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"Can Bush Be Reelected?!"

"I think that whoever the Democrats nominate will be our next President. And, yes, that very much includes Howard Dean. It appears to me that the establishment simply will not allow President Bush to be re-elected. The media, in lockstep as usual, have gone into a full-time Bush-bashing mode. Magazines like Time and Newsweek have gone over the top in a manner that would have been unimaginable just a few years ago. Last night in a gym I checked in on CNN periodically over an hour and a half. CNN's entire progamming during that time was an anti-Bush campaign commercial; it was so blatant as to verge on self-parody. But that doesn't make it ineffective. Events between now and next November will matter, of course, but I'm afraid they won't matter much. By then, it will be firmly established "fact" that the Iraq war has been a failure. It simply makes no difference how well the situation there goes over the next year. The goalposts will be moved to whatever extent necessary. The truth is that the Iraq venture has gone astonishingly well so far, but that doesn't prevent the media from portraying it as a failure, and nothing that happens in the next year will change that. The same applies to the economy. The economy has actually been doing quite well for some time, and the stock market has been booming for the past six months. The facts don't matter: voters are becoming increasingly convinced that the economy is bad, and after four years they will hold Bush responsible. When George Bush senior ran for re-election in 1992, the mini-recession of 1990-91 had been over for a year and a half, and the economy was growing fast. Media spin easily overcame that reality, and the same thing will happen next year."

WOW!! What a defeatist attitude this writer has. Personally, I believe Dubyuh's got the potential for really firing up the electorate behind him, but only if he starts following his most conservative instincts and quits trying to curry favor with the DemonRAT Leftists. The RATS need to be confronted, attacked and destroyed, not compromised with!!

If Dubyuh and the GOP chart out a true Reaganesque vision of limiting the size and scope of the Federal Leviathan, I can foresee a scenario wherein the Right enjoys a historic landslide of Reagan '84 proportions. However, if Dubyuh continues to play towards the Milquetoast Moderate Middle vis a vis domestic policy, he may follow the footsteps of his daddy.

FReegards...MUD

If Dubyuh and the GOP chart out a true Reaganesque vision of limiting the size and scope of the Federal Leviathan, I can foresee a scenario wherein the Right enjoys a historic landslide of Reagan '84 proportions. However, if Dubyuh continues to play towards the Milquetoast Moderate Middle vis a vis domestic policy, he may follow the footsteps of his daddy.

I agree that he needs to go conservative. He's done plenty of playing up to the soft soccer mom issues already. At this point, he needs to shore up his conservative base and concentrate on giving us a reason to turnout and vote. Like, where exactly are all these conservative judges we were promised? I mean the ones are appellate courts.

There is a new election dynamic that is as yet little noted. It is that in 2000 and 2002, turnout of base voters has overall become more critical to both parties. And '04 and at least the next few elections following will be much the same.

This is why Howard Dean is going Left so intently. He knows it's key to his primary victories but he knows he has to establish his bona fides with the radical Dim elements. That is why Bush can do the same if he actually wants to. The swing voters simply are not as key to presidential elections or to downstream candidates as are the party's core voters. This is more true now than it has been in decades.

Rove acknowledges this, still smarting from an expected 3 million largely religious right voters that were MIA in the 2000 election. He may not admit it publicly but I think that he and Bush are very aware of it and they know that Bush had offered those people, once very loyal and regular conservative voters, very little reason to turn out and vote for Bush. And that cost votes for downstream candidates as well.

I notice a lot of comments here at FR that indicate this new election dynamic still hasn't really sunk in yet.

Thanks for the ping.

The economy has actually been doing quite well for some time, and the stock market has been booming for the past six months.

What country does this guy live in. ?

The President can't be beat in 04 unless some GOP people stay home and don't vote. That might happen.