John Kerry served . . . where?

I want to continue representing Massachusetts, and that's why I am running for re-election so I can use my voice all day every day to end this war and galvanize grassroots action to force Washington and our Democratic Party to live up to its responsibility.

- John Kerry, on Jan. 24, after announcing he wasn't going to run for president in 2008

THE GOOD news for Democrats is that John F. Kerry is not running for president again. The bad news: He's running for re-election to the Senate.

Everyone remembers Kerry's presidential race in 2004, when Swift Boat Veterans for Truth raised questions about his war record in the 1960s. Maybe Kerry did embellish a bit, but let's get real. Earth to Swift Boaters: That's why we call them war stories.

As a political-science professor and longtime student of Congress, I'm more concerned about what politicians have done for me lately, or at least in the last two decades. So who is John F. Kerry and does he represent Massachusetts? As I like to tell my students, John Kerry and I are a lot alike. We both have nice hair, we both have nice wives, and neither of us has accomplished anything in the Senate.

To tell the public about John Kerry's Senate "record," someone should start Senate Veterans for Truth. The first ad would go something like this:

VOICEOVER

"The United States Senate. Washington, the District of Columbia - D.C., the veterans call it. The media. The lawyers. The interns . . .

"Through our history, more than 1,000 Americans have honorably served their nation in this hot, gritty, dangerous place. Not all of them have come home alive.

"John Kerry claims to have served his nation in the U.S. Senate. He has made this claim a key part of his campaign for reelection to that body. But what are the facts? There are no records that anyone named John F. Kerry impacted any significant law, amendment, budget item or oversight hearing.

"So did John Kerry really serve in the U.S. Senate? What do veteran Senate officers say about John Kerry's alleged service in the U.S. Senate?"

Bob Dole (R-Kan.), former U.S. Senate majority leader:

"I've left pieces of my body in Senate debates about cloture, rescission to subcommittee, all the tough stuff where the nancy boys were afraid to go - and I never saw John Kerry out there where the motions were flying."

George Mitchell (D-Maine) former U.S. Senate majority leader: "I never heard of any junior senator from Massachusetts. I thought Ted Kennedy took up two seats."

Al Gore Jr. (D-Tenn.), U.S. Senate veteran, 1982-1993: "I served in the United States Senate. Maybe I didn't face the greatest danger, or do the most, but I did serve my country. I have no recollection of any controlling legal authority saying that John Kerry did or did not serve in the United States Senate."

Zell Miller (D-Ga.), U.S. Senate Veteran, 2000-2005: "If John Kerry had actually done anything in the Senate, then our brave soldiers would today be defending America with spitballs."

Robert Byrd (D-W. Va.), former U.S. Senate majority Leader:

"From the time of Bactitus the Sardinian, the great Roman senator who shepherded New Deal legislation through the Senate during the reign of Claudius the Elder, in the time before filibusters, there have been men - vile, mendacious men - who would claim to have served in the Senate when the records show it is not so. John Kerry is one of those men.

"If John Kerry lied about serving in the U.S. Senate, what else will he lie about?"

"Paid for by Senate Veterans for Truth, Arlington, Virginia." *

Robert Maranto teaches political science at Villanova, and can be reached at robert.maranto@villanova.edu. For the record, he has never served in the Senate.