You know you live in a small state with a small pool of possibilities when a guy announces he's retiring as Public Safety commissioner and he immediately becomes a rumored candidate for some political office or other.
Welcome to Kerry Sleeper's world.
Well, move on to the next name, because Sleeper tells me unequivocally that he's not going into politics. "No, I am not running for any political office."
Not only that. If you were wondering, as some have, whose camp he'd be in - he says neither, that he's not now nor has he at any time been affiliated with a political party. "I am a fiercely independent Vermonter."
What Sleeper is looking at once he leaves state government at the end of the year is possibly working in D.C. as a consultant on the National Information Sharing Strategy - the Justice Department's efforts to provide a means of various law enforcement agencies sharing info that might prevent terrorist attacks and the like.
Anyway, check his name off the list of possible candidates for whatever.
It's a credit to Sleeper that people zoomed in on him as a possible political candidate, but it's also true that people have a tendency to zoom in pretty readily in their thirst to fuel political speculation. It's also a credit to Sleeper that his secretary at Public Safety, when I told her I was calling about "his future," suggested that I try to get him to stay on as commissioner. He wasn't biting on that either.
- Terri Hallenbeck
