Fred Thompson — Readying a Stump Speech?

Former U.S. Sen. and current “Law & Order” television star Fred Thompson has a blog at the American Enterprise Institute, which politicos should check out every few days. (What I call a “blog” the AEI think tank more high-mindedly refers to as a “short publication.”)

With all the chatter of Thompson as the next Reagan (see Sunday’s London Telegraph article quoting former Reagan deputy chief of staff Michael Deaver about the man he says “could really make a difference”), it’s interesting to see what and how Thompson writes. Is this, perhaps, a future candidate in the midst of designing his stump speech and campaign platform?

If you’ve got the time today, read the post entitled “The Draft” and see if you think he’s drawing an analogy between drafting football players and picking political candidates.

Here’s an excerpt:

“On draft day, [NFL teams] look at a young man’s talent. Then they look at his rap sheet. Then someone evidently concludes, ‘He’ll be better when he’s with me. He’ll change.’ That’s right — same line used by starry-eyed, self-deceived brides — same results.

“Then the athlete is drafted and the problems resume — arrest, headlines, lawyers, team meetings, arrest, apologies, civil suits, suspensions, more apologies, rationalization by team and finally, as in [Tennessee Titans cornerback Pacman Jones’s] case, the loss of an entire season. So this is my last question for the teams this year: Wouldn’t it make more sense to draft a kid with just a little less talent, but a bit more understanding of just how fortunate he is to be playing in the big leagues?

“There are a lot of kids out there who idolize star players and will copy their behavior — whether it is good sportsmanship or hanging out at crime scenes. In the long run, though, it may be purely business that teaches the league the cost of benching morality. The Titans, after all, are going to play a year without one of their best players. I wonder what that’s going to do to their bottom line.”

You can read Thompson’s full post here: http://www.aei.org/publications/filter.all,pubID.26052/pub_detail.asp