Kerry's Plan?: let Bush lose election instead of expecting me to win it

[digno dave]

It's kinda how he got the nomination in the first place, isn't it? Dean lost the nomination with his "flubs" and "gaffes" magnified by the media and Kerry positioned himself to be the benefactor.
Apparently this is what he is banking on the the GE.
Unfortunately, He has been unable to present a consistent message. He does a very poor job of deflecting the bogus right-wing attacks.

Iraq and the economy have the potential to "improve"(perception wise, anyhow) over the course of the next few months. Come June 30th, our soldiers will pull back out of the cities and be less susceptible to attacks. When the public and the media sees that the # of deaths of US soldiers are dropping Bush's image will improve. The stats of the economy will also continue to improve, even if the unemployment continues to drag slowly behind. Fact is, the economy is getting better, not worse.
Unfortunately, this all puts the pressure on Kerry to act and define himself, which he has been unable to do since, well, the beginning of the DEMOCRATIC PRIMARY.

[wyldwolf]

1. No, it seems more like...

...play rope-a-dope until the Bush money machine runs low, then start swinging.

Witness the fact that with all the money Bush has spent so far on advertising, he has not gained, on average, in the polls.

As for the primaries - remember, it wasn't just Dean and Kerry. At times, Kerry was running behind Clark and Edwards, too.

When it came down to voting, people looked at the track records of the candidates and determined who was the most qualified.

[Mayberry Machiavelli]

12. Bugs me that I never see this viewpoint presented in the media.

I admit it concerns me that Kerry isn't UP more after all the news the last few weeks, but I think he's "OK". But the media spin I've seen is that this is pointing to a Bush landslide or something because Kerry isn't up 15% now. How ya figure?

The "alternate" viewpoint is that Bush has expended huge capital just to tread water with his war turning into a big disaster, and isn't ahead by a big % despite being incumbent and starting with a huge war chest, and this should point to a KERRY landlside come NOV. Sigh.

[AgadorSparticus]

13. i don't know about most qualified. but "electability" sure came up alot.

[Gore1FL]

14. Thats how I've seen it too...

The GOP has spent $75,000,000 out of their war chest to break even over a half a year before the election.

We are getting near the 50% spent mark for a "War President" who had the highest approval ratings in history, and the best he can do so far is break even.

Kerry does need to start defining himself better, but lets face it, Bush's ads have been about as effective as his presidency.

[bluestateguy]

2. Defeatist crap

At this time in May, 2000 Al Gore was 12 points down. The most pessimistic polls now show Kerry down by 5, and some show him up a point or two.

[wyldwolf]

3. also a veiled message that Dean would be a better candidate

...Dean lost. Get over it. I have about Clark.

[Nicholas_J]

7. Yup

Dean's record was the onev that would have made Dean most easy to marginalize as an extremist. That is why the Bush administration was desperate for a Dean nomination. They had a hard on for a Dean nomination accoring to every conservative political analysis. All polls indicated that very large percentages of Democrats would have jumped ship and voted for Bush had Dean beed the nominee and every poll compaing Democratic candidates showed Dean trailing Bush by high double digits, average 20 percent behind Bush in every poll that measured that information. Kerry is running his campaign his way, the same way that he ran against Dean, he let Dean pull impselg down and then stomped on what was left. There is no point going after Bush this early, and certainly not before the supposed turnover of soverignnty in Iraq. After turning tail in Falluja, utilizing the heads of the Republican GUard to go in and get thing in control Kerry will have a field day after JUne 30th.

[Cheswick2.0]

9. can you back any of that up with fact?

The first sentence alone is ridiculous.

[JNelson6563]

16. <snarf>

Not only did you get on your knees in front of the RNC, you swallowed. Have there been studies done yet? How long does it take to get out of the system?

Julie-who marvels at the fear so regularly revealed here

[The Magistrate]

19. An Odd Choice Of Images, Ma'am

Let us know what is really on your mind....

"LET'S GO GET THOSE BUSH BASTARDS!"

[RetroLounge]

18. Poop

eom

[digno dave]

8. typical presumptive garbage

uh, i voted for Clark too.

[wyldwolf]

22. but nevertheless true...

,,,but Kerry's Plan?: let Bush lose election instead of expecting me to win it --- THAT isn't presumptive, huh?

[Sparkly]

4. To those who only listen to 'pundits'

who repeat the RNC's distortions as fact all day and all night, I can understand it may look like Kerry isn't working to "define himself."

His Senate voting record has already "defined" him as a Liberal Democrat -- a "Massachussetts Liberal," in fact, or as some on the right like to say, "Even More Liberal than Ted Kennedy, That's How Liberal."

He's also "defined" himself as a fighter -- as a soldier, as a prosecutor, and as a politician. He has not backed down from the smears the Bushies have thrown his way, and has been criticized by the "experts" on network news stations for being "defensive, angry, testy," etc. for daring to defend himself.

He's defined his proposed policies in his speeches and on his website. He's released records as requested, right down to every old military review.

If he's not been able to change the Media Whores from being Media Whores, I'm not surprised. The question is what WE can do about it. Letters, contributions, fundraising, organizing, and talking at the water cooler all help at least to some extent. We are up against a HUGE machine, make no mistake. I think the Democratic campaign -- which is to say Kerry's campaign -- needs our help in the grassroots much more than our words of criticism.

[DieboldMustDie]

5. The election is still 6 months away.

[Gothmog]

6. It is a long time to November

It is still a long time to November. Kerry would be crazy not to let the events take their toll on Bush while keeping his powder dry for the Fall.

Kerry did a great job in locking in the nomination and it was not a case of Dean blowing it as Kerry running a good campaign.

[KoKo]

10. While I agree with part of what you say, Iraq and the Economy are not

going to look better come election time. All of it is starting to implode and hemmorage way before the Chimp & Co. thought. They have mis-managed everything and it's all coming home to roost.

Kerry doesn't need to define himself because the "house of cards" is coming down.

What he would be doing at this point in the campaign if things were going "according to what this "mis-administration" rosily predicted is another story. Would he have been on the attack more? Who knows? But, for now all he has to do is stay in the race, and watch the train wreck.

[digno dave]

11. how exactly do you see the economy/iraq issue imploding?

I can see how Iraq could get worse...but look for the casualties to drop once we pull back after June 30th. All most americans are concerned about are casualties. Most can't grasp the subtle issues of how f'd up things have become because of our policy.
And the economy...well, on paper it seems to be improving. All theat the media can guage the economy on are the monthly #s that come in, and for the most part those have been positive.

[The Magistrate]

20. There Will Be No Pull-Back Come July, Sir

The "Provisional Authority", sans a few leading figures, will simply move into the new fortress of the U.S. Embassy. There will be no other change, particularly no reduction in the role of U.S. forces in engaging the resistance.

"LET'S GO GET THOSE BUSH BASTARDS!"

[Lexingtonian]

15. What would Kerry get for winning the month of April? or May?

Nothing. Absolutely nothing.

And why care about how Kerry wins it in November? Better a win by implosion of Bush than an aesthetically pleasing spectacle that ends in a loss. Personally, I expect a decent Kerry fall campaign and a Bush failure of a campaign.

And I don't know why you let right wing talking points count for as much you do, though I could guess why.

Let's figure out the real score: These past two weeks Bush lost Iraq as a reelection argument. He's now down to some argument basically built on his semicompetent handling of things post-9/11. (Like digging Sandy Berger's plan to knock Al Qaeda out of Afghanistan out of the trash can he'd tossed it into, then telling Rumsfeld 'it's from the Clinton people so it's gonna work, and this IS an emergency'.) No, the economy is, like just about everything else, an issue area where Kerry gets higher numbers. If/when Bush runs out of 9/11 credit, he has nothing on which Americans consider him preferable to Kerry.

Kerry in the meantime got some diddling by right wing presstitutes about his medals and whining by lots of Inner Children that Kerry isn't going to offer a magical resolution to all things gone to and going to sh-t in Iraq before January. Swing voters didn't care, even though they certainly don't want to see him say he has no concrete plan in October.

I say the net damage to Bush is greater- and permanent. Kerry's looking a bit ragged but the damage to his positioning is entirely repairable, even if it takes some time and money/ads to do so.

You don't seem to know George Bush's approval trend line. He has three spikes upward, each smaller than than one before it, and continuous declines after each one- sharper ones every time. Without external enemies to rally against, Bush is always going downhill with Americans. No plateaus, no small upticks- he's got no staying power on domestic affairs, never had any. He's losing all credibility in international ones.

The Kerry-Bush struggle has a precedent as a power dynamic in Sherman's 1864 Georgia Campaign. Kerry and the other Democratic candidates and events pretty much manouvered Bush out of the support level needed to win the Presidency this November along the one issue 'national security', much like Sherman and his generals manouvered and fought Hood/Johnston out of Atlanta along the rail line from that city to Chattanooga. The present phase of the Kerry-Bush struggle is the next part of the Georgia campaign, where Hood tried to flush Sherman out of holding Atlanta by falling on Sherman's supply line, the Chattanooga railroad, and breaking it. But Sherman fights him off it and takes a while to repair it. Hood then gives up- his infantry is too fearful of Sherman's to risk another battle- and gives up on the Chattanooga railroad as a target. Both are run ragged by all the manouvering and effort. That's the equivalent to where we are now.

The rest of the campaign is pretty well known- Sherman sends half of his army back to Nashville because the grand Confederate plan is known to be to cut him off by taking over Tennessee and Kentucky again, or at least draw Sherman back there (and recover the all-important Atlanta). Hood sits in northern Alabama for a month, recuperating. Sherman leaves Thomas in Tennessee to fight Hood's invasion, he takes the initiative and with his half of the army burns down Atlanta and with weak opposition burns his way through Georgia's war supplies and railroad net to Savannah. Thomas defeats Hood at Franklin and at Nashville so that Hood's army is destroyed as a fighting force as Sherman settles in on a siege of Savannah. Sherman takes Savannah and has destroyed or lopped off 40% of the Confederacy from effective reinforcement of the key war arena, Virginia.

That's Bush backing off and refocussing his campaign on All 9/11 All The Time for the fall, with a bundle more spent on trying to undercut Kerry but to no net gain on either side into the summer. Kerry sets up his campaign to be very aggressive and mostly The Bush Scandals And Failures: The Movie. In October the poll numbers become decisive- Kerry and Bush keep their respective margin of (finally) 52-45, Nader is no factor, 9/11 craps out as a selling point as Kerry's surrogates hammer at it, Kerry's support becomes very hard and Bush's very soft but irrationally committed. Kerry is able to claim a mandate at the end- over 50%, tested with absolutely everything they could throw at him, the aggressive days of the GOP are over, they better fear November '06 and voter conviction that they're done for.

[Classical_Liberal]

17. I don't think he is planning it

I think his advisors are compromised and trying to lose actually. If Bush fucks up really bad, then they have a candidate that is only committed to ideas marginally to the left of Bush. So they get a conservative pres either way.

Kerry is better than Bush but he won't change foreign policy one bit without pressure from the EU and Asia to do so.

[Demoin04]

21. You've got to be kidding

You think Kerry is betting that the media magnify the flubs of bush so that Kerry will win. Ahem, have you been watching the news lately, Nightline ran a show with pictures and a list of names. Look what happens, Sinclair, a huge proponent of Bush, takes it off the air for 63 stations. MAking people think is apprently anti-Bush, and such FOX is making their own that is full of Iraq's achievements and successes.. well if it wasn't political before it is now.