The Unbroken Nest Egg

That grinding sound you hear is either the Democrats' collective teeth, or the knives sharpening for the in-fighting almost sure to come. It seems John Kerry turned into a fiscal conservative late in the presidential race.

Contact the team over at Football Fans for Truth. Kerry violated the most fundamental rule of contact sports (and politics is most assuredly a contact sport): Leave it all on the field of play. Kerry finished the race with somewhere between $15 million and $17 million, plus maybe another $7 million in "legal expense" money.

Some Dems are outraged. And they want the money.

"'Democrats are questioning why he sat on so much money that could have helped him defeat George Bush or helped down-ballot races, many of which could have gone our way with a few more million dollars,' said Donna Brazile, campaign manager for Al Gore's 2000 presidential race.
Brazile is a member of the 400-plus member Democratic National Committee, which meets early next year to pick a new party chairman. One high-ranking member of the DNC, speaking on condition of anonymity, said word of Kerry's nest egg has stirred anger on the committee and could hurt his chances of putting an ally in the chairmanship."

It's doubtful that anyone seriously expects that Kerry cares about what happened in the down-ballot races. Good luck shaming the patrician senator into parting with his cash. A man who will marry a fortune (twice) and live like he earned it all himself will not shame easily. That won't stop them from trying.

While Kerry has likely given more money to state committees than any other nominee, no other Democrat has raised as much as he did. And second-guessing Democrats said Wednesday they couldn't recall a candidate leaving so much money on the table after a campaign.

"He's going to have to give some of it up for 2005 and beyond," Brazile said. "The party will demand it."

Well, good luck.

What's probably going on is a behind-the-scenes political ploy by the Clintons to create an excuse not to give Kerry any say-so in who gets to be DNC chairman. It's still fun to watch.