Posted on 09/03/2004 10:48:47 AM PDT by Roscoe Karns
My Democratic friends are mad as hell, and they aren't going to take it any more.
They are worried, having watched as another August smear campaign, full of lies and half-truths, takes its toll in the polls.
They are frustrated, mostly at the Kerry campaign, for naively believing that just because all the newspapers and news organizations that investigated the charges of the Swift Boat assassins found them to be full of lies and half-truths, they wouldn't take their toll. The word on the street is that Kerry himself was ready to fire back the day the story broke, but that his campaign, believing the charges would blow over if they ignored them, counseled restraint.
But most of all, activists Democrats are angry. As one who lived through an August like this, 16 years ago -- replete with rumors that were lies, which the Bush campaign claimed they had nothing to do with and later admitted they had planted -- I'm angry, too. I've been to this movie. I know how it works. Lies move numbers.
Remember the one about Dukakis suffering from depression after he lost the governorship? (Dukakis not crazy, more at 11.) We lost six points over that lie, planted by George W.'s close friend and colleague in the 1988 campaign, Lee Atwater. Or how about the one about Kitty Dukakis burning a flag at an antiwar demonstration, another out-and-out lie, which the Bush campaign denied having anything to do with, except that it turned out to have come from a United States senator via the Republican National Committee? Lee Atwater later apologized to me for that, too, on his deathbed. Did I mention that Lee's wife is connected to the woman running the Swift Boat campaign?
Never again, we said then.
Not again, Democrats are saying now.
What do you do, Democrats keep asking each other.
The answer is not pretty, but everyone knows what it is.
In 1988, in the days before the so-called independent groups, the candidate called the shots. To Michael Dukakis' credit, depending on how you look at it, he absolutely refused to get into the gutter, even to answer the charges. His theory, like that of some on the Kerry staff, was that answering such charges would only elevate them, give them more attention than they deserved. He thought the American people wanted to hear about issues, not watch a mud-wrestling match. In theory, he was right. In practice, the sad truth is that smears work -- that if you throw enough mud, some of it is bound to stick.
You can't just answer the charges. You can't just say it ain't so.
You have to fight fire with fire, mud with mud, dirt with dirt.
The trouble with Democrats, traditionally, is that we're not mean enough. Dukakis wasn't. I wasn't. I don't particularly like destroying people. I got into politics because of issues, not anger. But too much is at stake to play by Dukakis rules, and lose again.
That is the conclusion Democrats have reached. So watch out. Millions of dollars will be on the table. And there are plenty of choices for what to spend it on.
I'm not promising pretty.
What will it be?
Will it be the three, or is it four or five, drunken driving arrests that Bush and Cheney, the two most powerful men in the world, managed to rack up? (Bush's Texas record has been sealed. Now why would that be? Who seals a perfect driving record?)
After Vietnam, nothing is ancient history, and Cheney is still drinking. What their records suggest is not only a serious problem with alcoholism, which Bush but not Cheney has acknowledged, but also an even more serious problem of judgment. Could Dick Cheney get a license to drive a school bus with his record of drunken driving? (I can see the ad now.) A job at a nuclear power plant? Is any alcoholic ever really cured? So why put him in the most stressful job in the world, with a war going south, a thousand Americans already dead and control of weapons capable of destroying the world at his fingertips.
It has been said that in the worst of times, Kissinger gave orders to the military not to obey Nixon if he ordered a first strike. What if Bush were to fall off the wagon? Then what? Has America really faced the fact that we have an alcoholic as our president?
Or how about Dead Texans for Truth, highlighting those who served in Vietnam instead of the privileged draft-dodging president, and ended up as names on the wall instead of members of the Air National Guard. I'm sure there are some mothers out there who are still mourning their sons, and never made that connection. It wouldn't be so hard to find them.
Or maybe it will be Texas National Guardsmen for Truth, who can explain exactly what George W. Bush was doing while John Kerry was putting his life on the line. So far, all W. can do is come up with dental records to prove that he met his obligations. Perhaps with money on the table, or investigators on their trail, we will learn just what kind of wild and crazy things the president was doing while Kerry was saving a man's life, facing enemy fire and serving his country.
Or could it be George Bush's Former Female Friends for Truth. A forthcoming book by Kitty Kelly raises questions about whether the president has practiced what he preaches on the issue of abortion. As Larry Flynt discovered, a million dollars loosens lips. Are there others to be loosened?
Are you shocked? Not fair? Who said anything about fair? Remember President Dukakis? He was very fair. Now he teaches at Northeastern University. John Kerry has been very fair in dealing with the Swift Boat charges. That's why so many of my Democrat friends have decided to stop talking to the campaign, and start putting money together independently.
The arrogant little Republican boys who have been strutting around New York this week, claiming that they have this one won, would do well to take a step back. It could be a long and ugly road to November.
To find out more about Susan Estrich, and read features by other Creators Syndicate writers and cartoonists, visit the Creators Syndicate web page at www.creators.com.
Yep, just ask Kerry's 527 and Michael Moore. They've been at it for a year.
The arrogant little Republican boys who have been strutting around New York this week, claiming that they have this one won, would do well to take a step back. It could be a long and ugly road to November.
LOL!!! They haven't stopped. Thanks for the laugh, Southack.
Your "nutshell" analysis of the GOP convention is worth repeating! Thanks! :^D
Susan Estrich has gone nuts. They were all expecting a flat Republican convention. Arnold stood everybody at attention, Zell Miller brought the ceiling down, Cheney pi$$ed Kerry off, and Bush calmly laid out his plan for the next four years.
Hey, Susan! Stop the whining! You look like an ugly sex-starved cobra! The more you whine with that wide mouth of yours the uglier you get! You belong in the same cage with Maureen Dowd! Quit defending Kerry for the lies about himself that he's been feeding into his little brain which have distorted his 'vision' of himself making him too big for his Boston britches! Why, he is beginning to look, and almost sounds, Irish!
Amazing article! She has totally flipped out!
Oh, well, Susan (who ran Dukakis's campaign), hasn't gotten over her wee mistake of telling Dukakis to hop right into that tank for the photo op. And why no mention of Kitty Dukakis's drinking problem? The Kitty litter jokes...empties strewn all over the state. Nasty piece by Estrich. She's done herself some serious harm. I loved the line about 'Dukakis not crazy. More at 11.' Hehehehe. Lee Atwater was a genius.
Where did you get that picture. Did you steal it from the museum.? Are you the one? Hehehehehehe....
"Is any alcoholic ever really cured? So why put him in the most stressful job in the world, with a war going south, a thousand Americans already dead and control of weapons capable of destroying the world at his fingertips."
Unless she has completely abandoned any pretense of being a rational, thinking human being as opposed to just another mindless ideological zombie, her conscience obviously will not allow her to support Barack Obama, since there is a far greater liklihood that a heroin addiction will come back to re-claim its victim.
Has the "news" show 60 Minutes promised to try and do the same for sKerry as they did for Clinton when the truth was about to sink his candidacy?
Susan, speaking as a private citizen, I hope you think long and hard on this one.
If you thought Dukakis was merely a loss for you, associating with those on this 'dirty tricks' move could destroy you forever.
But I'm sure President Bush is saying, "Bring It On".
Is that supposed to be news?? Everyone knows there are Democrats running. 'Nuf said.
Yeah, that's why there were 500,000 republicans in the street in Boston comparing Kerry to Stalin, Mao and Pol Pot. Tying up traffic and disrupting official Dem events.
Oh wait, I would miss racing and football. Never mind ;)
Don't you just love the company these people keep...and take seriously!?
SOP for Democrats...whine and blame someone else.
There is none so blind as one who will not see.
Remember President Dukakis?
Oh, she's living in some alternate reality. That explains alot.
To find out more about Susan Estrich,
Who in the world would want to do THAT ???
Na. Old motor oil. Now THAT's viscuous.
Is it our imagination, or does Susan Estrich resemble nothing so much as a bobblehead doll? And when she gets really mad, the bobble-rate increases dramatically?
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