Posted on 07/14/2004 7:03:08 AM PDT by Valin
Time to make a fool of myself. On June 4, I posted my prediction for the Presidential election on my office wall. I have President Bush carrying 36 states and winning 348 electoral votes. It sounds kind of crazy, and I’ve felt rather lonely with it for about a month. But after more reading I see that I’m not the only person on Earth who doesn’t think it will be close.
Number-crunching economists such as Ray Fair and Nigel Gault agree with me. Their econometric models are predicting Bush will take 56% to 58% of the two-party vote. As of this writing, the Iowa futures-traders are slightly less optimistic, but they are valuing the Bush vote share at about 52% of the two-party vote—and that's just two days after John Kerry’s selection of John Edwards as his running-mate. Previously Bush futures have been selling at 60 cents for a $1 contract.
So why do I think will Bush win big? I may be wrong, but I have several reasons. Here are just three that are hitting the front pages right now.
1. The Running Mate: Vice presidential nominees rarely make a difference—probably Lyndon Johnson was the last one who did. Still, the choice of John Edwards was expected to give Kerry a momentary bounce in the polls.
Well, a handful of new polls came out at the end of last week, and it just hasn’t happened. If anything, Bush improved his standing, surging to a 49%-45% lead in an Associated Press-Ipsos poll released Thursday. That was a statistically significant 5% improvement for Bush over their previous poll.
This is not to say Edwards is actually bringing the ticket down, but his failure to help Kerry in the short run is curious. Perhaps the public doesn’t share the media’s enthusiasm for the young Democratic messiah?
For all his good looks, John Edwards is a political lightweight. He went straight from fooling jurors and swindling doctors as a trial lawyer, to buying himself a Senate seat in 1998 over the hapless Sen. Lauch Faircloth (R.-N.C.). And that's his whole career. If John Edwards were running for re-election this year in North Carolina, polls suggest that he would probably lose. That dims his regional appeal, which was always one of the main arguments for his selection.
It’s not just Republicans who are saying Edwards won’t help Kerry in the South, but Kerry himself, speaking in the universal language of “putting your money where your mouth is.” Despite recent public polls showing Kerry competitive with Bush in two must-win Red states—in a dead heat in Arkansas and six points back in Louisiana—Kerry decided to stop advertising in those states a week before making his veep choice.
Kerry did not make a major mistake choosing Edwards—he is probably the best of Kerry's realistic options, although an unexpected dark-horse candidate could have been more exciting. Rep. Dick Gephardt (D.-Mo.) has always been a dud on the stump, and Iowa Gov. Tom Vilsack (D.), in many ways the safe choice, is not flashy enough to excite people outside of Iowa. Besides, John Kerry is a snooty, boring Massachusetts liberal, and John Edwards balances him out by bringing some “levitas” to the ticket.
Then again, he might bring a bit too much. President Bush found the right line when a reporter asked him last week the difference between Edwards and Vice President Dick Cheney. His reply: “Dick Cheney can be President...Next?”
2. Same-Sex Marriage: This issue will directly affect the presidential contest in two important states: Michigan and Oregon. Voters there will be deciding on state constitutional amendments to protect traditional marriage. This will create a strong turnout on the social Right in two states where self-identified Republicans and Democrats are already near parity.
In Oregon, which Bush narrowly lost in 2000, this alone could be decisive. Michigan, on the other hand, hasn’t had a good Republican year since Geoffrey Feiger—Dr. Jack “Death” Kevorkian’s lawyer—ran for governor as a Democrat in 1998. But Michigan is by no means a Democratic state.
Missouri Secretary of State (and gubernatorial candidate) Matt Blunt (R.) failed in his attempt to put a marriage initiative on the November ballot; voters will instead take it up in the August primary. But same-sex marriage will indeed be important there and elsewhere, especially after this week when the U.S. Senate votes on a constitutional amendment defining marriage as the union of one man and one woman.
Kerry and Edwards—if they show up to vote this week—will almost certainly vote “no” on FMA. All rhetorical dodges aside, this places them firmly in favor of same-sex marriage, and you can bet Republicans won’t let anyone forget it.
There is another aspect of this, as Kerry and Edwards are already quietly selling themselves as “the gay ticket.” Last May, Edwards took a big risk by endorsing radical social experimentation on helpless children—or as he called it, “the rights of gays and lesbians to adopt children.” The National Gay and Lesbian Task Force Policy Institute issued a statement last week calling Kerry/Edwards “the most gay-supportive national ticket in American history.” This definitely isn’t going to win them support from blue-collar voters in West Virginia or Ohio.
3. ‘Dude, Your Country’s Right Here’: If you watch a lot of CNN and read the New York Times, you might get the impression that many people actually heed the hard Left. You would also be surprised to hear that things are actually going pretty well in America right now. The average person who doesn’t read The Nation or belong to an anarchist commune realizes this.
Kerry can scream all he wants about the economy, but people are now finding jobs, and good economic numbers keep rolling in. Interest rates are still quite low, unemployment claims have fallen to a four-year nadir, hundreds of thousands of new jobs are being created by the month, self-employment has surged, and the stock market is back on the upswing. Kerry has even abandoned that line he used to drop all the time about “the worst economy since Herbert Hoover,” because he had to—it’s obviously silly and false.
And what of Iraq, that other huge crisis that will supposedly decide the election? As much as Michael Moore and others on the Left complain about that ill-considered invasion, the situation there has stabilized considerably of late and casualties are relatively few. This is not exactly Vietnam, where everyone knew someone who had died.
And oh, in case you’ve forgotten, the Democratic ticket now has two senators on it who voted to go to war in Iraq. Both Kerry and Edwards will complain about the war’s particulars, but Kerry has no right to do so. He’s the one who drew up the Bush War Plan, letter by letter, in a September 2002 op-ed in the New York Times—including the part about a unilateral invasion if the United Nations fails to act.
Next to Kerry, Edwards looks positively hawkish. While Kerry spent the entire presidential primary obfuscating his pro-war position on Iraq, Edwards was trumpeting his support for the war. In February 2002, just months after al Qaeda terrorists—not Iraqis—had destroyed the World Trade Center, Edwards declared on CNN, “I think Iraq is the most serious and imminent threat to our country.” On MSNBC's Hardball in October 2003, he reiterated his support for the already-completed invasion, despite the lack of support from the United Nations: “I think we couldn’t let those who could veto in the Security Council hold us hostage,” he said.
So both Democrats have endorsed the unilateral Bush foreign policy that has the hard Left in hysterics. I haven’t seen the news stories yet on how Edwards’ selection will generate extra support for Nader—I don’t expect Times reporters to write anything that could throw their candidate off-message—but you can bet it’s going to happen.
Most important of all, George W. Bush just isn’t Adolf Hitler, Dick Cheney is not the “spawn of Satan,” our civil liberties are still very much intact, and America is not being irretrievably destroyed or thrown into a new Great Depression.
It’s an awful challenge to remove a sitting president. It only happens when things are going terribly wrong, which they are not—Michael Moore notwithstanding.
David Freddoso, Assistant Editor for Human Events, writes for Brainwash
AMEN! There are SO many more ways to communicate now. Get right back in the lefts face! Fight them calmly with logic and solid facts! Dont let them get away with spreading their propaganda and oppose it in every tiny corner they try to spread it. You wont change their minds, but you may win votes from those who read your debates with them.
Sounds like you didn't read the article, which had nothing to do with any of that. No one is taking Pat Buchanan or his ilk seriously, and for good reason.
I think some members of the general public could get in, but only after the invited guests. You might consider calling the venue now to ask, so that if the public can get in, you can make plans accordingly. (Then you can give the rest of us FReepers who live in other states a post-debate report.)
My tagline until the election:
A vote for Kerry-Edwards is a vote for Osama bin Laden, Saddam Hussein, Jacques Chirac, the UN, International Criminal Court, and Hollyweirdos.
Failure to vote, or a vote for a minority party, is a vote for Kerry-Edwards (unless you’re a liberal/Leftist who’ll vote Nader, a minority party, or stay home).
WOW .... nice response Dubya :))
Reason #4 : AWB expires and people on the right breathe a sigh of relief and pull the Bush lever.
Reason #5 - Kerry is already showing signs of giving up on Missouri and the South by pulling out advertising money.
Looking at recent polls, as well as political futures trading sites has gotten to be a bit depressing lately.
Let's hope the author is right.
<< I have President Bush carrying 36 states .... >>
What a pessimist!
Here's mine:
United States of America's President and Armed-Forces Commander-In-Chief, George Walker Bush: 44 States -- Those other bozos: 6 states -- and DC.
Blessings -- Brian
BUMPping
<< Reason #5 - Kerry is already showing signs of giving up on Missouri and the South by pulling out advertising money. >>
You're right. Kerry's whipped and knows it.
But don't forget that the effective Two Billion Dollars 'contribution' of the left-wing biased 'mainstream' media complex is not being withdrawn.'
Don't forget, too, that the congressional races go on for the votes of the fifty percent of Americans too stupid to know they're being lied to and/or two mean-spirited and/or greedy to care and for those of the felons, criminal-alien invaders, dead people, the insane and other members of the "DemocRATS" base and those able to be swayed to it.
So just 'cause Kerry's doomed and knows it isn't reason for us too quit.
Remember 2000 and Florida's 50,000 effectively disenFRanchised Republican voters -- and stay on the ball.
Great read - makes a lot of good points - The GWB team just has to get our message out now and we win -
I believe you're right. More like 43.
It just fits.
I've always felt that Bush will win. It reminds me of the 1864 election where Lincoln had very little hope of reelection, but won handily. I know the stakes are as high as they have ever been. If America elects the 1st and 4th most liberal senators as their leaders, then we very well might be on our way of becoming french. I just don't believe it. Most of the Americans I work with are hard working people with good values and are not ready to throw the country away. I,m biting my nails and praying that we will hold the course as Reagan would have wanted us and not give in to the traitorous, amoral, socialistic, gay-pandering liberals.
A moment I'd love to see at the debate. Dick Cheney to John Edwards: "You're no Dan Quayle".
bump
That is an impressive group you are backing. You should be real proud!
And as far as me being an "alleged conservative", your comments illuminate your ignorance. Never bring a knife to a gunfight and in the future, never let your mouth write a check your butt can't cash...and you are way overdrawn, Junior!
Three reasons Bush will win:
John Kerry
John Edwards
Teresa Heinz
BTTT
We optimists will merely laugh at your cowardness because we know better.
The press has been trying to hypnotize the sheeple to vote democrat for decades, but to no avail. Republicans have won the presidency six out of the last nine tries. That's a pretty bad track record for the press.
But you go on choosing to fear the press and their sheeple. To hell with the facts.
I sill have faith in the American voters and I strongly believe that before Election Day will come and despite the liberal media lies a majority of voters will realize that the ultra liberal flip flopers from Massachusetts is not fit to be President and they will re-elect President Bush.
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