Political funerals and the gift of astuteness
a tribute of sorts to Bob Dole
Senator Bob Dole of Kansas died last week.
He was war hero, a congressman and Senator, Senate Majority Leader (and Minority Leader), presidential candidate 3 times, and the GOP standard bearer in 1996.
The accolades of him at his funeral aside, Bob Dole was bitter, mean spirited, and partisan. Yes, truly patriotic and with a strong sense of decency, but Bob Dole could be an absolute jerk.
In 1985, the ranking Democrat on the Senate Judiciary Committee fought the nomination of Daniel Manion to the Seventh Circuit Court of Appeals. After losing the confirmation battle, Joe Biden, the junior Senator from Delaware, asked for reconsideration of the vote. A common procedure and a sort of buyer’s remorse if one was lucky enough to have 1 or 2 Senators on the fence and needed a second chance to beat the nomination down.
Unfortunately, Bob Dole decided that he’d preclude that possibility by locking the physical piece of paper nominating Manion (signed by the President Reagan) in the safe in his office. Despite ceding a second vote by unanimous consent, Dole did not cede the paper required to execute that consent to a second vote. The childishness of the maneuver backfired and ultimately a second vote took place with Vice President Bush providing the critical vote to reaffirm the nomination a month later.
Pure Bob Dole though.
Nine years earlier during the first Vice Presidential debates, Bob Dole lashed out against what he termed as “Democrat Wars1” in an obtuse defense of Gerald Ford in the age of Watergate.
It was not the first or last time Bob Dole’s sarcastic wit did not bite him back.
None of those kind of memories were regaled during his eulogy or in remembrances while Bob Dole was laying in state in the Capitol even though plenty of his political foes came to pay him tribute - Bill Clinton, Dan Quayle, Joe Biden, Chuck Schumer, and others. I feel certain that had Walter Mondale not predeceased Dole, he would have shown up as well.
President Biden took the time to retell how Bob Dole ensured that AMTRAK got funded to “make sure Biden got the hell out of town at night”.
Others shared their favorite Bob Dole stories, political battles or just being on the end of one of Dole’s sarcastic barbs.
Here’s mine:
In the Mediterranean, there is an island called Cyprus. It is an odd little Republic insofar as both Greece and Turkey lay historic claim to it and every time U.S. support comes up for Cyprus or Turkey, the Armenian genocide is recounted in some way or another.
During one debate in 1990, Minority Leader Bob Dole (R-KS) and Majority Leader Robert Byrd (D-WV) were having an intense debate a Senate resolution on the occasion of the 75th anniversary of the Armenian Genocide. And it was intensely personal and defied partisanship.
Robert Byrd’s interests and views were colored by his position on the Appropriations Committee (the member on it despise having money tied to morals or atrocities - a Senate Resolution could affect funding of aid to Turkey) and the fact that his son-in-law was of Turkish descent.
Bob Dole’s views about it were intensely much more personal. After he was seriously injured during a battle near Bologna, Italy during WWII, Dole was cared for by an Armenian American surgeon named Hampar Kelikian.
I can still remember his impassioned speech. It was important to me because I learned about Armenia from a woman named Bea, the first love of my life. And I can still remember her grandmother’s story of her and her mother running just ahead of merciless Turkish troops.
As I watched the intense debate with two fellow congressional staffers (one of whom was of Armenian descent), I said out loud to no one in particular. “Wow, this is what is is like to have Bob Dole on your side.”
While most of the Senate attended the services for Dole, the cadre of GOP presidential wannabes were nearly invisible. Mostly because they barely knew the man - fewer than a dozen current Senators served with him in the Senate. They lacked connection with Bob Dole or with what once was the Republican Party.
But also a sure sign that lauding tributes to anyone not named Donald Trump would inure Trump’s ire. After all, Trump took the time to attack Colin Powell on his funeral. Praising a genuine war hero would surely not go unnoticed by Trump. There is no doubt Trump would have attacked Dole as a “loser”, a friend to Biden and Clinton (at times), and an enemy of Turkey.
This comment and Ford’s insistence that Poland was free of Soviet dominance during his third Presidential debate with former Georgia Governor Jimmy Carter destroyed any momentum the GOP ticket had.