All Aboard

by Howard Altman

I won my first election pool 20 years ago when I picked a tall, lanky lieutenant governor named John Kerry out of a crowded field of Democrats vying to replace cancer-stricken Paul Tsongas as the U.S. Senator from the People’s Republic of Massachusetts.

Even though I was a mere freelancer/chef -- scraping a living by cobbling stories for just about every publication in the Boston metro region while whipping up quiches and other delicacies for a restaurant called Edibles -- I had inside insight none of my better-credentialed pool pals at the Globe, the Herald, the Phoenix or any other Boston-area media possessed.

For several months in late 1983 and early 1984, I was a (mostly) unpaid volunteer for the campaign of Congressman Ed Markey, who at the time was also in the hunt for the Tsongas seat.

Why Markey?

I wish I could remember, exactly.

Probably because he struck the right chords in my then-much-crunchier psyche. As a congressman, he fought the phone companies over access charges, the Reagan administration’s ban on open nuclear reactor permit hearings and for limiting the use of U.S. soldiers in Central America.

It was either that or no one else would allow me to pursue my delusions of political grandeur.

Back then, I hate to admit, I was a 23-year-old with a yen to make a name for myself on the campaign trail.

Sadly, the only name I made for myself, ultimately, was "Great American."

"You’re a great American," was the derisive phrase reserved by Markey campaign muckety-mucks for those of us relegated to scut work, like fetching Markey’s lunch once he figured out what he wanted.

I remember more than one occasion on which Markey, his mind apparently cluttered with more important issues, would hem and haw and stammer as he tried to choose between a burger or an order of pasta from the Italian restaurant around the corner.

What does a two-decades-old election pool and lunch order have to do with anything, you ask.

Good question.

The answer, I guess, is what’s on the minds of Democrats nationwide: electability.

Back then, my old boss was the front-runner, ahead in almost all the polls. Despite that, Markey dropped out of the race, opting to seek re-election to the House.

Markey’s befuddling move paved the way for the guy chasing him in the polls -- Kerry, who handily beat the rest of the pack and then went on to beat Ray Shamie to win the seat he has held ever since.

The Markey campaign knew that Kerry -- like JFK, a waterborne war hero -- was a tough opponent, eminently electable. I knew that the Markey people knew this, which is why I nailed the primary election pool right on the head.

Then again, what do I know?

I thought Markey was electable.

For the last 20 years, I have been puzzled about why he dropped out. Finally, with all this Kerry talk in the air, I couldn’t take it anymore. I called Markey on Tuesday.

"Call me back and we’ll talk off the record," he said after returning to D.C. from a swing through New Hampshire stumping for Kerry.

"Oh, come on," I beseeched. "For the past 20 years, I’ve been dying to know why."

Markey could not believe that after so many years, anyone was still interested, and we both laughed.

"I can’t help you with that one," he said, finally.

I asked if he had any regrets about dropping out, any feelings that perhaps if he went on to the Senate he could be the one seeking the nomination.

"Now you are talking about the Peloponnesian Wars," said Markey, who, if nothing else, was always a pretty humorous guy. "That’s really ancient history. I’m not even thinking about that."

OK, so, what about Kerry? Why should he be elected president?

"Because, um, John Kerry, fought in a war, um, let me frame it," Markey said, sounding very much like the hungry candidate who could not decide between a burger or spaghetti. "John Kerry fought, volunteered to fight in the Vietnam War, but, but, uh, will fight the Bush administration, will fight -- the Bush administration declared war on health care, education and the environment and retirement programs -- and that’s what the Democratic Party needs. That it can withstand the assault on national security and homeland security issues and return fire on domestic issues."

So how will Kerry do against Bush, should he win the nomination?

"I think it is going to be a neck-and-neck race," said the congressman. "The country was closely divided in 2000 and still is. The candidate who runs the best campaign wins."

On a day when the president backpedaled away from his assertion that Iraq required invading because it had weapons of mass destruction, on a day when six more U.S. soldiers died in Iraq, on a day when the 9/11 Commission held a public hearing on the screwups that led to the worst attack ever on U.S. soil, on a day when Kerry won a resounding victory in New Hampshire, it’s all about electability.

Howard Dean’s better on the war than Kerry, who’s been a weasel. And the growl heard ’round the world doesn’t bother me so much.

But if the Dems back Kerry over my guy, then I’ll do what I did the last time they picked Kerry over my guy.

Hop aboard the Electability Express.