"Fired up" Kerry eyes 2008 race, plans on visible role in Senate

By Mike Allen
The Washington Post

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WASHINGTON — Democrat John Kerry plans to use his Senate seat and long lists of supporters to remain a major voice in U.S. politics despite losing the presidential race last Tuesday, and he is assessing the feasibility of trying again in 2008, friends and aides said yesterday.

Kerry will attend a post-election lame-duck Senate session that begins next week and has said he is "fired up" to play a highly visible role, the friends and aides said.

Aides said Kerry is relishing the prospect of renewed combat with President Bush, fighting such measures as the president's proposal to open the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge to oil drilling.

Kerry's plans contrast starkly with the approach taken by former Vice President Al Gore, who all but disappeared from the political scene after losing to Bush in the disputed 2000 presidential election.

Kerry fueled talk about a 2008 bid during remarks at a Washington restaurant Saturday night. He provoked a thunderous reception by reminding about 400 campaign aides and volunteers that Ronald Reagan twice sought the Republican nomination for president before winning it in 1980.

"Sometimes God tests you," Kerry told the crowd, according to an aide. "I'm a fighter, and I've come back before."

Bob Shrum, Kerry's chief campaign consultant, told reporters during a Democratic panel yesterday that Kerry "will be active and vocal. He has one of the most powerful lists in the Democratic Party and one of the most powerful fund-raising bases ... and I think he intends to use it to speak out."

But several Democrats expressed skepticism about Kerry's plans, saying they think the party needs a fresh face and must turn a corner.

"I can't imagine people are going to say, 'It worked pretty well last time. This is what we need next time,' " said one Democrat involved in Kerry's campaign strategy, who requested anonymity.
 
Kerry has mostly remained at his Boston home since Election Day and has spent some of that time preparing for his return to the Senate. The friends and aides said he wants to use his new following and credibility to become a major force on a range of legislation that will extend well beyond his previous portfolio of national-security issues.

He also is contemplating establishing a political-action committee and perhaps a think tank to elevate his role during the jockeying over the definition and leadership of the Democratic Party. Kerry lost to Bush by three percentage points in the popular vote and by 34 electoral votes. The president carried 31 states to 19 for Kerry.

Shrum made his remarks during an appearance at a Christian Science Monitor breakfast with James Carville, chief strategist of President Clinton's first campaign, and Stan Greenberg, a Democratic pollster. The session started out as a clinical dissection of what went right for Bush and wrong for Kerry. But it quickly became a blunt, emotional discussion of the future of the Democratic Party.

"I'm not in denial. Reality hit me," Carville said. "Let's take the greatest morality story of all — we're born again," he added, in a play on words connoting both his view that the party needs a fundamental change, as well as the importance of evangelical Christians to Bush.

"The purpose of a political party is to win elections, and we're not doing that," he said.

Washington Post staff writer Dan Balz contributed to this report.