In his book about Bill Clinton, Christopher Hitchens describes how, in a 1992 speech on an event hosted by Jesse Jackson, Clinton "ambushed" Jackson by picking a fight with certain anti-White rap lyrics. Hitchens relates how, in reaction to this, Jackson "exasperatedly described the hungry young candidate as 'just an appetite'"
Why does Jackson use 'appetite' here? Is this an idiom I'm not familiar with?
I do see the potential wordplay on 'hungry' but I wonder if that's really supposed to be the punchline here. Since if it was, it seemed a bit off-target for Jackson quite clearly intended to rebuke the presidential candidate's behaviour, which is something else entirely than scoffing his hunger for office.