Krauthammer: Make Her Run for Office

If Caroline Kennedy wants the Senate seat, she needs a better reason than her name
By Gabriel Winant,  Newser Staff
Posted Dec 19, 2008 12:02 PM CST
Krauthammer: Make Her Run for Office
Caroline Kennedy walks into city hall with Mayor Matt Driscoll. left, during a visit in Syracuse, N.Y., Wednesday, Dec. 17, 2008. Kennedy is interested in the Senate seat vacated by Hillary Clinton.   (AP Photo/Kevin Rivoli)

Don’t worry that Caroline Kennedy doesn’t have enough experience to be a senator; worry that she thinks she’s entitled to it because of her last name, writes Charles Krauthammer in the Washington Post. Given that she hasn’t accomplished a whole lot, what else is Kennedy offering? “I hate to be a good-government scold, but wasn't the American experiment a rather firm renunciation of government by pedigree?”

The British have a special house of Parliament “exclusively for highborn twits.” Crucially, though, the House of Lords has no power, while “the US Senate retains House of Commons powers even as it develops a House of Lords membership.” If she wants the seat, Kennedy should run for it like a commoner. It’s New York, not Camelot, that’s entitled to a senator.
(More Caroline Kennedy Schlossberg stories.)

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