Lifelong Collector of Data Can Bog Down His Staffs

[cosmicone]

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A28106-2004Oct12.html

By Dale Russakoff and Jim VandeHei
Washington Post Staff Writers
Wednesday, October 13, 2004; Page A01

Until his presidential campaign, the biggest enterprise Sen. John F. Kerry (D-Mass.) had run was a county district attorney's office in Massachusetts with 90 lawyers in the late 1970s. By all accounts, Kerry was a skilled manager, running the office for an old-line district attorney and swiftly transforming a sleepy, nepotistic organization of part-time prosecutors into one of the most high-powered and innovative in the northeast.

"I saw for the first time John's ability to take in huge amounts of information, reach out to experts, set a course and lead," said J. William Codinha, who succeeded Kerry in the Middlesex County district attorney's office and now heads the litigation department at Nixon Peabody in Boston.

Kerry campaign staff members, from left, David Wade, Sarah Bianchi, Michael McCurry and Stephanie Cutter listen to their candidate speak. (Gerald Herbert -- AP)

Almost 25 years later, Kerry brought the same voracious appetite for information to his presidential campaign. He has three dozen domestic policy councils, two dozen foreign policy groups, an expanding corps of consultants, and many informal advisers he calls -- about 15 per night -- before going to bed.

But rather than "set a course and lead," as Codinha described, Kerry has lurched from course to course, periodically switching drivers and road maps -- and messages -- as he reacts to more and more information and advice. "His strength is that he listens," said a regular recipient of Kerry's late-night phone calls. "The problem is he's listening to too many people."

</snip>

[truthisfreedom]

1. he has to do this for now. once the election takes place and he WINS, he

can more realistically approach these things. it's critical that he not make any mistakes between now and the election that bushco can make hay from.

[Julien Sorel]

2. The libral media at it again.

Look out Gore, Kerry is about to be Kerryed.