Would former Georgia Senator Sam Nunn make a good pick for VP?

[NNN0LHI]

This is regardless of who wins the nomination. I think he is well liked throughout the country and especially the south and I personally like him a lot. What do you guys think?

Don

[Nicholas D Wolfwood]

1. I like him too

But I think there are better options and I'm not keen on two senators running together.

[Toronto Ron]

2. Nah.

He's been out of the scene for too long. Not the type of personality to fire anyone up, which Kerry needs I think. And forget about trying to carry GA.

[Ganja Ninja]

3. Too right wing.

We may have to run a centrist in the number one spot on the ticket but lets not forget the liberal wing of the party. Sometimes we go a little too far in trying to win over the right. It's their pResident that's screwing things up. Let them come around to us.

[The Traveler]

4. Yer right

Sam Nunn has a quite reasonable record on defense but his civil rights record is not exactly admirable.

[NewYorkerfromMass]

5. too old. eom

[Jai4WKC08]

6. "Let them come around to us"?

And if they don't? You're willing to accept 4 more years of Bushco, rather than bend your lofty principles?

If you were a businessman, would you say, hey, the product I make is perfect. If people are looking for something different, screw 'em. They don't know what's good. I'm gonna keep my widgets just the way they are. Let the customers come to realize on their own that they really do need what I'm selling.

You wouldn't be in business long.

Fwiw, I don't think Sam Nunn is a good choice. But NOT because he's too right-wing.

It's a sad fact that a candidate needs to be extreme enough to win the nomination, and moderate to win the general election. Bush is president (won't say he "won") because he convinced too many people that he was a moderate, a compassionate conservative. It was a lie, of course, but people bought it.

We have the opportunity to convince people how wrong they were, but only if we can fill the vacuum with a team that they will find equally acceptable.

[Tinoire]

7. Naw... Too in bed with defense, corporate globalization & the hawks n/t

[Lydia Leftcoast]

8. Rolled over for Reagan when he should have been leading the opposition

Used to infuriate me when he went along with the insane Pentagon buildup and the immoral and ignorant interventions in Central America and the Caribbean.

One of my least favorite "Democrats."

[nothingshocksmeanymore]

9. Nunn ended up on the board of a defense firm after he left office

Was heavily involved in a lobbying group for privatizing more of the military and was a major block against gays in the military...NO!

[Tinoire]

10. He was a major block?

I wasn't paying close enough attention to who from "our" side was involved in that at the time. Thanks NSMA.

[nothingshocksmeanymore]

14. Here ya go...references..he's responsible for "don't ask..don't tell"

Nunn criticized for opposing end to gay military ban
January 29, 1993.
ATLANTA (UPI) -- A coalition of Georgia gay and civil rights groups Friday urged Sen. Sam Nunn, D-Ga., to end his opposition to President Clinton's proposal to lift the ban on homosexuals serving in the military.

Nunn, chairman of the Senate Armed Services Committee, has opposed lifting the ban and had proposed a six-month waiting period during which federal hearings would be held to consider the impact of removing the restrictions.

Representatives of several groups held a news conference on the steps of Atlanta's Richard B. Russell Federal Building and urged Georgians to flood the telephones in Nunn's office with calls protesting his stance.

``We are here today to call upon Sen. Sam Nunn to stop obstructing President Clinton's effort to end discrimination in the United States military,'' said Don George, the Atlanta field coordinator for the Human Rights Campaign Fund.

``Yesterday, U.S. District Judge Terry Hatter ruled the military ban against gays and lesbians to be unconstitutional,'' he said.

``Today, we ask Senator Nunn to abide with the court ruling and stop standing in the schoolhouse door and to work with President Clinton to end this 50-year-old injustice against lesbian and gay Americans,'' said George.

http://www-2.cs.cmu.edu/afs/cs.cmu.edu/user/scotts/bulgarians/nunn-ban.html

Offers Compromise on Military's Gay Ban
By Martin Kasindorf
Newsday
WASHINGTON

As the Senate Armed Services Committee began hearings Monday on President Clinton's plan to end the prohibition of gays and lesbians serving in the military, committee chairman Sam Nunn (D-Ga.) offered an olive branch on the explosive issue.

Nunn, while siding with the uniformed Pentagon leadership against Clinton on maintaining the longtime ban, suggested in a "CBS This Morning" interview that an interim six-month compromise reached in January could be made permanent.

If the White House agreed, such an arrangement would continue a new policy of not asking would-be recruits about their sexual orientation. But service members who then went public about their orientation would be subject to administrative discharge, as they were for decades before Clinton announced plans to change the policy by executive order.

Clinton ordered the Pentagon to draft an order by July, preventing discharge for the mere status of being gay but subjecting all service members to a rigid code of personal conduct.

Nunn, foreseeing problems of equal treatment for "hand-holding," "kissing" gays and non-gays under a new code of conduct, said that "if people keep their private behavior private, if they don't declare and advertise their private behavior," they are currently able to stay in the service as long as they perform their duties. The interim compromise "may be a pretty good place to end up," he said.

http://www-tech.mit.edu/V113/N16/nunn.16w.html

Then he took a seat on GE's board

BUSINESS WEEK ONLINE NEWS FLASH!
January 6, 1997

Edited by Thane Peterson




SAM NUNN TAKES A SEAT ON GE'S BOARD
General Electric Co. named ex-Senator Sam Nunn to its board on Monday, Jan. 6. The Georgia Democrat, who retired from Congress on Friday, was the longtime chairman of the Senate Armed Services Committee. Although less than 5% of GE's revenues currently come from defense contracts, the company has often had board members with connections to the military
http://www.businessweek.com/bwdaily/dnflash/january/new0106b.htm

[Tinoire]

15. Thank you! I did not know the names back then but I remember the

policy well and remember how livid I was over it. We had more people persecuted under that policy than we did before because some cautiously came out of the closet only to be identified and chased out. Urghhh! I never understood how anyone expected that to work for gays any better than it would have worked for Blacks and the KKK.

Thanks for that!

[Feanorcurufinwe]

11. He ain't my favorite.

There are so many better choices. The best thing I can think about him is that he'd be too old to run in 2012

[On the Road]

12. Good Solid Choice, but a Governor is Better

[edzontar]

13. Too old, too conservative, famously homophobic...

He is just about the WORST possible choice.

[Lydia Leftcoast]

16. Naa, Zell Miller would be a bit worse

:-)