Surely he’s not that foolish.
But the word I get is that AG Koster is still leaning toward doing it. If it’s true, this puzzles me for a couple of reasons. The first is that he claims he’s being nonpartisan. He stressed the fact that the legislature, by passing SR27, and the voters, by passing Prop C, have told him what they expect someone nonpartisan to do.
That sounds reasonable at first glance, but one might just as easily argue that SR27 was an attempt to bully him into becoming partisan. Whether or not you agree with the word “bully”, this much is indisputable: joining that suit would be highly partisan. He would not be representing Missouri, because many Missourians are grateful to no longer worry that a pre-existing condition, a lifetime cap, or job loss might rob them of health insurance. Joining the suit would mean that he doesn’t represent that half of the state.
The second reason I’m puzzled is that he’s too savvy not to know that the second he signs on to that suit, the Democrats who are going to care enough to vote in the 2012 primary will despise him. I don’t know if Margaret Donnelly or Jeff Harris would be up for a rematch, but as long as only ONE of them took him on, she or he would stand a good chance–because Democratic voters would remember Koster’s perfidy and punish him. Every activist in the state would work to paste a sign saying “Koster the Imposter” over that winning smile.
Attorney General Chris Koster needs to butt out of this politically charged, partisan issue and concern himself with the stated duties of his office.
Update: St. Louis Activist Hub has a fine piece on the subject of Koster’s future, should he join the lawsuit. Adam takes my thinking one step further and notes that even if Koster were to win the primary, he’d lose the general because neither side would have much to do with him. Our Attorney General needs to focus on the road ahead before he drops an axle into a pothole the size of Audrain County.
it will be because he figures that:
1. Missourians are too stupid to remember what he did. (Twain has a character in Huck Finn say: “H’aint we got all the fools in town on our side? And ain’t that a big enough majority in any town?” Koster perhaps agrees. Missourians voted him in, didn’t they?)
2. Part of the reason they did was the money he spent, and Michael Bersin’s recent post points out that Koster collected $41,500 in one day from such far flung locations as Santa Fe, NM; Farmington Hills, MI; Washington D.C. (several); Atlanta, GA; Flowood, MS; Albuquerque, NM; Watertown, MA; West Provo, UT; Anaheim, CA; Plano, TX; and Concord, NC. Each of them was a minimum of $1,000. I don’t know what makes him so popular in that odd assortment of cities, but maybe Koster figures that cash trumps issues and personal history every time. Maybe we’ll see if he’s right.