Posted on 09/15/2004 5:42:50 AM PDT by FlyLow
It was amusing to see the Left in full meltdown mode last week. There was Chief Democrat attack dog Terry McAuliffe, denouncing the President of the United States for possible discrepancies in his records from half a lifetime ago.
Then there was the Congressional Black Caucus, trotting out their partisan smear machine. They invited their favorite presidential candidate to come and bash the president, which he gladly did.
But for me, it was the spectacle of Sen. Tom Harkin jumping off another political bridge that was particularly amusing. Harkin, you will recall, has a history of making a fool of himself. He was the guy standing behind Howard Dean on caucus night in Iowa (was that really just last January?) when Dr. Screech embarrassed and discredited himself and all who had endorsed him (Harkin, Gore, etc.).
Harkin again blew a gasket earlier this summer when he angrily called Vice President Dick Cheney a coward for not going to Vietnam.
He then said that Michael Moore's mockumentary was so compelling that every American should see it, or some such nonsense. This despite the fact that Harkin admitted having seen only half of the film.
This time, like his comrades, the junior senator from Iowa was all too eager to accept as gospel the obviously forged "documents" purporting to show that George W. Bush lied about completing his Air National Guard service three decades ago. Quoting CBS's disgracefully incomplete "investigation" of Bush's service, Harkin immediately stepped in front of TV cameras to denounce the president as a liar and a fraud.
Old Senator Tom wants us to buy the idea that fake documents put forth by Dan Rather, one of the most partisan Democrat sycophants in today's national media, are to be taken as proof of something about which most Americans don't even care. The American people have seen George W. Bush in action as their commander in chief for nearly four years. Does Tom Harkin really think the voters care about whether the president skipped a few guard meetings back in the early seventies?
Of course, whenever he is attacking Republicans for their military service, or lack thereof, Harkin always neglects to mention that he himself has lied about his own military record. Over the years, Harkin has told his constituents that he served as a "fighter pilot" during the Vietnam War. The truth is that he never fought anything more dangerous than Tokyo traffic, since that is where he was stationed. But Harkin is a liberal Democrat, so no one in the so-called mainstream media will ever scrutinize his embellished resume.
Meanwhile, Kerry himself seems to believe that his ticket to the White House lies in silly slogans like "W stands for wrong" and fruitless attacks on Bush over the issue of allowing the so-called assault weapons ban to expire. In this case, even former Clinton advisor Paul Begala, now working for Kerry, says that strategy is just plain dumb.
Bill Clinton, from his hospital bed, told Kerry to get off the issue of Vietnam and start talking about health care, education and the economy. But Kerry can't do that, because his whole campaign is based on him being a war hero, a fact that is now not only being refuted by the Swift Boat Veterans for Truth, but also by some disgruntled Democrat strategists. Pat Caddell, a long-time Democrat pollster, said this week that Kerry should stop talking about being a hero.
"When you're a hero," Caddell said, "you don't tell people about it. They know."
Caddell makes a good point. But John Kerry has nothing else. He and his supporters certainly can't tout his left-wing record in the Senate. And so, they are hysterical whenever they are challenged.
Why is there panic on the Left? Because they have nothing to sell that a majority of voters want to buy.
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Doug Patton is a freelance columnist who has served as a speechwriter, policy advisor and communications director for federal, state and local candidates, elected officials and public policy organizations. His weekly columns are published in newspapers across the country and on selected Internet websites. Readers can e-mail him at dpatton@neonramp.com.
Terry McAuliffe seems to have the mental maturity and values of a high school groupy!
My Mom (r.i.p.) was fond of telling me "It's important to be a good loser", and then she would add "But it's even more important to be a good winner!" I would take no where near the pleasure in seeing the left lose if they would just learn to be good winners.
I was just listening to the DNC's new "fortunate son" attack ad (i.e. the one CBS and NBC are demanding the Democrats pull and/or modify). The video uses John Fogerty's (CCR) song "Fortunate Son" as its background music (Fogerty is a big time Kerry backer who recently put out a new "anti-War" song, "Deja Vu All Over Again"). I was struck by the irony of the fact that Fogerty himself was a National Guardsman who has acknowledged joining the Army Guard to escape service in Vietnam. What do you think about that?
God Bless your Mother. She was 100% right, and the liberal-demokkkRATs are perennial losers. They just can't get used to it.
He's the poster boy for the Kerry campaign. Infantile message, infantile behavior.
Classic Kerry supporter. Another faded musician who's looking for another 15 minutes.
Here's a trivia question: We all know that Carville was a Marine. Did Begala ever serve?
Dem flack Mary Anne Marsh was on O'Reily last night. Usually, she can spin deception with the best of them. But last night she was all doom and gloom, and just didn't have the heart to weave her usual tales.
O'Reily was warning her Kerry's days are numbered if they don't regain offense immediately and she was basically agreeing with him.
In the closing seconds O'Reily told her she better get the Kerry people together and have a strategy meeting and she wistfully said something like "that is the problem. We're having too many meetings." Quite telling when someone of her caliber comes on TV and basically admits the Kerry campaign is in a corner.
My expectation is that as Kerry sinks lower and lower the unofficial (and possible official) Kerry messengers will become shriller and shriller which will only turn off the "independent" vote. The Dems will be seen as the party of the unhinged.
Terry's been very very quiet since the CBS/DNC memocane connection came out.
And hopefull, the best is yet to come! Looking for Kerry to flip out. Certainly his "Uncle Teddy" will on his tour.
"Did Begala ever serve?"
Only his dominatrix.
My guess is that they'll place all their chips on the debates. Have Kerry fire off a continuous volly of inflammatory half-truths and untruths for Bush to respond to. Perhaps Bush can be photo-captured in some deer-in-the-headlights moments while he decides whether or not to be a gentleman in response. The MSM could then be recruited to declare Kerry the decisive winner and amplify the "Bush indecisivenesss" theme to hideous proportions. Probably won't work, but their behavior suggests that they might try something desperate like this anyway.
That is an insult to a high school groupy.
My Mom's was similar..."It's nice to be important but more important to be nice". Good words of advice.
"Take some 8mm film of that...I may want to trot it out in 30 years"...."I am JFK"!
I think we're in for a lot of desperate acts. Last week they decided Kerry hasn't been "nasty" enough yet, Lord help us.
My sympathies to swing state residents. Living in CA has the minor advantage of knowing there is soooo much Kool-aid being consumed that Bush won't bother to fight for it, so no political mudslinging onslaught, at least so far.
Now they are pulling out the old warhorse Senator Kennedy, among the most notorious leftists out there, to seal the Kerry catastrophe.
Senator Kerry compounds it all by making his gun-grabbing and Kim-appeasing ways clear.
His obvious status as a disaster on foreign policy is going to be the final nail into what may well be among the most lopsided electoral counts in history.
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