The GOP hasn't had a high quality national level strategist since Lee Atwater died in 1991. That the Democrats chose, of their own free will, as incompetent a campaigner as John Kerry, along with his firecracker wife and his smarmy Vice Presidential pick, is a Godsend to the GOP. All Bush and Cheney have to do is work the battleground states intensely and make a feint or two at states like New Jersey and Minnesota, to force the opposition to spend money in the relatively expensive Twin Cities media market and very expensive metro New York media market to hold onto core Democratic states and avoid a McGovern/Mondale style wipeout.
Obviously, the economy and Iraq remain important in voters' minds, but if the news remains improving in both areas, they should not serve as wedge issues for the Kerry-Edwards campaign.
The Kerry team is out of their league and unimpressive.
The Shrum speech was a terrible misfire, and Mary Beth Cahill is very unsubstantial... a Kennedy back-bencher with little national experience.
These people don't get it, and the MSM does them no favors by constantly telling them that they are right, and middle America is nuts.