Hollywood in the East [Part II]

Caroline Kennedy’s awkward handling of reporters during her maiden upstate get-acquainted tour inadvertently revealed the depths of hubris involved in her unseemly influence-mobilization campaign for ascension into the U.S. Senate. Kennedy didn’t know that it’s not enough to step in front of the cameras and smile on a political whistle-stop but that you also have to face the tough and even unfriendly questions that might arise on such an occasion.

Like for example, What about your total lack of experience in elected office? That’s something American voters obviously don’t mind in the long run (witness Reagan, Schwarzenegger, Ventura et al.), but you still have to have an answer for it. Kennedy swooshed through the assembled photographers and scribes without realizing that even Nicole Kidman has to stop on the red carpet and put up with a snarky grilling from Joan Rivers.

Kennedy’s breezy sense of entitlement is also showing in her attempt to bypass all the hard-working pols, including some smart and capable women, who thought a life of toil in the vineyards might have given them a shot at the promotion. Instead, her candidacy means they get passed over once again by someone with powerful male relatives—how very familiar.

In the end, though, it’s not Kennedy’s fault that she has decided to work the star system. It’s ours. Any Kennedy in the crowd brings out the dazzled biped masses as I recall from my years on Capitol Hill observing Teddy. Her presence guarantees that people will stump up the cash at a fund-raiser, and she probably starts out with 40 percent of the statewide vote in the bag based on her genes.

That’s hard to resist, but I’ll have profound respect for Governor Paterson if he surprises us and takes the hard road of making a merit-based choice.