Bad news for W is worse news for Kerry

New York daily News ^ | 4/22/04 | Richard Cohen

[NotchJohnson]

The more blows he takes, the better W does in the polls

In the last month or so, everything has gone wrong for President Bush. He has been criticized by members of the 9/11 commission for being lackadaisical about terrorism. Richard Clarke accused him of being weirdly obsessed with Iraq. More than 100 Americans have been killed there in the last 30 days, and Bush was so inarticulate in his recent press conference that you could say he violated the standards of his own "No Child Left Behind" policy. Still, if this keeps up, he'll win reelection in a landslide.

That, at least, is the forgivable conclusion you can draw from The Washington Post-ABC News poll released this week. It had Bush ahead of John Kerry by 48% to 43%, with most of the rest (6%) going to someone named Nader.

What's particularly telling is that Bush and Kerry have traded places on two key issues - national security and the economy. Where Bush once lagged, he is now in the lead.

The campaign may have just begun, but it looks to me as though it may be over. Why? Well, the last month should have been ruinous, and yet the President not only survived, he thrived. Explanations abound. Some credit the Democrats on the 9/11 commission for being too partisan and thus eliciting support for Bush.

Maybe. More likely, though, and certainly more important, is the $41 million the Bush campaign spent on television ads in March alone.

Money undoubtedly will matter in the presidential campaign. But what will matter just as much, if not more, is Kerry's message. At the moment, it is nowhere to be found. If anyone out there can complete the following sentence, please let the Kerry campaign know: Vote for John Kerry because.... The only thing that comes to mind is that he is not George Bush.

Significantly, in one area where Kerry is demonstrably not Bush, it works against him. Bush is minimally articulate; Kerry is downright verbose. When Kerry opens his mouth, whole chunks of paragraphs fall out and hit the floor with a clunk. He truly knows too much - a charge that cannot be leveled at Bush.

If I were running the Kerry campaign, I would show over and over Bush's press conference response about why he insists on appearing at the 9/11 hearings with Vice President Cheney. Bush had no answer - none whatsoever - and even a followup failed to get a response. (My followup would have been to ask if they were going to dress identically.)

The look on his face was both telling and scary. He simply had no acceptable answer.

Whether that would work with the American people, I don't know. A majority of them favor the President in the one area in which he has clearly failed them - national security. He has presided over two unprecedented intelligence failures - the surprise attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, and the fruitless hunt for weapons of mass destruction in Iraq - and took the nation into a war in Iraq before the one in Afghanistan had been successfully concluded. Still, Kerry has not been able to lay a glove on him.

Another bad month like the last for Bush, and the President will have his second term in the bag.

[NotchJohnson]

Not sure if Kerry's problem is that he is too articulate. He just doesn't have amessage to talk about. If he does have a message he can't actually say it or the country would want to boil him in oil. Cohen also blames Bush for 911 in the last paragraph. It's sad when you are that old and still that ignonorant.

[Monty22]

"He truly knows too much - a charge that cannot be leveled at Bush"

No, he's a know it all, while Bush is modest.

[sauropod]

"The campaign may have just begun, but it looks to me as though it may be over. Why? Well, the last month should have been ruinous, and yet the President not only survived, he thrived. Explanations abound."

Here's one. We are really tired of being "talked down to" by the likes of Mr. Cohen. In addition to being UFC, he isn't honest. He should siddown and STFU!. 'Pod

[counterpunch]

Be sure to hit this online poll:

http://www.politics1.com/poll.htm

From the look of it, this is a liberal site, and Bush was beating Kerry on the poll 50% to 40%, when they suddenly pulled the results display, and quite possibly reset the entire poll. Let's make sure they don't get their desired results this time around either, though they may just invent their own numbers from wholecloth.

[blackie]

We are winning ~ the bad guys are losing ~ trolls, terrorists, democrats and the mainstream media are sad ~ very sad!

~~ Bush/Cheney 2004 ~~

[Monty22]

Hah, they sure did pull it. Wusses.

[Codeflier]

These people just don't get it. By the way, a Barf Alert should be considered for this posting to let me know I am about to be angry.

[Mr. Bird]

He has presided over two unprecedented intelligence failures - the surprise attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, and the fruitless hunt for weapons of mass destruction in Iraq

Yes, and FDR (surely one of Cohen's lions of history) "presided" over a depression and a surprise attack on the Hawaiian islands.

What Cohen and the rest of the blind Left are missing is context. Those poor, retarded idiots in flyover country (in elitist terms, not mine) are quite capable of grasping the notion of a War on Terror. They are quite capable of looking at their tax bill, their paycheck, their community standards, and determining whether or not John F(lake) Kerry is presidential material.

Cohen just hates the fact that people like George Bush the man, and George Bush the POTUS.

[hilaryrhymeswithrich]

I've taken to calling Kerry Thurston Howell Kerry III because of his smug, hoity East Coast accident. It makes me crazy!!!

[MEGoody]

I went and voted, and it's not giving me any results - just a total number of votes.

[Sofa King]

"He truly knows too much - a charge that cannot be leveled at Bush."

Kerry doesn't even know what his own damn platform is.

[GoLightly]

They showed you results? All I got to see was that there were only 168 votes. :(

[MEG33]

Every word of this shows Cohen is hurting.Maybe we ought to send flowers....;)

[NotchJohnson]

Yes, Rainman was a genius with numbers. That didn't mean he could communicate anything.

[SoDak]

Kerry's problem is that he is someone who has planned desperately his whole life to be president, and will do or say anything to get there. I call it "The Gore Syndrome". Clintoon had it too, but he was such an artful BS'er he managed to snow the voters. I think people generally disdain anyone who wants something bad enough to shoot their character down the tubes to get it. Sure he's a New England liberal and all, but it comes down really to fundamental character (or in this case, the lacking). Kerry doesn't have any real ethics, principles, or even opinions that aren't subject to change with polling.

[GoLightly]

No kidding!!! From what I remember, the people in his state have a stronger nordeastern accent, where the word lobster sounds more like laabste.

[SoDak]

Thurston Howell was a Republican.

[new cruelty]

Agreed. Visions of tears splashing off of the keyboard come to mind. Maybe we out to send a few boxes of tissues as well.

[counterpunch]

Yes, they showed results before. It was Bush 50%, Kerry 40%, Nader 10%, with well over 1000 votes cast.
Now they have the results hidden and the "Total Votes: 211" that I am currently seeing makes me think they reset the entire thing.

Regarding this site's Liberal Bias, I present the following evidence:
1) The main page references some crap posted on Daily Kos, the notorious far-left blog.
2) Every single campaign listed on the Jobs page is Democrat!
3) They proudly report in their bias poll that "only" 32% of respondents said they were liberal!

Give 'em hell!