KERRY’S CAMPAIGN STAFF made bogus dirty tricks charges regarding the bunny-suit photo, and as a result gave the story serious legs, most recently in the form of this fashion analysis from the Washington Post:

The suit did not humanize Kerry. It did not make him look tough. Maybe if Kerry had had a surgical mask hanging around his neck, the suit would have given him the heroic glow of a surgeon emerging from the operating theater to announce that the patient will survive. Instead, the image left one wondering whether the suit had a back flap and attached feet. . . .

Being generous, one might argue that Kerry’s intellectual curiosity caused him to ignore how ridiculous he would look in the clean gear. The chance to crawl around in a spaceship was too tempting. Most folks would find that hard to pass up. But he is not most people — he wants to be president. As a general rule, anyone aspiring to be the commander in chief should always try to avoid looking like a Teletubby.

It would have been better to laugh it off.