John Kerry seems to be building momentum now, and as a Democrat, that worries the hell out of me.
Frankly, I do not think he has a prayer in the general election. Maybe I’m wrong, and I’m keeping an open mind. I’ll vote for him if he gets the nomination. I’m sort of a safe Democratic vote, though. It’s Kerry’s appeal with swing voters that worries me.
My concerns:
Kerry has a patrician air which does not go over well with the great populist center. He does not pass the “beer test,” as in “Would I feel comfortable sitting down for a beer with this guy?” Like it or not, I believe that factor is critical with many undecided voters, not all of whom wish to be troubled with detailed policy analysis.
Kerry will be tarred as a “typical New England ultra-liberal,” which is anathema to much of the swing vote in middle America. Already the Republicans are circulating images of Kerry embracing Ted Kennedy on the campaign trail. (That image alone will be enough to destroy him with many swing voters.) Republicans are also doing their best to associate him with Dukakis (under whom he served as lieutenant governor). And we know how well Dukakis did in the general election. Is Kerry ultra-liberal? Of course not. But perception is the problem.
Kerry’s military background, while impressive, will not be enough to offset his negatives.
Kerry comes across as a politician first and foremost, with no clear guiding principles. He has his finger in the wind. My sense is that he is going to say whatever he thinks people want to hear. He is running successfully on slogans and platitudes in the primaries but is very vulnerable, I think, to a “Where’s the Beef?” sort of challenge in the general election. (Contrast with Edwards, who discusses policy specifics with some regularity.)
Kerry can’t win in the South. As I’ve stated elsewhere, I now predict (without fear of being proven wrong) that if Kerry is the nominee he will not win a single Southern state in the general election. It doesn’t matter who his vice-presidential nominee is. Kerry’s performance in the South will be a repeat of fellow Vietnam vet Al Gore’s. (By the way, does anyone who is from the South disagree with my perception on this? If so, what Southern state do you think he can win?) Can the Democrats win without taking a single Southern state? We may find out this year if Kerry is the nominee.
Those are my concerns, but I’m trying to keep an open mind. As I said, I would vote for Kerry if he were the nominee, but I fear that a vast swath of swing voters would not.
Please explain why I am wrong, or give me an “amen.”
I would love to answer definitively, but first I have to see if there’s any discernable reaction to David Kay’s resignation in which he pretty much made it official that there are no WMDs in Iraq. I’m holding onto a thin shred of hope that this will make Bush as unelectable as he should be, given that he’s been proven one of: a liar, incompetent, hopelessly ignorant, amazingly corrupt, or grossly negligent. Of course I think he’s all of the above, but I’m not exactly the target audience if you’re looking for swing voters.
He’s not one. Are we ruling out candidates based solely on what the opposition will say? He’s liberal on some issues, and not on others.
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Like?
This sense is based on what?
He’s got 20-plus years in the Senate, mostly on foreign policy, Bush had none. He’s a heavily-decorated veteran, Bush skipped out on the national guard. Bush is vulnerable to the same sort of challenges. To wit: “Where’s the WMD,” “Where’s Osama,” “Where’s the health care,” etc.
They almost won without any Southern states in 2000, and I disagree that a Southern running mate couldn’t change anything.
Hey, I’m a Brit so what would I know but I do look at this from afar and see equivalents with our Labour party in the 1980s and 1990s. When he came to the head of the party no-one really knew if Tony Blair was electable…and now he appears to have become a fully paid up member of your Republican party lots of us are rather wishing he had proved not to be.
:rolleyes:
In the end it came down to the Conservatives become un-electable rather than Labour being electable so I’m with pantom in hoping that the latest news on WMDs torpedos GWB fatally.
But my warning (from Blair’s time in office would be) you can still end up with crap even if what you’ve got rid of looks terrible to start with. So I’d strongly urge that you still look and see not just if Kerry is electable but if you [I[really* want him to win. If not, look round for the right candidate and thank God (or whatever) that you get the choice of your leader…we just get whoever the party in government puts up…and see what that has got us at present.
Encouraging, but it’s still the weekend. I want to see what happens in a few days, when people have had the opportunity to digest the implications of the fact that this war accomplished exactly nothing.
Kerry really does strike me as a “finger in the wind” politian for sure. He was a nobody but he picked up Dean’s anti-war message (despite his voting record to the contrary), and Clark’s focus on his military history and there he goes. I sincerely hope this is just a post-Iowa surge.
The general population won’t like him being a northeasterner and the political right has a LOT of ammunition against him. This isn’t like the dirt against Clark, where he becomes less appealing to the far left because of his record, a mute point if he gets the nomination. This is dirt that will send the middle-of-the-road voters fleeing right.
Don’t forget that Bush has $200 million and an war-time incumbency behind him. I can see Kerry getting past all that but its a far shot.
Any of the Democratic candidates seem to me to be a vast improvement over Bush. Hopefully, the swing voters will feel this way as well come November. As for Kerry not being able to win in the South, the South has traditionally been more conservative than the North, so a Democratic candidate will have trouble gaining any sweeping victories there in any case.
The poll numbers are nice, but voters who are long in the tooth will remember that Dukakis held a polling edge over Bush the Elder for quite some time in '88. And we know how THAT turned out.
Then too, a national poll of Bush vs. Kerry is deceptive. It may just mean Kerry has overwhelming support in certain urban areas, but not so much elsewhere. And as was so painfully demonstrated in 2000, the popular vote doesn’t decide the election. It’s really 50 state elections.
More meaningful would be Bush v. Kerry polls in such potential battleground states as Ohio, Missouri, Indiana, and Florida. (Some clever pollster needs to get on this.)
I have already expressed my admiration for Kerry, an admiration of long standing. I also think certain pundits have it right, the move to Kerry is largely due to people sympathetic to Deans views, but regard him as the lesser messenger. I concur.
But win? Very unclear. The Bushiviks will go into this with an enormous advantage in money, even more than they had the last time. On the other hand, the Dean netroots movement showed us a spark of hope. Perhaps people can trump money.
Now if GeeDubya goes into this with a two (three?) to one advantage in money and the Good Guys prevail nonetheless…oh, pals and gals, what a lovely morning for democracy that would be.
It can be done, it should be done. What the hell, lets do it!
Democrats don’t need a sweeping victory in the South. They just need to take one or two states out of the Republican column there. Say, Florida and North Carolina, maybe. Or Florida and Arkansas. Edwards or Clark could pull that off, but not Kerry.
I’m one of those non-partisans in the middle who one of you has to convince. I’ll probably still vote Libertarian though.
IMO, Kerry is the most electable of the current set of Demos. The race is for the middle. That’s why Dean would have been the GOP’s wet dream. You need someone who will have the confidence of the military this time around and that only leaves you with Clark and Kerry. Kerry is the more natural politician of the two.
I honestly think that short of a major economic collapse in the next few months, Dubya has this one sewn up. Kerry is your best shot. Good luck.
The fact that all I hear from him on the campaign trail are empty platitudes and slogans.
The fact that when the political winds were in favor of the Iraq war, Kerry was in favor of it. And when the winds among Democratic primary voters were against it, Kerry shifted his position.
The fact that he (very awkwardly) works a reference to the New England Patriots into a Meet the Press interview to try to convince people he’s a regular Joe.
Etc., etc.
He sounds like the end product of extended focus-group testing.
After four years of a President who does whatever the damn hell he wants, with no regard for the public will (yeah, George, just shrug off several hundred thousand anti-war protesters as nobodies), I think a politician who does deliver what the public wants would be a good thing. Ain’t that why we call them “representatives”?
I thought that Mickey Kaus had a pretty good bit in his Slate blog about why he considers Kerry to be an “opportunistic hypocrite” as well as a few links to some other journalists who think likewise or discuss anti-Kerry tactics :
Admittedly, Kaus doesn’t really flesh out his accusations all that much because it is just an entry in a blog, but claims he will do so after the NH primary.
The public will? Do you believe that those anti-war protesters represented the majority opinion in the US? I’m not convinced that ‘what the public wants’ is in any way related to the views so loudly shouted out at those protests.
I think that a politician who actually had some guiding principles and followed through with them would be far preferable to one who just delivered ‘what the public wants’. We have representatives so that they can use their judgment rather than merely acting as tools of the electorate.
Sooner or later in a debate before all that part of the American electorate that cares this line will be uttered:
“Mr. President, you spoke of the achievements of the War in Iraq. As a man who watched his friends and comrades die in war, who as a man who wrote the letters to the families of men who died under his command, I tell you that the price in treasure and lives paid for the conquest of Iraq is too great a price and is a price that did not have to be paid, and a price that we are not done paying. Because of you policies we are enmeshed in a civil war half way around the world that does not make America safer and indeed exposes us to more danger.”
When that line is uttered, when the President has to answer the challenge directly then we’ll see who is electable.
If Senator Kerry is not ejectable then we have to conclude that no one who challanges the Bush machine, the Texas mafia, can be elected. In that case we should just sell the whole damnd country to the big guys in Houston and make the best of it.
It’s tough for a senator to win his party’s nomination and even tougher to win the general election. Kerry has been there a LONG time. A long senate career means thousands of votes and speeches, taking positions that may not be consistent or popular at the time of a presidential bid.
The last three(ten) senators to win their party’s nomination were Dole, McGovern and Goldwater.
Recent polls by Newsweek indicate that Kerry would beat Bush by a couple of points if the election were held today. And his recent numbers in South Carolina are quite impressive.
My Hubby has been volunteering extensively for Senator Kerry since last spring, so I’ve heard him speak several times and he most certainly DOES discuss policy specifics. I haven’t seen any indication of this “finger in the wind” phenomenon mentioned above - the message I’ve heard has been quite consistent, with a track record that backs up his assertions and claims. His record on the environment is incredibly strong, and environmental concerns are an important part of his campaign.
I will grant you that he doesn’t seem like a regular Joe. We’ve got Joe in the White House right now, elected in part thanks to a press corps that enjoyed being along for the ride with the cool kid. Somebody who’s a bit better educated and more experienced than the typical drinking buddy would be a nice change.
Just to add- poll results at this stage aren’t worth much, as I said. I can’t guarantee Kerry will win, especially not 9 1/2 months before the voting. I’m suggesting that he’s serving notice that he is electable.