NY Gov Cool on Kennedy

After a weekend of accelerating speculation, New York Gov. David Paterson is looking to put the brakes on rumors that Caroline Kennedy will be chosen to replace Hillary Clinton as New York's junior senator. The New York Post has a "source close to the governor" saying that the odds of a Kennedy appointment are no better than 20:1. Paterson has spoken with Kennedy and admitted to "liking and respecting her" but is worried, the paper puts it, that she "doesn't have the personality to be an aggressive fighter in the Senate on behalf of the state's increasingly desperate need for federal financial help." Asks one administration insider: "The bottom-line question is: Can Caroline Kennedy be the tough, hard, calculating, aggressive, articulate and, yes, obnoxious type of senator New York needs and expects?" The Post's sources also say that Paterson is weeks away from a decision and that Hillary Clinton is "dead-set" against Kennedy taking over.