John Kerry’s thoroughly modern American family — complete with divorce, loss, stepchildren and forward roles for women — was rolled out to the public on Wednesday, a walking testimonial to the Democratic challenger.
A day before Kerry makes the speech of his life to date, Wednesday’s turns by his wife, Teresa Heinz Kerry, his grown daughters, Vanessa and Alexandra, and his stepsons, Chris and Andre Heinz, were designed to inject some warmth into the campaign of a candidate apparently unable to generate such sentiments on his own.
Heinz Kerry got top billing, her popularity among the Democratic faithful at new heights after Tuesday night’s address to the Democratic convention — and the latest public outburst from a woman unafraid of eccentricity.
In Ms Heinz Kerry’s favour among Democratic activists is an exotic biography, from her girlhood in colonial Mozambique to her first marriage to the Republican senator and soup magnate John Heinz which allows her to claim affiliation with immigrants, women, and Latinos.
”For all of us, family life is the glue, it is the support system,” she told a crowded Latino caucus. She became even more daring, reaching out to Cuban-Americans, who are predominantly Republican supporters.
”They lost as I did when their country became a communist country,” she said.
In the normal course of events, Heinz Kerry might also be expected to devote some energy to herself, especially after she told a conservative columnist to ”shove it”.
Democratic handlers often despair at Heinz Kerry’s unpredictability, and there was a great deal of suspense in the conventional hall on Tuesday night in anticipation that she might depart from her carefully scripted address.
But in the universe of Democratic delegates — who want a more combative campaign — Heinz Kerry’s outburst makes her a heroine, and buttons reading ”America says shove it George W” were selling briskly yesterday.
”It gets Fox News’s panties in a bunch, but frankly they don’t like us much anyway,” said Ted Prezelski of Arizona, who had bought one of the new souvenirs. ”I know what a political wife has to go through, and this shows that she really has a lot of strength.”
Tuesday night’s address bolstered that impression, with Heinz Kerry making a skilful argument that those who disparaged her occasionally bizarre statements also wanted to stifle women’s right to expression.
”My right to speak my mind, to have a voice, to be what some have called ‘opinionated’ is a right I deeply and profoundly cherish,” she said, making quotation marks with her fingers.
It was the best line of the evening, drawing whoops of delight from the audience. Heinz Kerry went on: ”My only hope is that one day soon, women, who have all earned the right to have their opinions, instead of being labelled opinionated, will be called smart or well-informed, just as men are.”
Despite her impatience to be heard, Heinz Kerry has no gift for public speaking. The rest of the speech combined a testimonial to her husband’s leadership, with the now ritual presentation of personal biography.
Heinz Kerry is multi-faceted. As she noted in her speech, she speaks five languages and is a trained interpreter. As the daughter of a doctor, she said she understood how to heal. She also said she had marched in anti-apartheid demonstrations while a student in South Africa in the 1950s.
”I learned something then and I believe it still. There is a value in taking a stand, whether or not anybody may be noticing it, or whether or not it is a risky thing to do,” she said.
That independence endeared her to Democratic activists. ”I just love what she said that a woman has a right to be opinionated,” said Deborah Greenberg, a convention volunteer from Massachusetts. – Guardian Unlimited Â