Author Topic: Sen. Kerry decides against 2008 presidential run  (Read 1068 times)

Dos Equis

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Sen. Kerry decides against 2008 presidential run
« on: January 24, 2007, 10:47:04 AM »
Good decision.  He's a louse. 

Sen. Kerry decides against 2008 presidential run
POSTED: 1:29 p.m. EST, January 24, 2007

WASHINGTON (CNN) -- Sen. John Kerry of Massachusetts , the Democratic presidential nominee in 2004, won't make a second bid for the White House, sources familiar with Kerry's thinking told CNN Wednesday.

A source close to Kerry and a Democratic operative who worked for him in 2004 said the four-term senator from Massachusetts has decided to sit out the 2008 race, which has already drawn more than a dozen contenders from both parties.

Kerry made that decision within the past day and was expected to announce it later Wednesday, the source said.

In the 2004 presidential race, Kerry lost the popular vote to President Bush by a popular vote margin of 51-48 percent and by a 286-252 margin in the Electoral College.

Since his 2004 loss, Kerry has struggled to gain support for his re-nomination within the Democratic Party.

In the latest CNN/Opinion Research Corporation poll, five percent of Democrats said Kerry was their top choice for the 2008 nomination, and nearly half -- 51 percent -- did not want him to be the 2008 nominee.

Kerry trailed New York senator and former first lady Hillary Rodham Clinton, who led the field of Democratic preferences with 34 percent; Sen. Barack Obama of Illinois, with 18 percent; Kerry's 2004 running mate, former Sen. John Edwards, who got 15 percent; and former Vice President Al Gore, the party's 2000 presidential nominee, with 10 percent.

The telephone poll was conducted January 19-22, 2007, and involved 467 registered voters who describe themselves as Democrats or independents who lean to the Democratic Party.

The poll's margin of error was plus-or-minus 4.5 percent.

In November, Kerry apologized for a "poorly stated joke," which he said was aimed at President Bush but was widely perceived as a slam on U.S. troops.

At a rally for California gubernatorial candidate Phil Angelides at Pasadena City College, said: "You know, education, if you make the most of it, you study hard, you do your homework, and you make an effort to be smart, you can do well. If you don't, you get stuck in Iraq."

Bush and other Republicans called on Kerry to apologize to U.S. troops.

http://www.cnn.com/2007/POLITICS/01/24/kerry.2008/index.html