Word: kerrey
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Dates: during 1990-1999
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Born into a large (three brothers, three sisters) middle-class family in Lincoln, Kerrey received an early baptism in political discourse around the dinner table. The discussions "were always issue-oriented," recalls his sister, Jessie Rasmussen. "Never partisan. To this day I don't know if our parents were Republicans or Democrats." The younger Kerreys were taught by example to express and adhere to their beliefs. Before the 1960 presidential election, a dinner guest argued heatedly that if John Kennedy won, the Pope in reality would be running the country. When James Kerrey, Bob's father, persistently rejected the notion...
Despite the family sport of wrestling with issues, Kerrey gave no early indication that within him beat the heart of a skillful, if unorthodox, politician. High school classmates remember him as bright, fun loving, outspoken and very competitive, but he was not a B.M.O.C. At the University of Nebraska he held a few minor student and fraternity offices, dated often and pursued a degree in pharmacy, which he was awarded in 1966. By then, U.S. participation in the war in Vietnam was escalating and Kerrey enlisted. "I was pretty gung-ho," he says now. In March...
After a long convalescence, briefly interrupted in 1970, when the entire family traveled to Washington to see President Nixon award him the Congressional Medal of Honor, Kerrey abandoned plans to open his own pharmacy because the Lincoln area was "overstocked." Instead, he and sister Jessie's husband Dean Rasmussen launched a restaurant they called Grandma's because Kerrey wanted it to feature "grandmother's kind of food." Recalls Jessie: "Dean and Bob were everything at first -- busboys, waiters, cooks and managers." For months, "they worked almost around the clock," says Jessie. Today the brothers-in-law own six restaurants...
Nevertheless, in a major upset, Kerrey in November of 1982 edged Governor Charles Thone by 7,000 votes. Buffeted by a sagging farm economy and fascinated by the charismatic newcomer, enough Republicans crossed over to send Kerrey to the state house. Kerrey inherited a state debt of $24 million, which he attacked with budget cuts, a temporary new tax and a broadened tax base, "none of which was popular," he notes. After dating Winger several times (they met when she was on location in Nebraska for a movie), he moved her into the Governor's mansion and somehow his approval...
Then as his first term neared an end and the state's surplus reached $49 million, Kerrey withdrew from politics as suddenly as he had entered. "I had accomplished what I wanted to. It was time to move on," he says simply. Scott Matter, whose party regained the state house thanks to Kerrey's decision not to run, thinks his sudden disinterest is typical and unsettling. "He's got a short attention span," says Matter. "He's opportunistic. He could get bored with the Senate too." Kerrey concedes the point. "I could," he admits. Observes pollster Hickman: "He could walk...