A Tale of Two Governors

Deacon Greg, who is – like Julie and Happy Catholic and Patrick at Paragraph Farmer – locked out of his blog at present because someone flagged him to google/blogger as a “spam” site, sent this piece by Michael Gerson and asked if I would link to it. I see why. It’s pretty interesting.

Call it a tale of two Democrat governors of similar background – both Catholic, both men who have spent time volunteering to work amid “the poorest of the poor.” Their backgrounds are similar, but only one of them is being touted as veep material by Barack Obama; two guesses why:

It is an extraordinary bit of political trivia that two popular red-state Democratic governors — both in presidential battleground states — spent time as Catholic lay missionaries in the developing world.

Gov. Tim Kaine of Virginia taught at a Jesuit school in Honduras in the early 1980s, an experience he credits with turning his life toward public service. “It was life-changing to live among the poorest of the poor,” he has said.

Gov. Bill Ritter of Colorado moved his young family to Zambia for three years in the late 1980s to run a nutrition center — spreading agricultural technology, caring for the sick, and digging graves for AIDS victims. The experience, he has explained, caused him to make time for the needy and unwanted: “This may be what Jesus meant when he said we must lay down our lives for others.”

You’ll want to go read Gerson and find out why Ritter is less attractive than Kaine for the veep slot. It will not surprise you.