Chris Dodd’s Last Hurrah
By Rod Pennington
It has to be bittersweet. Still a young man by US Senate standards, Sen. Chris Dodd (D-Conn) is only 66, he will stand at the elbow of President Obama when he signs the Financial Reform bill Dodd helped ram through. Instead of the pinnacle of a long Washington career it will be a Last Hurrah.
Senator Chris Dodd
Sen. Dodd, who came to the House of Representative as a part of the Democratic “Watergate” class of 1974, claimed his father’s old senate seat in 1980. His 30 years in the senate makes him the longest serving senator in Connecticut history. Instead of campaigning for a 6th term, he is cleaning out his desk.
Caught up in a series of petty scandals that would be overlooked in Washington in a different time, their combined weight and a restless electorate doomed him. There were persistent rumors of his womanizing and drinking. Dodd got a “Friend of Angelo” interest rate on a loan from Countrywide. He was accused of getting a sweetheart deal on a vacation home in Ireland from a man he had persuaded then President Clinton to give a presidential pardon.
None of these would have been enough to retire a man with Dodd’s longevity and seniority, but the financial crisis that swept the country in 2008 was his downfall. As the Chairman of the Senate Banking Committee – normally a non-controversial position – he was swept up in the collapse of the mortgage industry. His happy face portrayal of the situation at Fanny Mae and Freddy Mac in advance of the TARP bailout was embarrassing but his protecting the bonuses of executives at AIG after they had taken billions of federal dollars was the last straw.
The people of Connecticut had grown tired of overlooking the outrageous self-indulgence of their Senior Senator. With him running 20-30 points behind in the polls earlier this year against an unnamed generic Republican, he withdrew before the state primary.
Dodd, who went straight from college to Congress, had a reputation for exemplifying the worst of Washington arrogance. With the mood in the country, an exulted self-worth and sense of entitlement doesn’t play well. How the mighty have fallen.
Don’t expect Sen. Dodd to “go gentle into that good night.” He is a creature of Washington. With his relative youth and massive ego he will be around for a long time. The Financial Reform bill may be the Last Hurrah of his senatorial career, but it will not be the last act of the continuing drama known as Chris Dodd.
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Posted by The Editors
on Jul 16 2010. Filed under Featured Stories.
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