exposes themselves to criticism for their various positions, flip-flops, gaffes, embarrassingly low poll numbers etc whereas as senators they are able to flub and hide on tricky issues. Senators don't have to lead and are not very good at when they try.

It may be just the constituents felt ignored. Lieberman certainly got in trouble. He lost the nomination. Had he not run for President in 2004, his being for the war would not have been such a hot issue.

You know one thing with Dodd that is just politically incorrect to bring up is that his father stole money and was censored. Does anyone but me and you remember that? The New York Times at the time refereed to the elder Dodd as a "disgraced incumbent". Now everyone thinks he got a bum deal.

Now a days Thomas Dodd is fully rehabilitated and has all kinds of building named after him.