Bush Senior Strategist Matthew Dowd talks about the polls.

Hugh Hewitt's website ^ | 10/12/04 | Hugh Hewitt

[WarrenC]

Tuesday, October 12, 2004 Posted at 4:00 PM, and updated thereafter.

Bush-Cheney '04 senior strategist Matthew Dowd on CNN's Inside Politics earlier today:

"I think fundamentally, this is going to be a race that is a choice, and I think what you see even in the Gallup poll, your poll, when you ask them on the important issues "Who do you trust more, who do you trust more to deal with Iraq?" the public trusts the president more; "Who do you trust more on the war on terror?" the public trusts the president more; even on the economy which has been a signature issue of the Kerry campaign, it is almost dead even. So I think still, fundamentally, this is a race where the public is going to decide who has better plans, better vision, on these issues. And right now, on two of the three biggest issues, we have an advantage, and on the other one it is basically tied."

I put the question to my callers: What is the choice on 11/2. here's a list of their responses:

Churchill v. Chamberlain

Reagan v. Carter

offense v. defense

advance v. retreat

resolve v. dithering

blunt talk v. nuance

England and Australia v. France and Germany

Allawi in power v. Saddam in power

post 9/11 v. post-Cole

values of America at its founding v. the values of Europe today

leader v. talker

lightning v. lightning bug

White House v. waffle house

Noah's Ark v. Titanic

Lincoln v. McClellan

limits on abortion v. no limits on abortion and taxpayer-funded abortions

parental notification v. no parental notification of teens seeking abortion

tax cut v. tax hike

private sector growth v. public sector growth

cheeseburger v. escargot

honest humility v. prideful arrogance

"Let's roll" v. roll over

Thanksgiving in Baghdad v. Christmas Eve in Cambodia

F-102 v. hot air balloon

September 12 v. September 10

reality v. make believe

big fish v. big fish story

Patton v. Peter Pan

Popeye v. Wimpy

Iceberg v. crushed ice

Battle Hymn of the Republic v. Kumbaya

Pat Tillman v. Michael Moore

D-Day v. Dunkirk

Brit Hume v. Chris Matthews

G-suit v. stuffed suit

national identity v. international anonymity

to be v. not to be

G-man v. g-string

tastes great v. less filling

Gary Cooper v. Inspector Clouseau

Red Dawn v. Reds

007 v. Austin Powers

Osama running from us v. Osama coming at us

adult v. adolescent

Henry V v. Dauphin

Braveheart v. Chickenheart

Jim Brown v. Ricky Williams

hard blow v. blow hard

Heart of America v. Le Car

steak v. pate (Lileks)

hard sharp cheddar v. runny brie (Lileks)

red, white, blue v. tie die

10 gallon stetson v. the magic hat

Saving Private Ryan v. Gigle

rock v. hard face

world series v. world cup

eagle v. magpie

cowboy hat v. blue helmet (radioblogger.com)

bulldog v. poodle

Laura v. Theresa

John Wayne v. Jane Fonda

Ray Lewis v. Jerry Lewis

filet mignon v. ground turkey

safety blitz v. prevent defense

"nuculur" and nuisance (radioblogger.com)

body armor v. body bag

global freedom v. global test

we the people v. we are the world

adverb v. adjective (Adam Youngman)

big rocks v. botox

Toby Keith v. Milli Vanilli

bazooka v. oompaloompa

Bring it on v. time out

backbone v. back flip

Thor v. Loki

action v. a plan

character v. caricature

stars and stripes v. smoke and mirrors

Arnold v. Gray

Hannibal v. Varro

marriage v. same sex marriage

Dirty Harry v. Barney Fife

Alexander v. Darius

"Blood, sweat, toil, and tears" v. "Peace in our time."

"Never, never, never, never, never give up" v. "wrong war, wrong place, wrong time"

Charge of the Light Brigade v. Electric Light Parade (Adam Youngman)

a Bradley v. a Yugo

hard hat v. beret

Lambeau Field v. Lambert Field

101rst Airborne v. 101 Dalmatians

Old Glory v. white flag

road warrior v. road kill

Mr. T v. mystery

logical v. pathological

Jaws v. Flipper

men v. boys

Zorro v.zero

Secretariat v. Frances the Talking Mule

mini skirt v. burkah

victory v. Vichy

God Bless America v. God-less America

compass v. windsock

Predator v. prey

tough calls v. pratt falls

The Star Spangled Banner v. The Internationale

composure v. poser

boots on the ground v. hands in the air

"I'm the greatest!" v. "No mas."

Captain Kirk v. Colonel Klink

safer shores v. manicures

a grand slam v. french toast

tough in the trenches v. courting the frenches

sanity v. vanity

"bring it on" v. "Not in the face! Not in the face."

Spanky v. Alfalfa

fire power v. flower power

bunker busters v. spit balls

Baghdad '03 v. Dien Bien Phu '54

iron v. irony

Navy SEALs v. navy beans

high and inside v. intentional walk

shock and awe v. hem and haw

Semper Fi v. simpering

I will add more entries as I make my way through a flood of e-mail on the subject, but this caller-generated list tells me that John Kerry hasn't got a chance. He's branded himself, with help from Bush-Cheney '04 for sure, as weak and vacillating, a brand that cannot be sold in the post 9/11 America, with the echoes of that day that sounded in Bali, Madrid, Beslan, Taba and a hundred other places of terror and tragedy. "The choice," as Matthew Dowd put it, and as all these callers and e-mailers amplified it, could not be more stark.

Lileks pointed out that if Al Franker were to hold such an invitational --and assuming someone lent him an audience for the day-- those callers would key off of Bush's alleged lack of intelligence or eloquence, or perhaps his faith in God. He's correct, of course, but I think the fact that there could be a list doesn't detract from the significance of this list. Look at the semiotics of Kerry as displayed on this list: French, failure, weak, defeat, effete, elite. And the choice before the ocountry is for president in wartime.

Bush wins 40 states. Maybe more.

[jwalsh07]

Read the WaPost tonight or tomorrow. Something going on there. A couple of articles that are definitely helpful to Bush. Weird.

[Torie]

Without reading the articles whatever they are, I have been alone on this board in saying the Washington Post is a splendid newspaper, and to lump it in with some of the liberal rags is a silly conflation.

[jwalsh07]

Are you accusing me of lumping silly conflations? :-}

[wynter]

Just jumping in here to ask a question... Where are these 100,000 new voters in Fl. and somewhere else.. can't remember.. coming from. I mean, are they Democrats or Republicans? What stirred them up? I'm getting worried that there are a lot of voters signed up that we have no idea why they're voting. Did someone just round them all up and bus them in? Show them a number and tell them to punch it? That did happen once a few years ago. But they just kept on punching other numbers. Maybe these are the same type of voters. It's really really bothering me. They said they have more people registering now that they've ever had.

[KnutCase]

Perhaps the Dems are "seminar pollees", lying to the Polsters just as "seminar callers" try to worm their way into Rush and Hannity talk shows. We've all heard them...."I've been a long term Republican/Conservative, but my mind has been changed since Bush has been in office, blah, blah, blah....". It may be a massive ploy to skew the polls by the DNC. Perhaps just another technique developed since Florida 2000.

[Torie]

I suspect that accusation might have traction, but I can't prove it, so I assume a position of modest patience on that one. :) All I know, is that only Torie that I know of has said good things about the Washington Post, and that I think the rag is fair and balanced these days. It probably is because Woodward is running things, and he is a Rockefeller type Pubbie. I know the type, and the species is not wholly foreign to me.

[COEXERJ145]

Very likely. Look at what they've been doing to all the online polls after each debate. The DNC and Kerry campaign send out an e-mail to all their cronies giving them links to all the polls they need to hit. They also use BOTS, programs that auto vote until told to stop, to flood the polls with pro-Kerry results.

[midftfan]

Following the second debate the first MSNBC flashpoll had Kerry winning 77% to 23% when most objective observers thought it was a Bush win or draw. I may be wrong on the exact numbers, but I do remember that Kerry had a huge margin. Don't think people aren't influenced by the numbers game, and the Dems know it. I have no doubt they are rigging the polls with a huge misinformation campaign to convince the duped out there of Kerry's comeback. We all know now what levels the Dems will go to win this election, so it shouldn't surprise any of us.

[gop_gene]

I think the poll you're referring to was the USA Today/Gallup poll which had some curious data. It had 24% of the conservatives voting for Kerry, and that Bush only had a 5 point lead overall in the southern states.

Already that's suspect--there's NO way Bush is anywhere near up only a 5 point average in the South (would be just like saying Kerry is up on average 5 points in the NE and Western Seaboard). As for the conservatives, that # is hogwash--W's base is rock solid, he has well over 90% of it intact.

[OpusatFR]

"Pinheads like articulate lawyer types who seem to absorb and thrive on detail."

Don't give lawyers that much credit. The field is overburdened with some whomping morons and mediocre thinkers, and lots wind up in Congress!

The reason we have problems in this country is that lawyers thrive on sophistry while those in business, engineering, and the solid sciences rely on sets of facts and theories that actually arrive at an outcome which may have variables, but if the premise is not correct, the product or result will fail.

GWB is trained as an businessman. He has an MBA from Harvard. He isn't trained in sophistry or equivocation. I have little respect for lawyers at this juncture.

[reformedliberal]

I think it is an old technique.

My late father was a die-hard FDR Democrat. Back in the 1980s, I asked him if he had been polled. We talked about this for a bit (he had been) and he grinned and said:"I lie to them". If you knew my Dad, this was a total shock. The man would choke before he lied. He would evade rather than lie. Personally, in over 50 years, I never caught him in a lie nor even suspected he was lying, ever. But, he considered it a personal responsibility to not tell pollsters a thing that they could ever use w/any reliability.