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HOW 'FLIP-FLOP' KILLS KERRY
New York Post ^ | 3/09/04 | DICK MORRIS

Posted on 03/09/2004 12:56:01 AM PST by kattracks

Edited on 05/26/2004 5:19:58 PM PDT by Jim Robinson. [history]

March 9, 2004 -- IT is increasingly clear that President Bush's line of attack against Kerry will be to describe him as a flip-flopping politician, changing his positions constantly to suit the political needs of the moment. One negative ad, previewed on "Meet the Press," showed an animation of two John Kerry boxers battling one another. The winner? George W. Bush. The obvious goal of the Bush attack is to discredit Kerry and make it hard for anyone to believe in him or anything he says. But this round of flip-flop attacks is just the precursor of the main Bush offensive. Attacking Kerry for reversing himself on many key issues will weaken the Democrat, but the real point is to soften him up for two more deadly attacks likely to follow.


(Excerpt) Read more at nypost.com ...


TOPICS: Editorial; News/Current Events; Politics/Elections
KEYWORDS: 2004; dickmorris; flipflop; issues; kerry; unfit
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1 posted on 03/09/2004 12:56:01 AM PST by kattracks
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To: kattracks
bump
2 posted on 03/09/2004 12:58:31 AM PST by yonif ("If I Forget Thee, O Jerusalem, Let My Right Hand Wither" - Psalms 137:5)
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To: kattracks
(Sometimes, White House staff liberals took advantage of this axiom to leak word that Clinton was about to take a liberal position so as to foreclose him from doing anything else for fear of it seeming to be a flip-flop. During the welfare-reform debate, after Clinton had privately decided to sign a waiver to let Wisconsin move ahead with the work requirements and time limits its Legislature had adopted, some White House staffers leaked that he had decided to veto it instead. Terrified of seeming to flip on the issue, Clinton eventually backed off the Wisconsin proposal but then signed a national welfare-reform law. )

These are the kind of tidbits Morris throws out that I find very interesting. He could write a book with nothing but these kind of vignettes and I would buy it.

3 posted on 03/09/2004 1:01:37 AM PST by Lancey Howard
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To: kattracks
John F. Kerry has a bubble. I think his sleaziness will be his own downfall. The key is to make sure he can't move to the center in time for the fall campaign.
4 posted on 03/09/2004 1:03:45 AM PST by goldstategop (In Memory Of A Dearly Beloved Friend Who Lives On In My Heart Forever)
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To: Lancey Howard
Clinton ran for re-election as a small "c" - conservative Democrat. All of his signature initiatives were stuff that didn't cost anything and appeared patriotic. He made sure he ran to the right of Bob Dole by the time the fall campaign opened. The rest as they say, was history.
5 posted on 03/09/2004 1:05:39 AM PST by goldstategop (In Memory Of A Dearly Beloved Friend Who Lives On In My Heart Forever)
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To: kattracks
Like him or not, Morris writes fascinating, insightful stuff. I love the boxing theme.
6 posted on 03/09/2004 1:11:28 AM PST by tkathy (Without national security there would be no new jobs!!!)
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To: kattracks
Whatever you may think about Dick Morris personally, the fact is that he's typical of a small group of people who are 100% political animals. Politics is all they live for; without politics to dominate their every waking hour, they'd probably shrivel up and die.

I'm not saying such people are good or bad; I'm simply noting they exist.

I find Morris to be the sharpest such person among this select group. I really don't think he cares about the party affiliation of the people he's worked for in the past (and he's worked for conservative Republicans as well as liberal Democrats). Morris is in it for the game.

I'm going to file this article of Morris' in my hardrive and bring it up in, say, late September. I have a feeling this article will prove to be an accurate description of how Campaign 2004 will pan out.
7 posted on 03/09/2004 1:11:40 AM PST by Poundstone
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To: Lancey Howard
30 Rounds of FLIP FLOP
Play this game 

8 posted on 03/09/2004 1:15:56 AM PST by Wolverine (A Concerned Citizen)
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To: kattracks
By showing Kerry to flip-flop, Bush sets him up for the real charges - that he is too weak and too liberal to be president.

This really should read "by showing Kerry to be indecisive...he is too weak to be president.

9 posted on 03/09/2004 3:48:52 AM PST by Right_in_Virginia
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To: Right_in_Virginia

Janus-faced Johnny.

10 posted on 03/09/2004 3:50:13 AM PST by mewzilla
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To: mewzilla
FWIW, I saw an editorial on TV last night calling Kerry to task for his statements about the military.

Go here for the details:

http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1093579/posts
11 posted on 03/09/2004 4:13:22 AM PST by Loyal Buckeye
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To: Loyal Buckeye
I should have noted that this is the first time that I saw the media speak up about any of Kerry's positions or flip flops.
12 posted on 03/09/2004 4:14:29 AM PST by Loyal Buckeye
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To: Loyal Buckeye
I missed that. Thanks for the link!
13 posted on 03/09/2004 4:16:36 AM PST by mewzilla
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To: kattracks; PhiKapMom; My2Cents
Conventional wisdom says that this election is going to be close, a replay of 2000. It need not be so. If Bush runs aggressive national advertisements, hammering at these themes, he can put this race away by the end of the spring.

Dick Morris is correct, and the RNC should take heed if it hasn't already.

14 posted on 03/09/2004 4:22:33 AM PST by onyx (Kerry' s a Veteran, but so were Lee Harvey Oswald, Timothy McVeigh and Benedict Arnold.)
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To: Lancey Howard
"he could write a book" . . . . Er, he has.
15 posted on 03/09/2004 4:24:56 AM PST by LS (CNN is the Amtrack of news.)
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To: kattracks
IMHO Kerry just committed political suicide by saying foreign leaders are "praying for him to win"... the timing could not be worse given the articles about Ill Kim warming to the possibility of a Kerry presidency!

But you never know about the US public. Kerry appearing on stage w/ Jane and Ramsey is enough for me (to send money to George and help out the campaign) but the American people have been softened with Gramscian attacks for so long. Has the American public finally lost it? I never thought they would vote for the clown Clinton, and was I was wrong.

Its going to be a very interesting year - not necessarily a very comforting one...

16 posted on 03/09/2004 4:38:23 AM PST by chilepepper (The map is not the territory -- Alfred Korzybski)
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To: kattracks
Morris is often knocked on these threads, but he has seldom varied from laying out a credible game plan Republicans should follow to win friends and influence people and, not incidentally, elections. Democrats must rue the day Bill and Hillary Clinton sent out Terry Lenzner and Jack Palladino to dig up dirt and destroy him.
17 posted on 03/09/2004 5:54:29 AM PST by OESY
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To: chilepepper
but the American people have been softened with Gramscian attacks for so long. Has the American public finally lost it?

That is what concerns me.

18 posted on 03/09/2004 5:54:59 AM PST by StriperSniper (Manuel Miranda - Whistleblower)
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To: yonif
Nasty John the Waffling French Undertaker, who is behind the atatacks on GWB's 9/11 ad, per the American Spectator.

Kerry, who is personally endorsed by Yasser Arafat, Haiti's Aristide, Iran's Mullahs, Traitor "Red Jane" Fonda, Kim Jong Il, (& Kim Il Jong), Mugabe, Marxist thug Chavez of Venezuela, Castro of Cuba, & France's Jacques Chirac, is a weapon of mass economic destruction.

He'll destroy the troops in Iraq, the War on Terrorism,

& the U.S. stock market with all his negative talk and whiny-leftist-liberal sour-puss troop-bashing, Bush-bashing, America-bashing talk & self-aggrandizing, ultra-negative sourpuss whiny elitist personality.

19 posted on 03/09/2004 6:21:35 AM PST by FReethesheeples
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To: tkathy
Morris writes great analysis of political strategy.

His weakness is political predictions, where he is about as reliable as a flipped coin.

20 posted on 03/09/2004 7:12:26 AM PST by dead (I've got my eye out for Mullah Omar.)
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