a step closer to reelection

[Tigermike 3,715]

For Bush it's a step closer to reelection

By Jeff Jacoby, 3/3/2004

AND SO THE primary season ends. November is still eight months away, but no matter: The general election campaign is now underway. John Kerry is going to be the Democratic Party's presidential nominee. And that means that President Bush is one step closer to reelection.

Just as they did four years ago with Al Gore, in 1988 with Michael Dukakis, in 1984 with Walter Mondale, and in 1980 with Jimmy Carter, the Democrats are poised to nominate a tedious blister as their standard bearer. In the months ahead, the voters will be harangued and hectored by Kerry, who will lecture them about how Bush has been the worst president in modern times, the Bush economy the most desperate, the Bush foreign policy the most reckless.

As spring and summer give way to fall, it will gradually dawn on many of them that Kerry isn't actually saying anything. What was true of the first President Bush, they will discover, is true of Kerry: He has no "vision thing." He has a sonorous answer to every question, but the more he talks -- and he talks a lot; his default setting is "filibuster" -- the less voters will be able to put their finger on why he wants to be president or whether anything about him is more than an inch deep.

"Excited by his resume, his panache as a war hero, Americans from coast to coast will be disappointed in the real man," writes Jack Beatty, an ardent liberal, in The Atlantic Online. "They will long for him to stop his answers at the one-minute mark and by Minute 2 will have tuned out, and by Minute 3 will pine for the terse nullity of George W. Bush."

Terse Bush certainly is, but unlike Beatty, I don't think he is a nullity. In 2000 I did think that and didn't vote for him. But Sept. 11 changed Bush. It focused his mind and his presidency on a single overarching challenge: defeating international terrorism and the Middle Eastern fascists who sustain it. Hard-line Democrats have spent the past three years telling themselves that Bush is a shallow idiot or a reckless cowboy, and all the while the object of their derision has been steadily advancing the most audacious foreign policy since Ronald Reagan decided to win the Cold War.

Democrats thought Reagan was an idiot and a cowboy as well, too simplistic and dangerous to be given the keys to the White House. "When the globe is a tinderbox, we need a president who knows what he's doing. We need a president who . . . has been tested by experience, who has read and remembered history . . . who sees force as a last and not as a first resort." That was Walter Mondale in 1984, sounding a lot like Kerry in 2004.

Unlike Reagan, Bush isn't going to win a 49-state landslide -- the nation is too divided now. Indeed, Bush may not win at all, especially if the war takes a sudden bad turn. But he is likelier to win with an opponent like Kerry, who looks great only at first -- only until voters realize how much less there is to him than meets the eye.

http://www.boston.com/news/globe/editorial..._to_reelection/

[TrueBlue72 0]

I agree with the writer here. As I've watched the democratic primaries unfold, I've come to believe that the Republican Party is salivating over having Kerry as the democratic nominee. Almost every day, I read some other tidbit about Kerry that isn't being exploited (today it was his blocking of the details of his purple hearts) and know that these are simply being filed away and the research is being done to use that information to show the American people who Kerry really is.

The Republicans aren't going to do anything to challenge Kerry as long as the primary process is underway, but when its settled, and the Bush vs. Kerry campaign starts, it will be a bloodbath! When it is all over, Bush will be elected by a wide margin and Kerry will have become such an embarrassment to the democrats that he will never again be a factor in the party.

When the American people get to know Kerry, they are not going to like what they see! Comparing him to Carter, Mondale and Dukakis is really unfair to Carter, Mondale and Dukakis..... they were, for the most part, sincere but simply over their heads. Kerry is one of the most insincere, self-important politicians of our time, sort of a northern Al Gore..... who invented the internet, you know. He will still get the votes of those who are simply voting against Bush, but those folks would vote for Jerry Springer if he were running against Bush. Until those in the leadership of the democratic party figure out what they are for instead of what or who they are against, they have little hope of ever regaining the White House or a majority in congress.

[DKW 86 7,899]

I truly believe that Dean was the one we wanted, but only because no one thought that Kerry had a prayer. Guys, he was in fourth not that long ago. Dean imploded and the Dems looked around and said "Who is electable?" And the answer was Kerry?

The more we know the less we like him. The flip-flops, the No.1 Liberal ranking, the pompous-assness, etc.

I just dont think the American people will really want him after they get to really know him. Bush has his flaws. Kerry has both sides of every issue, The anti-war stuff, the cuts to defense and intelligence, etc.

One thing, it will be uglier than it has been so far. Bush will fire back and Kerry will look like Ernest and Julio Gallo with all the Whine.

[Jenny AU-92 0]

Bush has his flaws. Kerry has both sides of every issue, The anti-war stuff, the cuts to defense and intelligence, etc.

Sure he has flaws - who doesn't? But the one thing I like the most about GWB is that you NEVER have to wonder where he stands on an issue - just listen, he will tell you! And then he sticks with it.

[Tigermike 3,715]

Sure he has flaws - who doesn't? But the one thing I like the most about GWB is that you NEVER have to wonder where he stands on an issue - just listen, he will tell you! And then he sticks with it.

John Kerry on the other hand will be for all four sides of an issue depending where his plane has landed and which of the special interest folks with the deep bank accounts are in the audience.

[Jenny AU-92 0]

Kerry is going to be in Houston sometime in the next two weeks - I can't WAIT to see how he is gonna pander to this crowd. My guess is low turnout and a lot of awkward silences, unless they bus in a load of pinkos from Austin to fill seats, which is probably what they will do.

You know, the Rodeo is in town this month - maybe he'll throw on some Tony Lama's and try his hand at a little steer wrasslin'... He better be careful - this ain't exactly pinko country 'round these here parts. Bush bashing won't get him very far in THIS one-horse town!!

[Tigermike 3,715]

You know, the Rodeo is in town this month - maybe he'll throw on some Tony Lama's and try his hand at a little steer wrasslin'... He better be careful - this ain't exactly pinko country 'round these here parts. Bush bashing won't get him very far in THIS one-horse town!!

I think the Kerry folks will be going to the rodeo to refuel. Bagging up the bullcrap for Kerry to spread wherever he goes!

[TxWarEagle 3]

You know, the Rodeo is in town this month - maybe he'll throw on some Tony Lama's and try his hand at a little steer wrasslin'...  He better be careful - this ain't exactly pinko country 'round these here parts. Bush bashing won't get him very far in THIS one-horse town!!

I heard He and Sheila were gonna ride the Metro train to the Rodeo. No word on if Delay will crash into it near the Med Center.....

[Jenny AU-92 0]

You know, the Rodeo is in town this month - maybe he'll throw on some Tony Lama's and try his hand at a little steer wrasslin'...  He better be careful - this ain't exactly pinko country 'round these here parts. Bush bashing won't get him very far in THIS one-horse town!!

I heard He and Sheila were gonna ride the Metro train to the Rodeo. No word on if Delay will crash into it near the Med Center.....

Delay wouldn't HAVE to crash into it - the odds are in his favor that some idiotic Houston driver will do it anyway!!!!!!!