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Kerry's Past to Star in Bush's Ads
Reelection Team Says Democrat's 32-Year Career Is Rich in Ammunition
By Howard Kurtz
Washington Post Staff Writer
Friday, February 20, 2004; Page A01


President Bush's reelection campaign has decided to focus its coming advertising barrage not only on John F. Kerry's record as a senator but also on his days as an antiwar activist, a House candidate and Massachusetts's lieutenant governor.

"The beauty of John Kerry is 32 years of votes and public pronouncements," said Mark McKinnon, the chief media adviser. McKinnon suggested a possible tag line: "He's been wrong for 32 years, he's wrong now."

Campaign officials said in interviews that they plan substantial positive advertising about the president, focused on his proposals rather than accomplishments, when they begin spending tens of millions of dollars on the airwaves next month. But they made it clear that many of the ads will accuse the Democratic front-runner of "hypocrisy," in McKinnon's word, in part by reaching back into his early career.

A 1970 Harvard Crimson interview in which Kerry said that U.S. troops should be deployed "only at the directive of the United Nations" will be fair game, the officials said. If they run ads about that period, they will probably focus on Kerry's high-profile opposition to the Vietnam War and comments about U.S. atrocities that could neutralize his record as a decorated veteran.


http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A56111-2004Feb19.html