Charlie Rangel told reporters he’s not thinking much about Harold Ford Jr.’s possible senate candidacy because, “Notwithstanding the press, it’s not on the political calendar, and there’s nobody here that can put it on the political calendar.”
Speaking outside the National Action Network headquarters in Harlem this afternoon, Rangel said he was supporting Kirsten Gillibrand because “she is the incumbent United States Senator from the great state of New York.”
Trying to switch topics, Rangel then went on a riff about how a defeat for Democrats in Massachusetts shouldn’t delay the passage of the health care legislation, even if Democrats fall below the 60 votes needed to stave off a Republican filibuster.
“We have alternatives to this cockamamie 60 votes in the senate—it doesn’t make any sense,” he said. “Fifty-one votes should govern, whether we’re talking about percent of votes in the House of Representatives or 51 percent of votes in the United States Senate.”
Later, I tried using the health issue that Rangel was eager to talk about to get into another discussion about Ford’s candidacy, which Rangel was ducking.
I asked Rangel if he thought someone could win in New York by running against the health care bill (which Ford seems to be willing to do).
“How would someone run against the health care bill in New York? You don’t have enough imagination to think about how that could possibly happen,” Rangel said. “Listen, I got a whole lot on my agenda but thinking about someone running against the president’s health care bill—I don’t have that much imagination.”
