Has a Senate Foreign Relations Committee chairman ever won his partys presidential nomination?
— Jerry Walls, Los Angeles, Calif. A: No. And in fact, Biden is the first sitting chairman of the committee to try. There have been a few who served as chairman and ran for president, but not at the same time. Among those on that list are Dick Lugar (R-IN), Frank Church (D-ID) and William Borah (R-ID) in the 20th century, and Henry Clay (Whig-KY), James Buchanan (D-PA) and Charles Sumner (R-MA) in the 19th. But none of them sought the presidency while they were chairman of Foreign Relations. Q: I love Hillary [Clinton], but doesn’t she realize that being an East Coast Democrat is the kiss of death in presidential politics? I feel her election chances would have been better as an Arkansas senator, and that moving to New York was not a good higher-office strategy. — Bob Hicks, St. Paul, Minn. A: Hillary is Hillary, and I suspect it wouldn’t have mattered much whether she ran from New York, Little Rock or her birth state of Illinois. Those who love her love her, and those who don’t, don’t
