 |
SwiftVets.com
Service to Country
|
| View previous topic :: View next topic |
| Author |
Message |
kate
Admin
Joined: 14 May 2004
Posts: 1891
Location: Upstate, New York
|
 Posted: Sat Sep 24, 2005 2:23 am Post subject: UNFORTUNATELY, KERRY ISN'T GIVING UP |
 |
|
The New Republic viaFreeRepublic
UNFORTUNATELY, KERRY ISN'T GIVING UP.
Long Run
by Michael Crowley
Only at TNR Online | Post date 09.23.05
| Quote: | Remember John Kerry? It's been a busy week for the 2004 Democratic nominee. On Monday, Kerry delivered a long speech at Brown University blasting the Bush administration's inept response to the Katrina disaster and just about every other thing it's laid a finger on. Two days later, Kerry gave a floor speech in the Senate declaring his unsurprising opposition to the John Roberts nomination.
Make no mistake: Kerry designed these to be attention-grabbers. His staff hyped both of them relentlessly. Four e-mails from Kerryland popped into my inbox before and after his Brown speech, which Kerry aides billed as a "major address." Meanwhile his Roberts speech was garnished with no fewer than six e-mail alerts, a pace that might embarrass some Viagra spammers.
And the net result was ... well, not much. Kerry's "major address" was ignored by The New York Times, while The Washington Post lumped it in with a similar anti-Bush speech delivered by John Edwards. His Roberts broadside earned only fleeting mentions in both papers. No one seemed very interested. Even bloggers didn't pay much attention. (New York Times columnist David Brooks did use the occasion to slam Kerry as a cheap partisan--hardly the attention Kerry wanted.)
So it goes with John Kerry these days. Had 60,000 Ohioans voted differently, he would now be leader of the free world. After the election it seemed possible that Kerry would soldier on as the voice of national Democrats. Yet in a matter of just months he's gone from the face of his party to another face in the crowd.
It's not that Kerry isn't trying. Kerry has done anything but slink off into a post-defeat hibernation the way some other recently vanquished presidential nominees--Bob Dole, Michael Dukakis, even Al Gore (remember the beard and the European vacation?)--have done. Well before this week, Kerry was traveling the country campaign-style to promote a children's health care plan he has, at least for the moment, made his top priority. Even as I write this, I see from the latest Kerry, Inc., email that the senator is touting another new plan to fight global AIDS.
No, Kerry seems hell-bent on redemption at the ballot box in 2008. You can see it in his strident attacks on the Bush administration, which he laid out in rhetorically goofy fashion on Monday:
.....Brownie is to Katrina what Paul Bremer is to peace in Iraq. What George Tenet is to slam
.....dunk intelligence, what Paul Wolfowitz is to parades paved with flowers in Baghdad. The
.....bottom line is simple. The "we'll do whatever it takes" administration doesn't have what it
.....takes to get the job done. This is the Katrina administration
You can also see Kerry's '08 ambitions in hints dropped by his political operation, which has never shot down speculation that Kerry would run again. As The Boston Globe's Peter Canellos wrote, Kerry's Katrina speech "had the air of a major political moment," surrounded as he was by his family and several top aides who "scrutinized his performance from the front row somewhat like the judging panel on 'American Idol.'"
And you can see it in that most reliable barometer of political activity: fundraising. As of August 15, Kerry's leadership PAC had raised around $750,000 this year, second only among his potential 2008 rivals to Indiana Senator Evan Bayh, who has practically declared his candidacy.
Yet while the political world hangs on every word from Hillary Clinton's mouth, and Joe Biden seems to be getting more airtime than Anderson Cooper, no one appears terribly interested in what John Kerry has to say anymore.
It's not just the media--it's Democratic voters, too. Kerry placed second in an August CNN/USA Today/Gallup poll which asked Democrats whom they preferred as a 2008 nominee. That doesn't sound so bad until you consider the numbers. Kerry finished with 16 percent, while the front-runner, Hillary Clinton (of course), had a whopping 40 percent. And Kerry was barely ahead of John Edwards, who placed just one point behind him. A June Fox News poll yielded similar results.
And it gets even more ominous. Kerry is especially unpopular within the world of netroots Democrats--the blog-based crowd who nearly lifted Howard Dean to the Democratic nomination and whose influence over the 2008 primaries will only be more powerful. The bloggers and their acolytes are still trying to figure out which candidates to promote for the next presidential nomination. But at the moment there seems to be no groundswell for the last nominee. In a summer straw poll conducted by DailyKos.com, perhaps the Grand Central Station of netroots liberals, Kerry finished with a pathetic 2 percent--putting him behind the likes of Biden, Virginia Governor Mark Warner, Wisconsin Senator Russ Feingold, and the estimable "No Freakin' Clue." (Wesley Clark finished a clear first with 34 percent.) Meanwhile in another recent straw poll over at the Kos-like site MyDD.com, Kerry tallied just 3 percent among 14 Democrats.
None of this should come as a shock. Kerry was never an inspiring candidate. He overcame Howard Dean at the last minute in large part because he could afford to give his primary campaign a huge loan. His feeble response to last summer's swift boat attacks revealed his clumsy political skills. Everything good about the Kerry campaign--its phenomenal fundraising, the passions it harnessed--derived mainly from Democrats' Bush-hatred, not from Kerry himself.
In the midst of Kerry's typically windy John Roberts speech, he paused and looked up to the Senate rostrum. "Mr. President, how much time do I have left?" Kerry asked. "The gentleman's time has expired," came the reply. And so it has. |
heeehee
worth a repeat ...
no one appears terribly interested in what John Kerry has to say anymore.
"The gentleman's time has expired," came the reply. And so it has.
now if someone would just tell skerry, in whatever language he might be able to understand
_________________
.
one of..... We The People |
|
| Back to top |
|
 |
LewWaters
Admin
Joined: 18 May 2004
Posts: 4042
Location: Washington State
|
| Posted: Sat Sep 24, 2005 5:49 am Post subject: |
|
|
Is the left contemplating a triune Presidency in 08? sKerry, Clinton and Gore?
Seems they are falling over each other lining up the blast Bush. Except, that is, Hillary sort of ripping the rug out from under Cindy Sheehan this week. LOL, that one really has some of the left fired up  |
|
| Back to top |
|
|
rhv5862
PO2
Joined: 21 Aug 2004
Posts: 379
Location: Massachusetts
|
| Posted: Sun Sep 25, 2005 10:45 pm Post subject: Unfortunately,Kerry Isn't Giving Up |
|
|
Need to remember that Kerry is up for re-election in Ma in 06. He needs to try and let voters know he is still awake once in a while.
RHV |
|
| Back to top |
|
|
mtboone
Founder
Joined: 10 May 2004
Posts: 470
Location: Kansas City, MO.
|
| Posted: Mon Sep 26, 2005 1:29 am Post subject: |
|
|
Need to remember that Kerry is up for re-election in Ma in 06. He needs to try and let voters know he is still awake once in a while.
No, Kerry is up for reelection in 2008 for Senator. Hillary and Kennedy are up for reelection in 2006.
_________________
Terry Boone PCF 90
Qui Nhon 68-69 |
|
| Back to top |
|
|
GM Strong
Master Chief Petty Officer of the Navy
Joined: 18 Sep 2004
Posts: 1579
Location: Penna
|
| Posted: Mon Sep 26, 2005 3:48 pm Post subject: |
|
|
If Ol' Lurch runs for POTUS and the Senate, he could get wiped out of both. It's near impossible to run for both with any viability, but his inflated ego won't see that. If a competative candidate ran against him for Senate, he would be forever toast on the political stage.
_________________
8th Army Korea 68-69 |
|
| Back to top |
|
|
JN173
Commander
Joined: 10 May 2004
Posts: 341
Location: Anchorage, Alaska
|
| Posted: Thu Oct 13, 2005 4:22 pm Post subject: |
|
|
This is suppose to be news? 
_________________
A Grunt
2/503 173rd Airborne Brigade
RVN '65-'66 |
|
| Back to top |
|
|
|
|
You cannot post new topics in this forum
You cannot reply to topics in this forum
You cannot edit your posts in this forum
You cannot delete your posts in this forum
You cannot vote in polls in this forum
|
Powered by phpBB © 2001, 2005 phpBB Group
|
FAQ
Search
Memberlist
Usergroups
Register
Profile
Log in to check your private messages
Log in
