Well, the Doonesbury link has me persuaded. :rolleyes: Veterans seem to be responding to him so far, and he’s got yards more credibility that way than GWB no matter how you slice it.
I hadn’t thought about that, but then I saw a New Hampshire veteran interviewed on the news last night, and he expressed that very sentiment. He had no use for a man who would pull that kind of stunt.
Yeah, we love it when you sweet talk us.
That is just the kind of bullshit stereotyping that will get the Democrats slaughtered in the South. And it IS bullshit. You don’t need to appeal to racism or fundamentalism to win votes in the South. What will win votes in the South is good old middle class populism. Bread and butter issues. This should be the strength of the Democratic Party, but they are either busy stereotyping the South (like Evil Captor), pandering on religion (as Dean awkwardly tried to do), or foolishly responding to Republican attempts to create wedge (non-) issues (like gay marriage).
Stick to the populism. Stick to the tax code issues. Explain how Bush is robbing from the middle class to give to the wealthy. Explain how Republican attacks on the estate tax, the capital gains tax, and tax on dividends ultimately harm the middle class by forcing them to carry the bulk of the nation’s tax burden.
Talk about health care.
Talk about the environment in the South. Southerners see their forests vanishing, and the rivers they once swam in become dangerously contaminated. They know the fish they catch are no longer safe to eat in many places. They see cities like Houston and Atlanta overwhelmed with smog. Environmental issues will resonate here, but national politicians don’t seem to recognize that. They think the way to win Southern votes is to eat a plate of barbecue on camera, or show up in a church pew. Very frustrating.
We’ll see how well this works if Kerry gets the nomination, since you basically just described most of his platform. I’ve heard him hit ALL of those points - hard - in almost every appearance; I’m sure he will do so in the South as well. Since you focused most on environmental issues, let me tell you this - that is, above all else, what attracted me to John Kerry in the first place. His environmental record in the Senate is unbeatable, with a 97% lifetime (i.e. almost twenty years) favorable rating from the League of Conservation Voters (which is why they endorsed him last week, the first time they’ve ever endorsed a candidate in the Democratic primaries).
I don’t want to turn this into a campaign commercial, so please go to his website (www.johnkerry.com) if you want more information; there are whole sections under “issues”, including one on the environment.
You then go on to say,
Help me make sense of this please. I cannot understand how you wouldn’t vote for the man iff he lived up to your expectations.
I suppose that before, I only suspected that Kerry had no concern for the South. I had hoped (counter to my intuition) that if nominated he might actually pursue a national campaign instead of turning my party into a provincial irrelevancy. I was wrong to hold out such hope.
And I have no intention of voting for a man who has said in plain language that it is a mistake for the Democratic candidate to look South. To hell with him.
I see. Hmm. So it would make no difference, for example, if his platform was agreeable but he didn’t campaign directly for the southern vote…? I’m just trying to understand this mentality. No one really fights over Massachusetts, so I guess I’m just used to being ignored.
Considering that I am widely assumed to be an angry Democrat, you might be interested to know that I think you are dead wrong.
Dean has been great for getting other Dems fired up. It’s nice to have someone express our anger. But that won’t get him elected, it will prevent him from getting elected.
The people who decide the elections are the swiing voters. The swings are uncomfortable with Dean. I’m a hardcore Lefty and * I’m * uncomfortable with Dean.
Dean is toast, or should be. He cannot win.
Except he didn’t, and you’re being weirdly touchy.
He said he didn’t believe the conventional wisdom that it is impossible to win without the south. He’s correct. That is not the same as dismissing Southern people or the things that are important to them, not even close. He’s talking about winning the electoral college. It is in fact possible to win sufficient electoral votes without winning a single Southern state. Why do you insist on making this a personal insult?
Well, yes he did. Here’s his remark:
Like I said, plain language.
Am I being “weirdly touchy?” Maybe, but that’s a cultural trait of Southerners, so I suppose it’s in my nature. Kerry can expect to encounter plenty more “touchy” Southerners with remarks like that.
I see that I’m not the only one who doesn’t understand Kerry’s appeal.
And I disagree with you strongly about Dean’s electability. I think he is much more electable than Kerry. What you and the pundits call “anger,” I call “backbone,” and it’s a trait that has been sorely lacking in Democratic candidates until Dean arrived. Bless him, I say.
Furthermore, I think Dean would actually have more appeal in middle America (including the South) than Kerry. Republican pundits have been trying to undermine Dean’s campaign by sowing the seeds of the “unelectability” stories, but I think those stories are dead wrong.
Dean has a macho “regular guy” quality which Kerry lacks. I am sick and tired of Democrats nominating milquetoasts, because that (as much as anything) kills them in these parts. (Yes, image matters.)
I would be quite happy if Dean, Edwards or Clark won the nomination, as I think any of those three would have a real chance of beating Bush. Kerry? Not a chance in Hell.
Let me see if I get this straight: Kerry says he probably won’t win many Southern votes. This angers Southern voter spoke-, who says he won’t vote for Kerry. This accomplishes what?
What you call Dean having backbone, most people are calling psycho. Kerry’s comment about votes bothers you, but Dean’s comment about guys who have Confederate flags on their pickup trucks doesn’t? I can see a guy born on Park Avenue who grew up in the Hamptons having problems in the South too…
I’m not convinced that Dean has so much backbone. He just blusters a lot, which is a good way to fake it. He supported an alternate war resolution to the one that passed that wouldn’t have changed a thing. Most of the time he pretends that didn’t happen, the rest of the time he says that resolution (which would have required Bush to speak to Congress but not get a vote) would have stopped the war. Who is he kidding?
…Even as the Slate guy is mocking Kerry, he DOES list some good points. Most of the article is irrelevant anyway- what does Cleeland’s speech have to do with Kerry? The writer seems to be being thick intentionally.
Hm, no further buzz since Kerry buried Dean again in NH.
Frankly, I don’t see what’s unelectable about the guy. The South thing? If he’s able to hold on to this current momentum, I don’t even think that old saw will continue to hold much water. Especially if he takes Edwards or somebody like that for VP.
Hey, JFK was a New England Catholic, for cripes’ sake. Yeah I know, its generally accepted that his dad bought him the election, but Kennedy went on to be one of our most popular presidents. Except among the right-wing cabal who had him killed. But I digress.
That’s not what he said. Quit trying to put a positive spin on it. He said it’s a MISTAKE to look South. In other words, he doesn’t feel he needs (and apparently doesn’t want the South’s help.
Don’t piss on me and tell me it’s raining.
More evidence of Kerry’s unelectability from Newsday.
Precisely. A Kerry nomination will spell doom for the Democrats.
And a Dean nomination would have put us on Easy Street?
I don’t understand how anyone can let their stupid regional pride determine their vote in this election.
My God! I’d vote for a Charles Manson/Jim Jones ticket if it would get Fearless Misleader out of the White House! What is this regional pride thing that’s going to stick us with four more years of Shrubya?
“Shrubya?” “Fearless Misleader?”
No offense, but you don’t exactly sound like the sort of swing voter who will turn the election.
The question is not how Kerry plays with the left. We KNOW the answer to that question. What matters is how he will play to the center. Answer: not well.
I have no real opinion yet on Kerry’s ability to push through a national election. I will point out that if he gets the nomination he will still have logged far more personal campaign time than Bush has. And if the Senate grinds into gridlock yet again as Senator Stevens predicts, Kerry’s going to have a whole lot of free time on his hands, too (of course, that didn’t work for Bob Dole).
There is, however, one exquisite possible irony lingering out there. I’ll try to tiptoe carefully up to it.
I know a few members of the service, and were very displeased when all those rumors about Bush cutting military health benefits and combat pay popped up last year. As best I can tell, the allegation that Bush cut combat pay is bullshit. But bullshit can be sticky, as those of us who invented the Internet recall.
Chances are that in November a significant proportion of the military will be deployed overseas, some of them will be in dangerous places, and some of them will be refitting after a year of being in dangerous places. George Bush may not be as much the soldier’s friend as he once was to a lot of those people.
You may recall the, ah, “recent unpleasantness” of the year 2000, especially in Florida. You may also recall that a significant amount of the controversy surrounded the counting of late arriving and unpostmarked military absentee ballots.
Well, you’ll be happy to know that Florida rectified this problem by changing the law so that next time there will be no question as to whether or not the ballots were filled out and sent from overseas while the election returns in the state were already being tallied. They will all be counted as valid, no matter what:
Things could turn out bad if Kerry wins the approval of the military and then things get close in Florida. On the other hand, the President’s brother is in charge of printing, distributing, and counting the ballots. So you never know…
Except that New Hampshire’s system allows independents, who would count as swing voters, to vote, and they chose Kerry. You seem to have just moved the criticisms of Dean to a different candidate, and they don’t stick. Despite the “liberal” thing, he does not follow the dictates of the party like some do, and I think that helps his appeal with swing voters. As far as the South goes, he just picked up an endorsement from Clyburn in South Carolina. It’s hard to know how he’ll do down there since the data won’t yet reflect his win last night.
[QUOTE=Marley23]
…You seem to have just moved the criticisms of Dean to a different candidate…QUOTE]
Not at all.
In fact Dean (despite his hard-to-explain appeal to former Greenies) seems quite moderate. I never understood how the “liberal” tag fit him. But the fact that he was successfully tarred as a liberal just goes to show you how stong the preception is that “Northeastern Democrat” = “liberal.” If they were able to make that stick to Dean, just imagine what they could do to Kerry (who has an actual liberal voting record). Toss in a couple of photos of Kerry hugging Ted Kennedy or hanging out with Jane Fonda and, well, you get the idea.
Sure, Kerry is electable. One reason not yet mentioned: presidential debates.
Bush is a dunce. Catch his State of the Union speech? Some in the right wing media have suggested that Bush has grown into the job in terms of his public speaking, but the minimal gains made have been primarily due to the fact that he is working from prepared text, polished by seasoned speechwriters. Media access to Bush is tightly controlled; his handlers don’t want a skeptical press to back him into a political corner. During a presidential debate, he would have to speak extemporarily on important matters of state against Kerry. Say what you want about Kerry’s patrician mannerisms, but recognize that in a tight race Bushes’ fumbling, stumbling, deer-in-the-headlights mannerisms could very well do him in. He won’t have speechwriters and policy wonks to bail him out. He will be on his own.
Art