Posted on 09/23/2005 4:05:17 PM PDT by RWR8189
emember John Kerry? It's been a busy week for the 2004 Democratic nominee. On Monday, Kerry delivered a long speech at Brown University blasting the Bush administration's inept response to the Katrina disaster and just about every other thing it's laid a finger on. Two days later, Kerry gave a floor speech in the Senate declaring his unsurprising opposition to the John Roberts nomination.
Make no mistake: Kerry designed these to be attention-grabbers. His staff hyped both of them relentlessly. Four e-mails from Kerryland popped into my inbox before and after his Brown speech, which Kerry aides billed as a "major address." Meanwhile his Roberts speech was garnished with no fewer than six e-mail alerts, a pace that might embarrass some Viagra spammers.
And the net result was ... well, not much. Kerry's "major address" was ignored by The New York Times, while The Washington Post lumped it in with a similar anti-Bush speech delivered by John Edwards. His Roberts broadside earned only fleeting mentions in both papers. No one seemed very interested. Even bloggers didn't pay much attention. (New York Times columnist David Brooks did use the occasion to slam Kerry as a cheap partisan--hardly the attention Kerry wanted.)
So it goes with John Kerry these days. Had 60,000 Ohioans voted differently, he would now be leader of the free world. After the election it seemed possible that Kerry would soldier on as the voice of national Democrats. Yet in a matter of just months he's gone from the face of his party to another face in the crowd.
It's not that Kerry isn't trying. Kerry has done anything but slink off into a post-defeat hibernation the way some other recently vanquished presidential nominees--Bob Dole, Michael Dukakis, even Al Gore (remember the beard and the European vacation?)--have done. Well before this week, Kerry was traveling the country campaign-style to promote a children's health care plan he has, at least for the moment, made his top priority. Even as I write this, I see from the latest Kerry, Inc., email that the senator is touting another new plan to fight global AIDS.
No, Kerry seems hell-bent on redemption at the ballot box in 2008. You can see it in his strident attacks on the Bush administration, which he laid out in rhetorically goofy fashion on Monday:
Brownie is to Katrina what Paul Bremer is to peace in Iraq. What George Tenet is to slam dunk intelligence, what Paul Wolfowitz is to parades paved with flowers in Baghdad. The bottom line is simple. The "we'll do whatever it takes" administration doesn't have what it takes to get the job done. This is the Katrina administration.
You can also see Kerry's '08 ambitions in hints dropped by his political operation, which has never shot down speculation that Kerry would run again. As The Boston Globe's Peter Canellos wrote, Kerry's Katrina speech "had the air of a major political moment," surrounded as he was by his family and several top aides who "scrutinized his performance from the front row somewhat like the judging panel on 'American Idol.'"
And you can see it in that most reliable barometer of political activity: fundraising. As of August 15, Kerry's leadership PAC had raised around $750,000 this year, second only among his potential 2008 rivals to Indiana Senator Evan Bayh, who has practically declared his candidacy.
Yet while the political world hangs on every word from Hillary Clinton's mouth, and Joe Biden seems to be getting more airtime than Anderson Cooper, no one appears terribly interested in what John Kerry has to say anymore.
It's not just the media--it's Democratic voters, too. Kerry placed second in an August CNN/USA Today/Gallup poll which asked Democrats whom they preferred as a 2008 nominee. That doesn't sound so bad until you consider the numbers. Kerry finished with 16 percent, while the front-runner, Hillary Clinton (of course), had a whopping 40 percent. And Kerry was barely ahead of John Edwards, who placed just one point behind him. A June Fox News poll yielded similar results.
And it gets even more ominous. Kerry is especially unpopular within the world of netroots Democrats--the blog-based crowd who nearly lifted Howard Dean to the Democratic nomination and whose influence over the 2008 primaries will only be more powerful. The bloggers and their acolytes are still trying to figure out which candidates to promote for the next presidential nomination. But at the moment there seems to be no groundswell for the last nominee. In a summer straw poll conducted by DailyKos.com, perhaps the Grand Central Station of netroots liberals, Kerry finished with a pathetic 2 percent--putting him behind the likes of Biden, Virginia Governor Mark Warner, Wisconsin Senator Russ Feingold, and the estimable "No Freakin' Clue." (Wesley Clark finished a clear first with 34 percent.) Meanwhile in another recent straw poll over at the Kos-like site MyDD.com, Kerry tallied just 3 percent among 14 Democrats.
None of this should come as a shock. Kerry was never an inspiring candidate. He overcame Howard Dean at the last minute in large part because he could afford to give his primary campaign a huge loan. His feeble response to last summer's swift boat attacks revealed his clumsy political skills. Everything good about the Kerry campaign--its phenomenal fundraising, the passions it harnessed--derived mainly from Democrats' Bush-hatred, not from Kerry himself.
In the midst of Kerry's typically windy John Roberts speech, he paused and looked up to the Senate rostrum. "Mr. President, how much time do I have left?" Kerry asked. "The gentleman's time has expired," came the reply. And so it has.
Makes sense to me. Start at Bush=118, Kerry=0. Kerry=60, Bush =118-60=58.
Assuming you counted them all to Kerry of course. He'd appreciate that.
118,000-60,000=58,000. Does this mean he wouldnt have had the electoral votes with that margin?
I watched Kerry on C-Span the other day when the senators were voting. It was one of those deals where the senators walked around and chatted with each other while they voted.
While other senators chatted among themselves, Kerry was by himself. One time when he went up to another senator, slapped him on the back and started chatting, the other senator looked at him and walked away.
It is obvious the other senators want nothing to do with him.
What college are you attending?
Just kidding, don't answer that.
Yes but to believe that all 60000 disputed votes would have gone to Kerry is fantasyland. Terezaland.
"If W won by 100,000 votes (Im not sure of the number)and 60,000 voted differently, wouldnt W have by 40,000?"
No, because Bush would have lost 60,000 AND Kerry would have gained 60,000.
Never mind, I get it now. Its obvious I go to a state school!
Say 100,000 people who voted for Bush was the margin of victory.
If 60,000 of these voters voted for Kerry, that means that Bush would have had 60,000 less votes and Kerry would have had 60,000 more (like duh!)
Hypothetical Bush victory numbers (too lazy to look up the actuals, I got crab cakes cookin')
Bush: 2,000,000 votes
Kerry: 1,900,000 votes
If 60,000 voters voted for the elite liberal snob who ran out on his men after 4 months in Vietnam and then met with the Viet Cong and North Vietnames Gov. reps while still a Naval reserve officer Kerry rather than the elite, conservative (kind of), I can hug a black woman who lost her home and mean it Bush
Bush: 1,940,000
Kerry: 1,960,000
Kerry would have won and we would have lost.
That's how this logic works!
Because the statement was 60,000 people voted differently. That means Kerry would gain 60,000 and Bush lose 60,000. That would be a swing of 120,000 and reverse the election.
But like someone else said a swing of 60,000 in several other states and we have an even more desive win.
It's a pipe dream for sore losers.
+60,000 for Kerry and -60,000 for Bush is a net change of 120,000 votes.
Yes, I see that now, at least the numbers aspect of it. But to wistfully declare that if something was different it would be different, doesnt make sense to me. Its like saying if my aunt had testicles she would be my uncle. No shiite. For Kerry to lament people choosing W over him caused him to lose, just seems foolish to me. Of course, the whole Kerry campaign was fraught with comedy and buffonery. Recall the op-ed where someone claimed that Kerry's flip-flopping was actually an asset for it allowed him to be flexible. And who can forget Kerry's "Foreign Policy Experience"? A personal favorite was the tanning fiasco. He achieved a comedic apex with his bunny suit photo-op, only to surpass it with the wild pitch at Fenway. Yes, I now understand the numeric logic that cost Kerry Ohio, but would submit that it was Kerry's boobery in a campaign that bordered on slapstick that cost him the White House..
but you have to put that other 60,000 in the kerry column
"I guess this explains why Im a 38 year old college student-I still dont get it. If W won by 100,000 votes (Im not sure of the number)and 60,000 voted differently, wouldnt W have by 40,000?"
That sounds about right to me, but I was a social studies major until I decided to add special education to the mix. (There was precisely ONE social studies teacher job in the state that didn't also want that teacher to be a coach. Me coaching would be a true case of those who can, do, while those who can't, teach.)
Many presidents have been elected by taking tiny margins in key states. Kennedy, Truman, and Carter among them. All were very lucky everything broke their way. Of course in Kennedy's case they managed to find or create enough votes to get him elected.
As far as Kerry goes, I think I will buy some get well cards and send one to him, one to HRC, and one to Rangel. They all need them because these explosions of hate and rage they have in GWB's direction are very bad for their health.
"They all need them because these explosions of hate and rage they have in GWB's direction are very bad for their health.
Not to wish harm on anyone, but a good apoplexy-induced heart attack would do some of those people good. They would have to chose to eliminate the vitriol, and I can't see them doing that. I really dispised Clinton, but I never particularly wished him ill, even though I refuse to display my retirement certificate, with his (hopefully Autographed) signature. When I started praying again, I prayed for him to be guided, just like I do for GWB, a President for whom I do have respect.
These folks often spew out vicious venom and vile lies. I never hear them offer any positive solutions. Pretty sad. I hate some of them too, but I try not to let it consume me. Some of these morons who think GWB is the devil are just nuts.
As far as the 60K vote thing goes again, I wonder what would have happened if Kerry won OH by a tiny margin but GWB had still taken a majority of the national vote. That would have made Kerry president while he LOST the popular vote. All those cries of "the one with the most votes should win!" would have been forgotten. When any Republican questioned the legitimacy of a Kerry presidency, you can bet the Dems would have screamed that we should "move on!" Anyway, no point in dwelling on that. Kerry had every advantage handed to him on a silver platter and he still LOST. Hee hee.
"Hee hee"
Yep. I can laugh at them too, along with you. Kerry is getting to be pretty funny, now. I wonder if he'd have a career possible as a stand-up commedian? He sure won't make it as a politician anymore.
I guess Kerry didnt really have every advantage, now that I think of it. He had one big albatross, and her name was Teresa. ;) He was also burdened with a lightweight running mate who couldn't even muster 44% in his home state. Not to mention the disadvantage of Kerry's own personality!
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