I didn't become a political writer until relatively late in life, so I didn't have the dubious pleasure of meeting many politicians during my relative youth. One of the few that I stumbled across was Geraldine Ferraro. I figured with Rep. Ferraro garnering some headlines today for practicing that special Clinton-style politics of meaning, it would be a good time to share the scarring anecdote of my dinner with Geraldine.
It was late Spring, 1988. Geraldine Ferraro was still pretty famous, her path breaking run for the vice-presidency that had succeeded in Minnesota (if nowhere else) still a fresh national memory. The almost Vice-President was spending the spring semester at Harvard's Eliot House while doing some sort of business at the neighboring Kennedy School. As an Eliot House resident and a Government concentrator (at Harvard, we called "Poli-sci" "Government"), I was invited to a dinner with Ms. Ferraro along with a dozen of my gov-jock compadres.
While such dinners with politicians doing a rehab stint at the K-School were a common thing, Geraldine Ferraro was by far our most famous guest of honor. The silver medalist in that regard would have to have been the then-former governor of Pennsylvania (and future Rathergate whitewasher) Dick Thornburgh. It wouldn't be entirely accurate to say anticipation sat heavily in the air as we eager undergrads gathered to break bread with a woman who came a mere 50 million votes from becoming Vice President, but at least for me anyway, the night did promise to break the monotony of watching Bruins games on a 12" TV in my dorm room.
The dinner began with Rep. Ferraro holding court. Endlessly. It was as if time stood still. She told a series of self-aggrandizing stories, each slightly implausible in its own way. At one point, she reflected that politicians whose names end in vowels have an inherent advantage because their admirers can easily chant their names. "Ronnie - Ronnie," she demonstrated. She then elaborated, "Gerry - Gerry." A friend of mine looked at me and mouthed, "Ford?" I shook my head no and demurely pointed to our guest of honor.
After a seeming eternity, Rep. Ferraro graciously offered to take questions for a few minutes. I raised my hand, and was recognized by our tutor. I asked, "You know virtually everyone in the halls of power in DC and elsewhere. Of all the people you know, who do you think would make the best president?"
Rep. Ferraro said that two people had a shot at being the next president, Michael Dukakis and George H.W. Bush. Since there was no sense in discussing people who didn't currently have their hat in the ring, she would confine her selection to that small roster. Unsurprisingly, she named Michael Dukakis as the most qualified among nearly 300 million Americans to lead us into the 90's.
Finding this evasion distasteful, the tutor intervened on my behalf, saying that it would be interesting for the students to benefit from Ms. Ferraro's wide circle of acquaintances. Rep. Ferraro delved even further into her entirely inappropriate "Meet the Press" mode. "I'm not here to discuss hypotheticals," she barked.
As the years have gone by and I've gotten to know some people who count many of our political leaders among their acquaintances, I've often reprised the question that I first trotted out during my dinner with Rep. Ferraro. Everyone has always answered the question, often in extremely interesting fashion. Believe it or not, Supreme Court justices come up a lot. Massachusetts senators do not.
Every time I've seen Geraldine Ferraro on TV the past two decades, I've thought of the time we broke bread together. And I've always thought she combined two of a mediocre politician's most unappealing traits - a tendency to robotically hew to message and an instinct for bullying when she sensed that option was available.
If Geraldine Ferraro's career has been belatedly euthanized because of her loathsome insinuation that Barack Obama owes his political success to his skin color, then she is going out in a strangely fitting fashion.
