Will Russ Feingold run for President or U.S. Senate in 2012? If he keeps gaining fans as supportive as Senator Barbara Boxer, we may well be on our way to Feingold 2012. This week, in her final speech before the 111th Congress, Senator Boxer said of Feingold:
“Over the years, Senator Feingold has distinguished himself as a leading expert on foreign and domestic policy who is willing to work across party lines to get the job done, whether it was reforming our Nation’s campaign finance laws or working to end the atrocities committed by Ugandan rebels in the Lord’s Resistance Army.
I have had the privilege of sitting next to Senator Feingold in the Senate Foreign Relations Committee. I have been proud to witness how, as the chair of the Subcommittee on African Affairs, he has led the Senate in recognizing and addressing many of Africa’s unique issues and challenges. He was one of the first to speak out about the genocide in the Darfur region of Sudan. He has advocated for an end to the illicit mining of conflict minerals that support armed conflict in the Democratic Republic of Congo. And he has placed a spotlight on drug trafficking in West Africa, the threat of terrorism in Somalia, and the affects of global diseases such as malaria on African populations.
Senator Feingold is a great reformer, taking the lead on campaign finance reform and on the Army Corps of Engineers.
Senator Feingold has been such an incredible champion for human rights, and I am personally grateful for his work on women’s rights, particularly his commitment to combating violence against women and girls worldwide.
His passion, expertise, and dedication to these issues are unmatched.”
Russ Feingold should not run. It would be nothing but a vanity campaign and he would be lumped in with the various gadfly candidates of years past and never recover his reputation. Quite frankly, he is too good for that. He should also not let himself be the poster boy of the far left just to make you guys feel better, because that is NOT how he has defined himself politically throughout his career. That would only pigeonhole him and limit his possibilities and his legacy. For him to be talked into fruitless, vanity, gadfly far-left efforts by bitter lefties would only mean he is in denial that his political career as an office-holder is likely over. And it would tarnish his 18 year Senate record and reputation. Let the guy go make some money, have a life, be happy, reflect on his career and perhaps spend time as an effective, respected cabinet member at some future point. He is still young. But for him to run for president out of some sort of misguided retribution, denial, anger, pining-for-the spotlight? God — I hope not. As I said — Feingold is too good for tha.
Public opinion shows that both parties are unpopular right now (GOP is the least popular despite their mid-term victories) . The time is right for an independent to take it.
Feingold/Nader ’12
Forward!