Mickey Kaus directs us to a “suggestive” 1998 article from the Boston Herald.
This is absurd.
Kerry’s alleged conduct is not unethical (assuming it pre-dates his marriages). Even if it does not, it’s between Kerry and his wife. There is no reason to so much as dignify these accusations with a response.
I would note that the WRONG thing to do would be to lie. That may legitimately come back and bite him. He should simply ignore them as being unworthy of mention.
- Rick
Given that someone had already drawn Scott McClellan’s name into this implying that it may have been Bush “gutter politics”, not to mention the fact that you yourself busted someone up over in the Pit for snipping off relevant parts of quotes, the relevant part from me being “If this turns out to be true…”, I’m afraid that I must chastise you, sir, for your comments. I nipped the gratuitous and obviously forthcoming Bush bashing in the bud, no more, no less. Was it snide? Sure was. But you, sir, have never posted a backhand comment like that before in all your time here. Nope, not you.
Since others have already rebutted your query with various cites, I’ll toss out a personal-level anecdote instead:
As I am writing this at work, I have a co-worker who is no more than ten feet away from me. Having talked to him about politics from time to time, he has informed me that his wife has not only received the (very dated) email spam about “Bill Clinton’s secret hit squad victims,” but she believes it is completely true. Never mind that these allegations are so much bullstuff, never mind that the death of Vince Foster (who is one of the names on the list, natch) was conclusively ruled to be a suicide… nah, Bill Clinton is such an evil man that he plots the deaths of his enemies, and has a secret stash of 50+ victims. :rolleyes:
And, of course, her husband – the afformentioned co-worker – believes this as well.
There. Two people who believe Vince Foster was murdered on orders from Bill Clinton. And I didn’t have to go more than ten feet to find 'em. 
Quick guide to making yourself famous. Andy Warhol recommends you write to…
http://www.johnkerry.com/communities/students/nhwinternship.pdf 
One of the advantages of a long primary campaign in which the ultimate nominee is not identified until late in the process is that there’s ample opportunity for the competitors to investigate one another and drag out any candidate-killing scandals like this. If the primaries are effectively concluded before a completely rigorous vetting process, it’s more likely that some unaired bombshell remains to be detonated in the ensuing general election campaign. Metaphorically speaking, you’ve got to leave the autoclave on as long as possible, or you could be unknowingly working with contaminated material.
Of course, one of the disadvantages of this process is that you’re just handing a bunch of ammunition to the opposition to be used down the road. C’est la vie.
I would hope that regardless of the verity of it all, Kerry just comes out and says it up front. Of course, that never really works because there’s always the “Yeah, but wait till we till you this other insignificant detail he DIDN’T mention!” schtick, but there’s not much to do about that. Lying or obfuscating is just going to make this into a centre stage issue.
Actually, what I would really hope is that every time Kerry gets asked about it, he responds with a pleasant “Fuck you, asshole. Next question.” But I don’t think that’ll happen.
Well folks, if the National Enquirer is carrying the story, then it must be . . . (okay I don’t know). Is it possible that the reason drudge provides no link is that he considers the source beneath even him? (Link found on instapundit’s site)
http://www.nationalenquirer.com/neo/newsstand.cfm --John Kerry’s Secret Life Exposed
Of course, four years ago that same paragon of journalistic integrity (sarcasm directed at Enquirer) had a story about a strippers claims of a torrid affair (only physical though) with then governor Bush. (link found on Atrios’ site)
http://www.nationalenquirer.com/stories/news.cfm?instanceid=5978
If this was released by another Democrat, why couldn’t be someone with the best interests of his party at heart? If Kerry has this thing in his past, isn’t it better to run it up against the American people now and see what kind of response you get?
If I were a Democratic operative who wasn’t tied to a specific candidate but just wanted to give the dems a good shot at the White House, this might be *exactly the time I’d leak this. The key to the timing is that Clark dropped out of the race. Why? Because if Kerry DOES wind up damaged goods, Clark could be encouraged to stay in the race, and then you wind up with a mess. But now it looks like a Kerry/Edwards showdown. These guys are in fact the two best candidates in the field. So once you’re down to those two, you release the dirt about Kerry, and see if he can survive it. If he can, great. You’ve defused the issue, and it’ll be old news by the time of the general election. If it turns out that this is a big deal, well, you’ve got Edwards ready to step in.
But the WORST thing that could happen would be to keep this buried and let Karl Rove spring an ‘October Surprise’. So there’s no way this was a Republican smear job. My guess is that if this is real, Rove probably went “Shit!” when he heard about it today.
And of course, the Hillary-watchers are seeing Clinton footprints all over this - keep the primaries a toss-up, get the delegate counts split up, and then go into a brokered convention with Hillary carrying the white flag. I do NOT believe that, by the way. I just think it’s amusing that some people are so fixated on the Clintons that they see their footprints in almost anything potentialy Machiavellian.
Where’s Linda Tripp now that we need her?
I agree with Sam Stone.
If this is true, then it is a lot better to hear about it now than later. If this turns out to be true and hurts Kerry with the voters, then there is still time to nominate Edwards, who may be more electable than Kerry anyway.
Yeah, then Rove can drop the Edwards intern bombshell in October. She’s already been “embedded” in the Edwards campaign staff by Rove as insurance.
Ya’ know, this whole hub-bub got me listening to Rush today and even he shot down a caller who proposed this brokered convention nonesense.
Also, to deny that there is something going on in the Democratic Party right now is to be a bit naive. Clearly there is some form of Clinton camp vs. Gore(?) camp thing going on.
Says it right here in the Bible:
Verily, I say unto thee
Thou shalt not, with thy staff, comfort thy rod
For it is an abomination…
Please note my repetition of the word “if” in italics, boldface and caps.
If JK was sleeping with an intern who was, at the time, under his supervison (i.e. hire, fire, write recommendations), I submit that there existed a professional relationship in which one had power over the other, in which context sexual activity would be unethical.
Again, if it’s him and a peer, it’s their lives. A United States Senator, unmarried or not, doinking a 20-year-old underling, is IMO, a despicable cad.
All of which, “if.”
Why is this newsworthy anyway? There’s no “perjury” excuse this time. No allegation of illegality, so who gives a fuck?
Remember all the Pubs who kept indignantly denying that they cared about a blow job. “It’s the perjury,” they moaned.
I don’t see how this can have any legs unless she’s underage or something. If no law was broken and his wife doesn’t care, then how is this relevant?
Sludge says that Kerry is going to explain himself on Imus tomorrow. If he’s honest people probably won’t care much.
If…big if, the whole thing at Drudge is right, then why would Kerry have anything to do with her leaving the country? After all, what he did is in no way wrong.
Just so I don’t get accused of solely being a “Bush-basher”–if it really was the Clark campaign that leaked this, as Drudge seemed to imply (but for some reason could not bring himself to say outright), let me get in a little Clark-bashing.
(conjecture to follow)
[Ol’ General Wes ran a novice’s campaign. Seemingly perfectly cast an outsider with cred among the crucial veterans’ vote, he let Dean grab the outsider mantle with both hands and a YEAAAARGH!, and Kerry proved the more popular candidate among the vets. Wes ran almost his entire campaign on CNN, and he couldn’t even get CNN really interested in him.
Then Clark, in–who knows, fit of pique?–forgets or fails to learn one of the first rules of political campaigns in the 21st century: nothing, about anything, is really “off the record” in the era of anonymous blogs and post “gentlemen’s agreements.” Hi-ho, an eminently dull week in the primaries becomes scandalicious! Thanks, Wes.]
The latest ‘hint’ about this is that he had a 2-year affair starting in 2001. If that’s the case, then a lot of people are going to see something wrong with that. And, you could make the case that right or wrong, it was stupid, and shows recklessness and bad judgement for someone planning to run for President.
But right now we’re all just speculating. I notice the “Enquirer” cover is also claiming allegations of drug use. Now, the Enquirer is usually not fit to wrap fish in, so I wouldn’t give it any credence, except that in the last few years it actually has had a record for scooping the major media and being right about some things. I guess we’ll just have to see if this turns into anything, and how Kerry handles it if there’s anything there.
Many voters would give a fuck. The perjury made a nice charge against Clinton, but most people paid attention because of the sex. If any candidate is shown to have banged a 20-something intern, that candidate is toast. You don’t care and I don’t care, but you’re smart enough to know that the media would fry him and the electorate would spit him out like a cockroach mixed in with dinner.