Soccer Dad

No baggage mfume

To the Washington Post's Lee Hockstader, author of the paper's Democratic talking points op-ed observer of local political races, the Maryland Democratic Party has a "Kweisi Problem."

As Democrats elsewhere rub their hands in anticipation of congressional gains in the midterm elections, Democrats in Maryland are gloomily contemplating a scenario in which they may lose a U.S. Senate seat they've held for 30 years.

And that scenario has a name: Kweisi Mfume.

Then he carefully tells us Kweisi's part of the story

Smart, personable and politically shrewd, Mfume is not exactly the image of a nightmare candidate. He has the bearing, bona fides and oratorical panache of a senator, and he possesses that priceless commodity for any New Age politician -- a poignant personal narrative. Having run with violent street gangs and fathered five children by four women by age 22, Mfume pulled himself together, earning a master's degree from Johns Hopkins University and winning a seat first on the Baltimore City Council and then in Congress before becoming president of the nation's most august civil rights group, the NAACP.

In March of last year, just a few months after resigning as head of the NAACP, Mfume announced that he would seek to replace Sen. Paul Sarbanes, just days after the incumbent announced that he would not seek another term.

About a month later allegations surfaced that in his time at the NAACP, Mfume had behaved improperly with female employees.

Allegations detailed in a confidential NAACP report claim that Kweisi Mfume gave raises and promotions to women with whom he had close personal relationships while he was president of the nation's oldest civil rights organization.

The 22-page memorandum, prepared last summer by an outside lawyer, did not accept as true the claims lodged against Mfume by a female employee but determined that they could be "very difficult to defend persuasively" if she filed a lawsuit.

Mfume, 56, a Democratic candidate for the U.S. Senate in Maryland, has denied the allegations. In an interview yesterday, he said the allegations in no way influenced his Nov. 30 announcement that he would leave the NAACP after nine years.

The nature of the allegations - they were made by one person - and the lack of an apparent followup suggest that the claims don't have much to them. However it's quite possible that the rumors were already being heard before they were reported and that would explain why

Mfume's strained relations with the party started like a bad first date. He was the first Democrat in the Senate race, resigning from the NAACP and jumping in just three days after the five-term incumbent, Sen. Paul Sarbanes, announced his retirement last year.

Then: silence. Democratic party elders, notably Rep. Steny Hoyer, the state party's capo di tutti capi , scoured the field for a viable alternative to Mfume. For a month and a half, while Mfume was the only big-name politician in the race, nearly every major Democrat withheld endorsement.

First of all, Hockstadter ignored the allegations against Mfume as playing a role in the Democrats' unwillingness to support him wholeheartedly. Mfume blames his political rivals for leaking the report, but the leak more likely came from his rivals within the NAACP as only members of the board had access to the report.

Second of all, at the time Mfume announced his intention to run

Four other members of Maryland's congressional delegation have said they are looking at the race, including C.A. Dutch Ruppersberger of suburban Baltimore, who plans to announce an exploratory committee this morning, and Chris Van Hollen of Montgomery County, who said yesterday that he would set up an exploratory committee "shortly."

Baltimore Reps. Benjamin L. Cardin and Elijah E. Cummings also are considering bids.

While Mfume was the first to announce there were a number of other potential candidates for the seat. I don't know if state political parties usually support the first candidate just because their first or if they wait to see how the race shapes up. I suspect the latter is true, but Hockstader's loyally parroting from Mfume's lines rather than offering up any sort of analysis.

But then there's another factor that makes Mfume a less than attractive candidate. When he announced for Sarbanes's seat the Washington Post noted

Mfume described himself as unabashedly liberal on social issues but said he had grown increasingly conservative on fiscal matters.

"Am I too liberal for the state of Maryland?" Mfume said. "We'll find out."

Liberal yes. And what about his allies? It was Mfume who, as head of the Congressional Black Caucus made a "sacred covenant" with the Nation of Islam, a racist and antisemitic group. Given that one of the factors in Gov. Ehrlich's surprise election victory in 2002 was that he attracted more Jewish support than expected, perhaps the Democratic party felt a little hesitant to support Mfume who would almost certainly alienate a significant portion of the Jewish vote. Loyal stenographer, Lee Hockstader, ignores that too.

Frankly, I don't see Cardin losing either the Democratic primary or the general election. There will be those who will play up Mr. Mfume's dissatisfaction, but he isn't as attractive a candidate as he thinks he is. Inspirational story aside, he has a lot of baggage.

Though Hockstader wrote an opinion column, his failure to disclose Mfume's shorcomings too made the piece look like campaign literature more than serious analysis.

Technorati tags: Kweisi Mfume, Maryland Politics, Election 2006.

Posted by SoccerDad at June 12, 2006 5:09 AM