"Many of us thought by this time, Kennedy would have 100 members of Congress tied up," a supportive House member reflected recently. "But he doesn't." And some of the places where Kennedy has failed to galvanize his potential support could prove critical in the coming months. Democratic Congressman Tom Harkin is deemed by some observers of the Iowa scene to be pivotal in the tight caucus fight upcoming in that state. Like Edward Boland of Massachusetts, Harkin commands support in a rural area that cannot be readily organized by campaign workers. Presumed early on to be in the Kennedy camp, he has not yet entered Kennedy's tent with endorsement in hand. In Illinois, Dan Rostenkowski, a force in Chicago politics, has not committed his support to Kennedy, either. One does not imagine these men being inspired to act as hastily as Jane Byrne, given Kennedy's performance in recent weeks. And in New Hampshire – where Kennedy must broaden his liberal base, especially in small working-class towns peopled by right-of-center Democrats – William Loeb's Manchester Union Leader is doing daily mischief with front page editorials against Teddy accompanied by negative feature stories and cartoons that consistently keep his foibles in full view. Last Thursday, for example, this blast was the centerpiece of a front-page editorial: "The more Senator Kennedy attempts to explain away his thoughtless and ill-timed condemnation of the former shah of Iran, the more irrevocably he establishes his reputation as a desperate political opportunist who will say anything, do anything, to win votes - and then dissimulate feverishly when it becomes apparent that his tactics have backfired."
The problem for Kennedy, then is one of accumulating wounds, self-inflicted and salted by the impression that he is a man of utmost impatience – "Not one to stand there with the bat on his shoulder" when public comment tickles his fancy, as a close adviser once described him, a personality of excess given to free-swinging and faulty judgments. Amid such public skepticism, the mere fact of his fumbling over words begins to make the sounds run, for it dilutes the view of Kennedy held until a few weeks ago, the view expressed by a member of the Massachusetts delegation who said, "Teddy's persona is larger than the sum of its parts. His sentences do not parse, but he always comes to the right decision."
Or so it seemed. Now he has seemingly come to several wrong decisions in a row, and suddenly the sum of his persona is being brought into question. Worse, yet Kennedy has created an Emersonian dilemma with his Iranian remarks: events are in the saddle and riding him. And the man holding the reins is Ayatollah Khomeini. Should Khomeini decide to act violently against the hostages, Kennedy will have succeeded in lopping off a share of the blame for himself that might have otherwise been Carter's lonely ration. More devastating would be the options left to Kennedy if Khomeini invokes retribution; if Imam harms or slays the hostages, Kennedy's only recourse would be rhetoric. Carter's could be war. Which is one of the reasons why the smart money – even among Kennedy's own advisers – was against his challenging the sitting president of his party.
