Posted on 01/21/2004 2:25:21 PM PST by Congressman Billybob
Alligators, kittens, and a world-class preppy were among the candidates running in the Iowa caucuses. The big winners were the preppy and the kitten. The big loser was related to a shark. To explain:
In advance of Iowa, I confidently predicted that Howard Dean would prevail in that contest, and Dick Gephardt would get buried. Only the second part was correct. In a big surprise to most commentators, including me, Dean placed a distant third.
That doesn’t mean, however, that the Dean effort is now dead. No phenomenon in American society that is backed by hundreds of thousands of people and tens of millions of dollars, no matter how foolish it may be, will collapse quickly. Think of Ford’s introduction of the Edsel. Think of the roll-out of the “New Coke.” Recall disco music and leisure suits. Sheer momentum guarantees that the Dean Machine will continue on for several more primaries, and might yet succeed in winning the Democrat nomination.
Still, there is a reason to think that Dean “jumped the shark”in his shouting, growling speech to the faithful Monday night about the Iowa results. For those not familiar with that phrase, it refers to a later episode of “Happy Days” when the show was running out of ideas and the whole cast went on vacation. It contained a shot where Fonzie, wearing his classic jacket and on water skis, literally jumped a shark. It means the precise moment when any program, person or movement abruptly changes from remotely plausible to obviously absurd. For a further explanation, go on the Net and search on “jump the shark.” But I digress.
The apparent big winners in Iowa were John Kerry and John Edwards. First, the Kerry candidacy: Almost a year ago I wrote about the Democrat candidates that I know personally or by profession. I met Kerry when he was 19, and he came into a meeting of the Yale Political Union in Woolsey Hall to give his maiden speech before the Union. I was then an officer of the Union and a veteran of its Oxford-style debates.
John Kerry then was an arrogant, social-climbing preppy, fully satisfied that he knew better than ordinary humans and overflowing with confidence in his own ideas for the world. He hasn’t changed much in the intervening decades. He has more money, more wrinkles on his face, and pays slightly more for his haircuts. Other than that, he is the same person now that he was then. His only real connection with “real people” is that they are the folks who bring his car around and open the door for him.
I feel reasonably certain that perception of the reality of the “new JFK,” as he styled himself at Yale shortly after the assassination of President Kennedy, will spread among the population and will be reflected in descending vote totals for Kerry. If that result does not rear its ugly head in New Hampshire, it certainly will when the primaries move below the Mason-Dixon Line to South Carolina and elsewhere.
And that brings us to John Edwards, the Senator (for now) in North Carolina. I was appalled to see Edwards campaigning in Iowa, claiming that “with this accent, I’ll do well in the South.” I don’t expect folks in Iowa or New Hampshire to play close attention to local politics in the Tar Heel state. But it is a grievous mistake for the political reporters not to do their homework on the Democrat candidates still standing. Here is what we in North Carolina know about our Junior Senator.
The story Edwards puts out is that he withdrew from seeking reelection to the Senate here in North Carolina to focus on his race for the presidential nomination. The truth is quite different. Consistent polling here showed that Edwards would be soundly trounced if he sought reelection to the Senate.
It wasn’t just Republicans here who thought Edwards didn’t deserve reelection. A substantial number of the Democrats here feel the same way. Also, the normal presumption is that any candidate for President or Vice President will carry his home state as a matter of course. Edwards did not even show this “favorite son” quality. A steady majority of the North Carolina electorate said that they did not think he should run for President. The harshest comment was a local voter who said, “Well, maybe he should run for Vice President because at least it would get him out of North Carolina.”
If Edwards had stayed in the race for reelection to the Senate, those polls about how little his home state folks think of him would have been regularly taken, and regularly reported not just here but in every state where he was in a presidential primary. There’s an old saying hereabouts, which as modified is also the punch line of a tacky joke. “If his own family doesn’t like him, why should anyone else?”
The more attention the press and the people elsewhere in the country pay to Edwards’ unpopularity among his own constituents, the more the bloom will be off his rose in primaries in other states. And now that his head is above the foxhole because of the Iowa results, I expect that will occur.
Besides, he is really running for Vice President, not President. Other than the fact that Vice Presidents occasionally wind up becoming President, I’d have no quarrel with his serving in that second banana role. Recall Mark Twain’s observation, “There were two brothers. One went to sea, the other became Vice President. Nothing was ever heard of either one, again.”
What is the true nature of John Edwards, as opposed to the image that he presented in Iowa? Is he a “nice guy” who has “positive plans for America”? Is he a wolf in sheep’s clothing? No, it’s much worse. He’s an alligator with an attitude in the clothing of a kitten with a ball of yarn.
Along the way as a lawyer, I have met more than a few John Edwards, trial lawyers who made a pile of money very fast as plaintiffs’ lawyers, caging juries into backing up Brinks’ trucks to their offices and handing them a pitchfork to take the money. Just once, I was involved in a multi-million dollar case.
There were twenty-five lawyers representing sixteen plaintiffs. The lead counsel for our group had negotiated a $63.4 million settlement, but with a hitch. Unless all counsel and all parties agreed on how to divvy up that money, no one would get anything by way of settlement. Here was the scene in that conference room in Washington, D.C.
Imagine a tank of hungry piranhas. Imagine a two-pound Porterhouse steak. Now imagine that steak thrown into that tank. Between 2 p.m. and 5:30 p.m., those trial lawyers did agree, with some reluctance on some parts, on how to divide that money. I have to confess it was one of the most interesting meetings I have ever attended as a lawyer.
I took time to talk with some of the lawyers there, most of whom specialized in disasters with mass deaths involved. One even had an Associated Press ticker in his office, so he or his partners could be on the scene before the bodies were cold, whenever such an “opportunity” arose. They would ask each other, “Were you in Bopal?” “Were you in the Arrow Air case?” Some of the stories from that experience are even more cold-hearted and money-oriented than that, but these should suffice.
John Edwards, and other liability trial lawyers, present themselves as being “out for the little guy.” They never complete the sentence. Here’s the whole, correct statement: “I am out for the little guy because he is my ticket to having a $3 million house in town, and another $3 million house at the beach.” In a crude sense, that is being “out for the little guys,” not to serve their interests but to serve his own.
When Bill Clinton first ran for President, there were knowledgeable people in his own state who properly assessed his fundamental nature. It wasn’t just Republicans who issued the warning. It was a Democrat Senator who said of Clinton, “He would rather climb a tree to tell a lie, than stand on the ground to tell the truth.”
Not enough people listened. Clinton won, twice. He had earned the nickname “Slick” in Arkansas. Edwards is only a slick wannabe. He lacks Clinton’s consummate skill at prevarication. Rather than slick, Edwards is merely oleaginous. I believe that enough of this information will reach enough of the voters, so Edwards’ campaign will ultimately fail.
As a Republican, I’d prefer selfishly to see the Democrats nominate the worst possible candidate, so President Bush can bury that candidate Dukakis-style in the general election. However, as a political scientist concerned with the political health of the Republic, I would rather see the Democrats nominate a candidate who genuinely deserves to get into the White House without a visitor’s pass. After all, there is a remote chance that candidate might win.
Unfortunately, on the Democrat side at the present time, the pickings are exceedingly slim for a candidate who is worth being President. The only visible option is Joe Lieberman, who was a classmate, a fellow member of the Editorial Board of the Yale Daily News and whom I respected and supported until late in his career. I split from Joe when he bailed on the Clinton question and later turned himself into a political pretzel to accommodate his own views to those of Al Gore.
Defective as he is, Joe is the best of that lot. However, his chances to be President will sink like a brick in a well, in less than a week in New Hampshire.
Most folks think that political parties exist to win elections. That’s not necessarily true. One of my most telling case studies in political science classes in college concerned the Mississippi Republican Party in the 1950s. The powers-that-be in that party at that time were content to lose election after election, taking the “lesser lion’s share,” the benefits and appointments that still flowed to the losing but second-strongest party. It was a closed club that the Old Guard was content to keep.
The young Turks who entered that Republican Party had to fight and defeat the Old Guard first, before they could even begin the task of trying to win an election.
As an overview, I think it’s largely irrelevant who the Democrats nominate this year. That Party is now ingrown and incestuous. It isn’t seriously trying to win the 2004 presidential election. It is in the position of the Federalists, the Whigs, the Republican-Democrats, and various other parties in American history who at one point were dominant, but who lost touch with the American people and faded into footnotes in the history books, to be ultimately replaced by the current Democrat and Republican Parties.
Like an alcoholic who must hit bottom before he perhaps faces the truth and changes his ways, the Democrat Party is on a downward spiral that probably will not end before the 2008 election, if then. Looked at it as a political scientist and in light of American history, the 2004 Democrat primaries are not an election, but a death watch.
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About the Author: John Armor is an author and columnist on politics and history. He currently has an Exploratory Committee to run for Congress.
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Methinks... with all due respect... the Deaniacs are indeed a mile wide... but no more than in inch deep. This will be their downfall.
Howeird's noisy crowd is like a brightly painted picture... painted in a hurry for the starving artists sale... that does not (cannot) match the frame.
Regards
The secret as any Dick Morris can tell you was polling. Clinton never made a move unless he had it polled first. Even in the Monica situation he had Morris poll on how to hold on to his job. He polled what lies to tell and how to tell them.
The secret to Clinton's success was he told the voters what they wanted to hear or as near as he could considering his inability to control his behavior.
Now fast forward to today. What are the remaining 7 Dwarfs doing? Are they telling Democrats what they want to hear? Not so you could notice. Look at the Iowa results. For months the Democratic candidates have been telling everyone who would listen that the key to victory is to be against the war from day one... Just ask Wesley Clark. But is that the way the voters in traditionally anti war Iowa voted? They voted for two senators that voted to support the war. Dean was up the creek with out a poll... wasn't he? Dick Gephardt was with him.
It appears to me that Dean, Kerry, Edwards, et all have been playing to those that show up at their campaign appearances. Look at what they are doing. They show up at a campaign event and draw a few hundred people. They try out themes and punch lines on those that show up. Then they try to go with those that get the best responses. They are trying pitches on the fly... with the media recording it all for instant play back on the news channels. That is just plain DUMB CITY. Rarely are the reactions of people that show up at campaign events the reactions of the voters on the other side of that TV camera.
A lot of what they say blows up in their faces and they still don't learn. Haven't they been paying attention? They act like true believers.. Well they would if they just knew what to believe.
Think of how Clinton did it. He had Morris and company polling and focus grouping every punch line ... every response to every question. They were prepared with tested statements long before a voter or media guru could ask the question. They rarely screwed up. The 7 dwarfs rarely get one right. What happened to professional consultants. These candidates act like they attended the Michael Jackson school of public relations.... and flunked.
All the Democrats are winging it. That is very strange. Didn't any of them take politics 101? They are trying to guess what the public wants to hear. And most of the time guessing wrong. How could they be so clueless.
There have been more gaffles by Democratic candidates than I thought possible. This is amateur city.
There is one other thing that puzzles me about Iowa. Fairly early on an independent group started running negative ads on Dean. That group was traced to the Blue Collar Unions connected to Gephardt. Soon Dean was running negative ads on Gephardt. And then Gephardt was openly running negative ads on Dean.
I know for a fact that that blue collar unions understand what negative ads do. They had to have a good idea of how Dean would react.
For those who don't know, negatives ads reduce support for the object of the negative ad. They get zero votes for the candidate that runs them. When Gephardt and Dean both ran negative ads, Gephardt and his unions had to know that it would cost both Dean and Gephardt any chance of victory.
Gephardt and his union supporters had to know that the negative ads would result in increased votes for Kerry and and Edwards. The question is why did Gephardt and his union guys do it. The De Moines Register had to know it when they endorsed Edwards.
The question is why did Gephardt and his union supporters do it. And remember the first negative ads attacking Dean were paid for with union funds. Not funds given to Gephardt and then spent on the negative ads. The blue collar unions knew what they were doing and ordered it done. Why?
The other factor is the white collar unions were in Deans camp. The white collar unions had lots of people and money put on the line for Dean.
My question is, does this situation show there may be bad blood between Blue Collar Unions and White Collar Unions? This is a behavior I have never witnessed.
What I want to know is who will the Blue Collar and White Collar unions now support. And if they do not support the same candidate what will that portend as the primary season rolls on.
Maybe I am seeing things that aren't there.. The next couple of weeks will tell.
One final aside.
I saw in one of the Channels that the Breck girl was in Greenville South Carolina today... he drew a hundred people to his meeting. I could draw more people than that with a ball point pen that was nearly out of ink. If that is all the Breck Girl can draw, he may be in a heap of trouble come election day in South Carolina.
IMHO, when the Dems get done splitting up the crumbs along the way to the Nomination, the adults (sic) in the Party will give 'em all the hook and then put Hillary on the Ticket in a last gasp of desperation to stave off disaster.
She may be at the top, she may be at the bottom, but she will be there to "save" the Party.
This entire Kabuki Dance is being played out to perfection by the Clinton Crowd and all her campaign staff which is warming up and pitching in the Clark Bullpen.
The important thing in this charade is, make sure Hillary doesn't have to face the voters or any Media scrutiny until the very last minute. She will pop up just in time to fall under the vaunted Campaign Finance Reform "60-day rule", which will effectively stop any genuine grass-roots movement from frightened Americans aghast at her Coronation Romp to Office.
I, too, am also very interested in the initial split between the white collar and blue collar unions and who they support. The union movement has been steadily shrinking (other than "public service" unions and aerospace ones) for more than 30 years. We may be seeing the death rattle of the political power of the unions, and the relics fighting over the remnants.
Cordially,
John / Billybob
Would you hit the NC list? I don't have it with me at CPAC.
Thanks,
CD
You are the first person from North Carolina to ever use that word. In fact, you may be the first to every use a five syllable word (besides "Carolinian"). I'll have to check . . .
I like the usage though
oleaginous
adj 1: unpleasantly and excessively suave or ingratiating in manner or speech; "buttery praise"; "gave him a fulsome introduction"; "an oily sycophantic press agent"; "oleaginous hypocrisy"; "smarmy self-importance";
Note that the definition of oleaginous includes the word smarmy. That's another favorite of mine that is sadly neglected in modern discourse.
However, Tar Heel folks routinely use five-syllable words. Consider the word "Golly" as pronounced by Gomer Pyle. LOL.
John / Billybob
BillyBob, confess how old you are to have known the ketchup boy at this stage in his life. I can't stop laughing about this article and must bookmark it for later reading, hopefully, when the oleaginous Breck boy falls.
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