Tag: john loughlin

Patrick Kennedy (D, RI) cutting and running.

Was it something we said?

[UPDATE]: Welcome, Instapundit readers.

That’s the word that’s going down on the street:

A Democratic official says Rep. Patrick Kennedy has decided not to seek re-election for his seat representing Rhode Island in the U.S. Congress.

The official spoke to The Associated Press only on the condition that his name not be used because he was not authorized to speak ahead of the official announcement.

[snip]

Patrick Kennedy has been in and out of treatment for substance abuse since crashing his car outside the U.S Capitol in 2006.

Interesting that the Kennedy name is no longer sufficient to protect its holders from premature leaks like this. Also interesting that this is happening; then again, his numbers were abysmal. They were so abysmal that GOP challenger John Loughlin might even be disappointed about this, although… no, I doubt it.

More here: apparently, Kennedy felt the need to take his life in a ‘different direction.’ I would be cruel about my suggestions of where that different direction might end up going – but I just noticed something about this video I did a while back:

The Democrats are starting to run out of sitting Congressmen featured in it who’ll still be sitting Congressmen, starting next January.

Moe Lane

Crossposted to RedState.

Meet John Loughlin (R CAND, RI-01).

I have to call this ‘taking a shot from Patrick Kennedy.’  If I took one at him he’d probably just drink it.

(H/T: Hot Air & JammieWearingFool) A lot of the focus of this article is on the abysmal performance of Rep. Patrick Kennedy (D, RI) in it – when asked if he deserved re-election, only 35% of his constituents said ‘yes’; 28% said ‘no,’ and 31% asked ‘what are our options?’ – and we’ll get back to it (and John Loughlin, who’s running for the job) in a moment.  But I would like to highlight these two paragraphs about Sheldon Whitehouse:

Just 33 percent approved of Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse’s job performance, down 11 points from a mid-December Brown University poll.

Fleming said a factor may have been the senator’s controversial December statement that floor opponents of health-care reform were fueled by fanatics, “right-wing militia” and Aryan support groups that hate President Obama.

The NRSC would be well-advised to start atoning for its error in 2006 by finding an acceptable candidate to oppose this fellow in 2012.  And by ‘acceptable’ I don’t mean ‘acceptable to the NRSC.’

Continue reading Meet John Loughlin (R CAND, RI-01).

Rep. Patrick Kennedy (D, RI) denied Communion.

At least, he’s claiming that he’s been forbidden it by Bishop Thomas Tobin of the Providence Diocese, and Bishop Tobin hasn’t denied it – and Tobin has denied that he’s ordered priest under his authority to actually deny Kennedy the Sacrament.  Bishop Tobin’s office has also released a letter indicating that the bishop has chastised the Congressman on the subject of abortion since at least 2007; which will call into question the accuracy of Kennedy’s accusation that this is all about the Church’s firm line on abortion funding.  It’s probably a factor, and it’s certainly true that Rep. Kennedy has been obdurate in his heresy* for some time, so this is merely the latest salvo.

Still, it’d be nice if we didn’t have to deal with this particular legacy Congressman. There’s actually a serious candidate this go-round: John Loughlin.   State legislator, business owner, former military; not to be unkind, but Kennedy really hasn’t worked a day in his [expletive deleted] life, and it shows. Like, for example, in Kennedy’s ability to get himself sufficiently in trouble with the Church on this issue so as to actually be denied the Sacrament.

That takes skill.

Moe Lane

*The fact that the Church has neither the ability nor the particular desire to punish Rep. Kennedy (or other avowedly pro-abortion Catholics) for their shared heresy does not make it any less of one.

Crossposted to RedState.