Has Anyone Considered That Kerry Knows He's Losing

Where Kerry Went Wrong
Where Kerry Went Wrong
Kerry and Shrum got it backward. If they'd sliced up Bush this summer, they could have used the debates to seem presidential.
By Jonathan Alter
Newsweek

Sept. 27 issue - After Labor Day, the political calendar goes into a time warp. Everything speeds up. With voters finally starting to pay attention, a week is about the equivalent of a normal month in political time. In late October the intensity can be so great that creative campaigns sometimes accomplish in a single day what it might once have taken three months to imprint on the minds of the voters. We

don't know yet if we'll see such inventiveness this year, which means that for all of the weeping and moaning and rending of garments by despondent Democrats, we simply don't know if John Kerry is finished. We do know that his strategy so far, designed by Bob Shrum, lies in ruins, and for reasons that go far beyond the campaign's failure to respond quickly enough to the Swift Boat ads.

Shrum's grand plan wasn't complicated. He figured that with most voters believing the country is on the "wrong track," all that Kerry had to do was establish his credibility as a potential commander in chief and he would win?-hence the "bio" convention. No need to respond directly to Bush ads sliming him for wanting to cut the same weapons systems that Bush's father cut. No need to explain how the Iraq war had been botched. No need to discredit Bush at all, because he was already thoroughly discredited.

Oh, well. The Shrum strategy was the product of short-term thinking (the assumption that Bush's unpopularity in the period of the Abu Ghraib Prison scandal would last until fall) and was reinforced by the sealed and often smug world of Democratic politics, where it was taken for granted that Bush was bad, bad, bad, and any reasonable person already knew why. Shrum correctly realized that a Michael Moore-style sledgehammer would do little to sway undecided voters who don't loathe Bush. But Shrum wrongly extrapolated from that point that Kerry had no need to indict Bush in easy-to-remember phrases that would stick. He once told me as much, and that name-calling wouldn't work in post-9/11 presidential politics.

That was wishful thinking. Politics has always been a contact sport where the winning team is the one that pins the kick me sign on the other guy. This is especially true in a race involving an incumbent. Focus groups always tell consultants that they're turned off by negative campaigning. It sounds good and makes them feel virtuous, but it's not true. Except in multicandidate races like the Democratic primaries, where voters can reject both the attacker and the attacked in favor of a third choice, the edge always goes to the predator over the victim. Americans like their candidates tough, especially during a war.

So Kerry and Shrum got the strategy exactly backward. If Kerry had used sticky language and cut-through-the-clutter ads to slice up Bush over the summer, he could have used the debates to seem positive and presidential. This is what Reagan did in 1980 against Jimmy Carter. He attacked him every day, then, with Carter discredited, left it to the debates for voters to say, "This other guy will do."

With his strategy in tatters, Kerry must now discredit Bush and simultaneously sell his own vision. This will be difficult for a candidate for whom straightforward English is often a second language. But it's hardly impossible, especially with Iraq melting down. The key is to focus less on the past?-9/11 is Bush's ace in the hole?-and more on the present and the future, with a focus on the visceral and personal: Where's bin Laden? We've got him neither dead nor alive. Will your sons and daughters be sent off to fight in a second Bush term? You've got health insurance now, but will you lose it soon? Nailing Bush means painting a big "F" for failure on his forehead for what's going on right now, then pivoting to explain in the simple terms that have eluded Kerry what he would do differently in the months ahead: Give reconstruction contracts to allies in exchange for helping us stabilize Iraq. Set a date certain for getting out of Iraq. Promise we'll never have another Iraq. Fight terrorism where it threatens us most, which is not in Iraq.

Can all of Kerry's qualifiers, gaffes and flip-flops on Iraq be finessed with a KISS (Keep It Simple, Stupid) strategy? Yep. That's the magic of general elections, where 50 million likely voters are just tuning in. With a few choice one-liners, the onus of responsibility can be placed back where it belongs?-on Bush. Ripping off the GOP's 1994 "Contract With America" would also help. Voters needs to know four or five simple things that Kerry and the Democrats would do immediately. As the clock winds down, the odds against a Kerry victory grow longer every day. But a day can be enough in politics, for those who can fight and KISS at the same time.

URL: http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/6039027/site/newsweek/

The Media
The Media are repeating their long pattern of concentrating their reporting of internal problems among campaign staff instead of the candidate's issues. This is a predictable event based on a long history of such reporting failures. Unfortunately, such reporting focus often is a self-fulfilling proffecy. Reporting the conflict is much more exciting to bored reporters who are tired of the voice of the candidate they are covering than publishing issues information to the public. Very unprofessional!

Campaign staff are often more concerned about the outcome of the campaign on their future consulting reputation and salary potential. They all want to win but, in case of a loss, an "I told you so" might save their image. They blab to the Media to make sure their views are known.

The candidate, out on the road, may not know everything that is going on back at the ranch until he learns of it via the Media. It's enough to drive anyone nuts, especially if the candidate is working his butt off and is tired. Getting everyone to set their ego's aside and pull in the same direction is a daunting, full-time task. The campaign manager must knock heads and announce "behave or get out!"

I'm still trying to decide, after decades of watching campaigns, if candidates are helped or hurt more by campaign consultants. What do you think?

BBB

Kerry's New Call to Arms
Kerry's New Call to Arms
Battle Plan: Kerry was to spend the fall on the economy. Then came a new team of advisers?-and a fresh focus for the homestretch
By Richard Wolffe and Susannah Meadows
Newsweek
Sept. 27 issue

Sitting in his black-leather swivel chair, with his trusty world atlas beside him, John Kerry huddled with his aides in the executive-style cabin at the front of his campaign jet. Kerry was preparing to accuse the president of failing to tell the truth about "the mess in Iraq"?-part of an aggressive fall strategy to challenge George W. Bush on the war. But before he spoke to the National Guard convention in Las Vegas, Kerry sought the advice of yet another sounding board on his plane: former four-star general Wes Clark. Kerry knew from Vietnam what it felt like to face the bullets without the support of the folks back home. So how, one of his senior staff wanted to know, would Kerry's attacks go down now with the troops in Iraq? "Look, the soldiers are debating it themselves on the ground," Clark reassured Kerry's inner circle. "They're coming back and they're incredibly critical. You have to call it like it is."

After the summer's phony war over Vietnam medals and memos, the 2004 election has landed in the real-world battleground of Iraq. For Camp Kerry, it's a liberating feeling to engage in straight talk about Iraq, shaking off debate about the candidate's Senate votes. "I'm thrilled," said one of Kerry's longtime loyalists, "because it's the John Kerry I know and love." Kerry's gambit: to revive his campaign?-trailing by anywhere between one and 13 points in new polls?-by questioning Bush's credibility on the conflict, his management of postwar Iraq and the no-bid contracts won by his veep's old firm, Halliburton. Kerry is betting that the hard truths of Iraq will undercut Bush's soft-focus picture of a liberated nation, and ultimately the president's image as a war leader.

It's a bet that Kerry was unwilling to make until this month. Not so long ago, Kerry's strategists planned to spend the fall talking about the economy and health care, thinking they had proved their candidate's national-security credentials in Boston. They also planned to stay positive, shunning political attacks in the belief that slime could alienate swing voters. But that was before Kerry's August swoon, and an influx of fresh faces?-a mix of Boston loyalists and Clintonites?-at the top of the Democrat's team. Their main job is to keep Kerry on message and sharpen his attack on Bush. While Kerry will continue to hit at the Democrats' traditional pocketbook issues, his new strategists have embraced Clark's advice to tell it like it is. They also found a way to bring the war home, saying Bush's go-it-alone approach had cost billions of dollars that could have been spent on jobs, schools and health care. Kerry now intends to repeat and refine his critique through the rest of the campaign?-spending, NEWSWEEK has learned, the closing week of the election on Bush's war.

The reaction from Camp Bush was gleeful. "Good," said one senior Bush aide. "We're glad he's talking about Iraq." It remains Exhibit A in the flip-flopping case against Kerry, built around his prewar nuances and his postwar votes. Moreover, the Bush campaign sees Kerry's attacks as a sign of weakness and as an attempt to shore up his base?-a leftward tilt that could alienate "persuadables" in battleground states. Bush's advisers are confident that their candidate can win any contest of straight talk, pointing to a series of polls that give him a big lead on questions of honesty and consistency. And Bush is certainly bullish on the subject on the stump. "We'll help them get their elections, we'll get them on the path to stability and democracy as quickly as possible, and then our troops will return home with the honor they have earned," he told one rally in St. Cloud, Minn., last week. Yet back in Washington, Bush quietly receives considerably less glossy weekly national-security briefings on Iraq. In their candid moments, the president's aides concede they have struggled to convince voters about the mission in Iraq now that Saddam Hussein is sitting in jail. "Well, no, I don't think they know what it is," said one senior Bush strategist.

Kerry argues that only a new president can change the dynamic in the region, bringing in new international troops as well as the support of Arab nations. But the candidate is rarely succinct about his plans. Bush and Cheney pounced on Kerry's long-winded response to Don Imus last week, suggesting that even the popular radio host, who likes Kerry, was unpersuaded by his policy. The president's surrogates went one step further, accusing Kerry of adopting a "defeatist" position that was weakening American resolve in the war. Kerry's aides counter that such Bush attacks have run their course. "The flip-flop tag has already been priced into the market," one senior staffer said. "Bush's failure in Iraq hasn't."

Both sides see the Iraq debate as a test of character as much as a test of policy. But to Kerry, the war over the war has become personal, a chance to prove his mettle as a candidate and prove his point about the issues. Where Kerry was cautious about treading into the Iraq minefield, he's now become much more gung-ho. Kerry's aides say their candidate was galvanized by the Swift Boat vets' attacks on his character, by Dick Cheney's suggestion that he would weaken American defenses?-and especially the vitriolic speech by the Democratic turncoat Zell Miller at the GOP convention. "He just is furious that there is this Orwellian world out there now where Bush is seen as strong on terrorism and strong on the war in Iraq when he's screwed both of them up fairly well," said one Kerry confidant. Other senior aides see Kerry's aggressive position on Iraq as a natural response to the Republican attacks. "They lied about John Kerry and tried to tell people he was unfit to be president," said one. "That more or less mandates a demonstration of strength from here to the election, and that's what they're going to get."

For the moment, Kerry's show of strength depends heavily on the news. Democrats seized on a pessimistic CIA forecast of civil war in Iraq, while the violence in Iraq continues to spike upward. The death toll among U.S. forces rose to 1,029, while last week's clashes with insurgents, along with a series of suicide bombs, left more than 250 civilians dead. While the Kerry campaign points to the spiraling violence, the White House is embracing Iraq's new government. Bush's aides have carefully choreographed a series of events this week with Ayad Allawi, believing the presence of the Iraqi prime minister will make it harder to attack Bush on Iraq. At the United Nations as well as in Washington, the Bush team hopes Allawi can convince voters that he has his own "very cohesive plan to take down the insurgents," according to one senior administration official. Kerry's aides scoff at the notion that Bush can maintain his sunny mood with Allawi by his side. "The White House has consistently tried to cover up what has gone on over there in Iraq," said Joe Lockhart, Kerry's new communications strategist and Clinton's former spokesman. "They're going to do 'Fantasy Island' and we're going to do reality TV."

If Kerry is more aggressive and focused on the trail, it's thanks to an almost entirely new team at the helm of his campaign. Chief among the new hands is John Sasso, the onetime campaign manager to Michael Dukakis, who has known Kerry for more than two decades and now travels aboard his campaign jet. Sasso helped shape Kerry's slogan about Bush ("W stands for wrong") and was instrumental in Kerry's attack on Bush for allowing the assault-weapons ban to end, Democratic sources say. They credit Sasso with instilling discipline in the often rambling candidate. "It's really about the candidate carrying himself with confidence and clarity," said one friend of Sasso and Kerry's. Sasso is "very calm, and that gives the candidate reassurance."

As Kerry and Bush prep themselves for their TV debates (the first is scheduled at the University of Miami next week), their advisers are gaming out how Kerry can appear stronger and more trustworthy as a war leader. His aides are mulling over how to exploit Kerry's height advantage over Bush. "He's going to hang there for the handshake with Bush," said one senior campaign adviser. "Keep him long enough for everyone to get the shot." Meanwhile both sides are already playing the expectations game?-as two talented debaters poor-mouth their own skills while making the other out to be a latter-day Cicero. Bush's aides are intent on projecting the president as a likable leader, setting Kerry the challenge of looking like "a person people can feel comfortable with." Kerry's aides believe that their man stands to gain more from the TV debates after a tough summer of attacks. "People will get an idea of who John Kerry is, and that's so much better than the cartoon," said one senior adviser.

Even as they prep, both candidates know that events in Iraq could decisively change the course of the election. Some Democrats point to the Pentagon's fears of a Beirut-style attack on U.S. forces in Iraq, recalling the 1983 suicide bombing that left 241 servicemen dead. Administration officials have already suggested the insurgents could try to turn the election against Bush, just as terrorists tried to influence the outcome of the Spanish general election this year. No matter how much they want to win the 2004 election, neither side wants to see the insurgents' campaign in Iraq prove more effective than the political campaigns back home.
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With Tamara Lipper and T. Trent Gegax

© 2004 Newsweek, Inc.
URL: http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/6039833/site/newsweek/

a little backup to frank's comment:

"Documents: Bush's Grandfather Directed Bank Tied to Man Who Funded Hitler
Friday, October 17, 2003
WASHINGTON ?- President Bush's grandfather was a director of a bank seized by the federal government because of its ties to a German industrialist who helped bankroll Adolf Hitler's rise to power, government documents show."

Prescott Bush (search) was one of seven directors of Union Banking Corp. (search), a New York investment bank owned by a bank controlled by the Thyssen family, according to recently declassified National Archives documents reviewed by The Associated Press.

Fritz Thyssen (search) was an early financial supporter of Hitler, whose Nazi party Thyssen believed was preferable to communism. The documents do not show any evidence Bush directly aided that effort. His position with Union Banking never was a political issue for Bush, who was elected to the Senate from Connecticut in 1952.
http://www.foxnews.com/story

------------------------------------------------
BUSH-NAZI LINK CONFIRMED
Documents in National Archives Prove George W. Bush's Grandfather Traded with Nazis - Even After Pearl Harbor
by John Buchanan (Exclusive to the New Hampshire Gazette)

WASHINGTON - After 60 years of inattention and even denial by the U.S. media, newly-uncovered government documents in The National Archives and Library of Congress reveal that Prescott Bush, the grandfather of President George W. Bush, served as a business partner of and U.S. banking operative for the financial architect of the Nazi war machine from 1926 until 1942, when Congress took aggressive action against Bush and his "enemy national" partners.

http://www.takebackthemedia.com/com-buchanan.html

Thanks, DTOM. Good scholarship!

A real entertaing dig into the past may be had chasing down the original JFK's family. "Honey Fitz" Fitzgerald and Joseph P. Kennedy were quite the characters themselves. Honey Fitz was ousted from Congress by revelations of vote fraud, and was otherwise no stranger to scandal, while old Joe held a unpopular sentiment toward Germany and Hitler, occassioning the end of his own political carreer in the early '40s. Old Joe, scion of a family of Wine and Spirit purveyors, did real well during Prohibition, too. Parties at his place back then were well attended but very, very under-reported, for understandable reasons.