It's a rough patch I'm going through," says Chris Dodd. How rough? Not long ago, Dodd entertained dreams of ascending to the White House. He moved his family to Iowa in 2007 and enrolled his daughter in a Des Moines public school, all in the hope of winning the state's caucus. He gave solid (if never spectacular) performances in debates while fund-raising prodigiously. And, though he didn't vault into the top tier of candidates, he managed to end his bid for the presidency with his long-standing reputation as a serious player in Democratic politics basically intact.Today, Dodd--five-term senator, established Washington powerbroker, the man whose "magnificent handshake," The New York Times gushed two years ago, is "the grip of a pro, a ... political pro, which he is"--has been reduced to shoring up his liberal bona fides by railing against credit card companies on a blog called My Left Nutmeg (motto: "Where Connecticut Dems Scratch That Progressive Itch"). Despite representing a solidly blue state, he is, in his own words, an "underdog" in his reelection bid--perhaps the most vulnerable Democratic incumbent in the Senate. His approval rating has plummeted to the low 30s, and he trails Rob Simmons, his likely GOP challenger, by an astonishing 16 points.
The source of Dodd's problems is simple: He has become a symbol of Wall Street's grip on the federal government. Having served on the banking committee since 1981, and as its chairman since 2007, Dodd is one of the Senate's largest recipients of campaign contributions from that sector of the economy. Last summer, allegations emerged that he had received an especially sweet rate on his mortgage from one of the culprits in the subprime mess. And, in March, he managed to become wrapped up in the AIG bonus scandal, with critics blaming him (more than a bit unfairly, it turns out) for having maneuvered in Congress to protect the controversial bonuses. The case against Dodd may be a left-populist one, but Republicans have been more than happy to pile on. Simmons boils down the critique to a single catchphrase: "Chris Dodd has gone Washington."
But the commonly held perception of the Connecticut senator as an entrenched, almost anachronistic pawn of moneyed interests misses a critical layer of complexity. Dodd's public life has been shaped by the hovering presence of his father, Tom Dodd, who was drummed out of the Senate in 1970 after being censured for misusing campaign funds. The son, who arrived in the Senate ten years later, has spent his career pulled in two opposing directions: on the one hand, following in his father's footsteps by becoming one of the Old Bulls ensconced in Washington's corridors of privilege, the image that is now causing him such political headaches; but, on the other hand, presenting himself as the very antithesis of an old-style senator--a changemaker, a populist, an insurgent. Dodd, it seems, has never entirely decided whether he wants to be his father or what his father was not. Now, his political survival depends on his ability to present himself as the latter--and escape the ghost of Tom Dodd once and for all.