Posted on 05/07/2003 9:25:44 AM PDT by knighthawk
WASHINGTON - Actors have a recurring nightmare. In it, they appear on stage wearing nothing but a short undershirt and an ingratiating smile. It's all out there in the footlights for inspection.
I was reminded of this at the weekend, when nine Democrats seeking their party's nomination to challenge George W. Bush in the 2004 presidential election sparred in their first formal debate in Columbia, South Carolina.
The eight men and one woman on stage are not peas in a pod; they range in plausibility from the maybe possible to the utterly hopeless. They're all experienced politicians, and some have polish, but at this early stage in the race what is most obvious about them is a shared nakedness -- they all seem exposed, vulnerable and needy. There is nothing presidential about them.
This is one of the many ironies, and certainly the first irony, of running for the biggest job in the world; when you set out, it is an utterly ignominious business. The race has no shape or discernable pattern. No one knows what gimmick the others have up their sleeves. Some haven't worked out their shtick properly yet. And those who have don't know whether theirs will flop humiliatingly or catch fire and make them the front-runner.
They have precious little to react to because no one has said or done much yet. There's no meat in their debating so the debaters pay unseemly attention to crumbs. Senator John Kerry is still scolding Governor Howard Dean for a comment he made last month to the effect that the United States would not always be the world's strongest military power. It's pretty clear Dean intended to convey that he believes it is unwise of America to throw its weight around. But Kerry is determined to lodge in voters' minds the idea that the governor would make America weaker. Justified or not, the implication and the persistence with which Kerry makes it, is otiose and tedious.
It's still 18 months away from the day in November 2004, when voters will go to the polls. So, right now, no one apart from the contenders themselves and a few of us political junkies is remotely interested in what they do or say. Only a household name, such as Hillary Clinton, can afford to get into the race later in the year, yet seeking attention so far in advance seems absurdly gauche. It's like being invited to dinner at eight and turning up at four.
Debating their relative merits for a vacancy that, if it occurs at all, will do so only a year and a half from now, seems pushy and more than faintly ridiculous. Kerry (again) made himself seem smaller not bigger when, responding to Dean's taunt that he lacked courage on homosexual rights and health care, he mentioned his combat experience in Vietnam and said: "I don't need any lectures on courage from Gov. Dean."
Oh, yawn.
Until at least January 2004, the finest political résumé among contenders will seem flimsy and overwrought, the most tentative claim of achievement will appear windy and boastful.
From their photo-op in Columbia, the candidates beam out at what they wish were a waiting nation, and you just know they feel like prats. Grinning and bearing it is the first qualification for the Oval Office.
All nine want to look like leaders and yet they cannot avoid standing in an egalitarian line-up, much as if they were pretty young things in swimsuits, minus the winsome looks. Kerry, at one end of the line, and Congressman Dennis Kucinich at the other, lean inward slightly as though not sure they're actually in-frame.
The Democrats have an uphill struggle ahead of them if they are to knock off Mr. Bush. His leadership since 9/11 has made him a formidable candidate. Watching him launch his own campaign, jetting like some jock flyer on to the deck of the USS Lincoln, it all seemed very unfair to challengers.
Yet no matter how high an incumbent president is flying, and no matter how weak and ineffectual the challengers seem, the distance between them usually closes over the stretch.
Sometimes not. When Walter Mondale finally ended the long haul to the Democratic convention in 1984, he and his running mate, Geraldine Ferraro, were depicted by one cartoonist as a couple of rowers exhausted by the rigours of hauling themselves upstream. But ahead of them was the thundering waterfall of Ronald Reagan and George Bush Sr.
It is too early to tell whether Dubya is another such waterfall. But the Democrats' nine canoeists are gamely paddling upstream toward him.
Hugo Gurdon is editor-in-chief of The Hill.
More like strained peas.
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