Yesterday, a man in Monroe asked me what I thought about Dan Kildee's decision to jump into the governor's race.
"You know, I've always thought he was a great guy. But don't you think he is a little old for that job?" he said. Well, not really. Dan Kildee is 51, the same age as Jennifer Granholm.
But the voter had him confused with his better-known uncle, Dale Kildee, a congressman from Flint who is now over 80 years old.
Having a famous name probably will be a plus for Dan Kildee, once voters realize he isn't an octogenarian.
The Kildee name is a famous one in the Flint area, and those who know Dan Kildee give him generally high marks. He doesn't have Lansing experience, but does know something about government. Kildee spent a dozen years as a county commissioner and then thirteen years as county treasurer.
Last year, he became president of the Genesee County Land Bank, a non-profit urban policy center. It's possible that he might be just what the doctor ordered for the Democrats. He's a new face, though one with a familiar name.
He has experience, but not the kind of experience that has made him a lot of enemies. Nobody knows, of course, how he'll come off to the voters. I can't assess his charisma quotient, because he is the only serious candidate I haven't yet met.
But he does appear to be able to make up his mind. For the last few weeks, the Democratic contest for governor has been dominated by a series of "nervous Nellies" who couldn't decide if they wanted to run or not. Former state treasure Bob Bowman was out, then in, then finally out again. Ditto for pizza heiress Denise Ilitch. Speaker of the House Andy Dillon continues to play Hamlet and can't decide whether he is running or not.
But Kildee jumped in with both feet. He filed paperwork that will allow him to raise money and said that while he is doesn't yet have his campaign team in place, he is in the race to stay. Exactly where he sits on the political spectrum isn't clear, but he wants to be seen as a can-do pragmatist.
"Lansing politicians can't get a budget done on time and are putting excessive partisanship ahead of the people," Kildee said. Hard to quarrel with that. His entering the race also helps ensure that Democratic primary voters have a decent selection of qualified candidates for governor to choose from.
That will be true even if nobody else gets into the race. Alma Wheeler Smith is the least well-known and the least well-funded, but has many years of legislative experience and some well-developed ideas on tax policy and balancing the state budget.
Bernero, the mayor of Lansing, has both legislative and executive experience. And Kildee has plenty of both kinds of experience without having been part of the mess in Lansing.
For their part, Republicans also have at least three major candidates with major league experience -- a congressman, the state attorney general, and a big-county sheriff and former legislator.
The field is filling up, and voters in each party have almost six months to figure out who they want to dance with in the fall. Now more than ever, it's important that they make the right choice.
I saw Dan Kildee give a presentation about the Genesee land bank while at U of M a couple of years ago and came away very very impressed. This state would do well having an executive with experience using very limited resources to rebuild troubled communities and economies.
Posted by: ms | February 25, 2010 at 04:53 PM
In my essay above I refer to Bob Bowman as Pat Bowman, which was a silly error on my part. Apologies!
Posted by: Jack Lessenberry | February 26, 2010 at 06:03 AM