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Not only is the President’s approval rating currently
below 50 percent according to the recent Gallup poll,
but his handling of the economy, foreign affairs and
Iraq meet the approval of roughly 42 percent of Americans.
It would seem there’s no way John Kerry won’t
be our President a year from today. Except for the fact
he’s trailing Bush in that very same poll.
At the end of the Democratic Primary season two months
ago Kerry held a lead over Bush in most polls. After
Bush suffered through the worst two-month stretch in
a re-election campaign since Jimmy Carter, Kerry trails
in many polls. How did he manage to pull that off? It’s
what has Democrats taking shots at their candidate’s
obvious flaws and his campaign’s strategy shortcomings.
Part of this trouble is due to the fifty million-dollar
ad spree by the Bush campaign. Half the country thinks
Kerry is a ‘straddler’ according to the
latest Gallup poll and those holding a positive view
of Kerry have fallen to 38 percent.
But ads aren’t the only explanation for Kerry’s
problems. After all between the Kerry campaign and independent
expenditure groups like MoveOn, the Bush campaign has
been hit with almost as much negative advertising. Pollster
Frank Luntz summed up the central problem with Kerry’s
campaign, the one that has some Democrats nervous. He
found that after about nine seconds of watching Kerry
speak the people in his focus groups began reacting
negatively towards him. The longer Kerry goes on the
more people dislike him.
So we have pollster Zogby saying the race is Kerry’s
to lose and pollster Luntz saying that Americans sour
on Kerry after a grand total of nine seconds of exposure.
Being able to turn off the voters in nine seconds is
both impressive and, ominously, a good way to blow an
election. The question is how to save Kerry from the
biggest obstacle between him and the White House, himself.
Paradoxically the best way to convince voters to support
John Kerry this November is for him to spend the next
six months as far away from the American people as possible.
The long sought after campaign theme everyone is desperate
for Kerry adopt? I suggest the slogan:“Less is
more!” Kerry should campaign as if the election
were taking place in 1804 instead of 2004.
Nominees in the 19th century considered campaigning
on your own behalf untoward and beneath their dignity.
Let’s be honest, has there been a Democratic candidate
over the last few decades that gave off a stronger whiff
of egalitarian entitlement than Kerry? Two hundred years
ago Nominees would stay at home and allow others to
campaign on their behalf. If you’ve watched the
Kerry campaign rallies or seen his biographical TV ads
you notice that most of the time someone else is speaking
for Kerry as it is.
I suggest no more TV ads showing our actual candidate.
No more fake town meetings. Please, no more ‘exciting’
Kerry led campaign rallies. Send his fellow veterans
to the swing states. Let Howard Dean fire up the Democratic
base. Turn John Edwards loose on undecided soccer moms.
How about Mario Cuomo to give Kerry’s acceptance
speech at the convention this summer? Instead of having
one really dull and lifeless candidate taking his best
shot at blowing the election, we could have a veritable
all-star lineup of Democratic substitute campaigners.
Sequester Kerry on a ski slope or bike trail. Let him
spend the next six months berating his secret service
protection. Or we could send him overseas to woo more
support from foreign leaders. Just as long as no one
who will vote actually sees or more importantly hears
him between now and election day.
There’s only one flaw in my plan. Over the last
hundred years voters have become used to actually seeing
and hearing from their candidates. George Bush may well
have William Henry Harrison to thank if he wins re-election.
The year was 1840 and Mr. Harrison was making history.
That fall he traveled in his home state of Indiana and
neighboring Ohio making twenty-three speeches on his
own behalf. He was the first candidate to actively campaign
for the Presidency. As late as 1896, when candidate
William Jennings Bryan gave 600 campaign speeches, it
was seen as unseemly to appear to want the Presidency.
John Hay, who had been personal secretary to President
Lincoln, attacked Bryan as such.
“He is begging for the Presidency as a tramp
might beg for a pie, with no idea that it is a manner
of any more importance.”
How can we in good conscience let John Kerry spend
the next six months looking like a tramp? I for one
won’t stand for it!
If this was 1804 instead of 2004 I could spend less
time making a list of things to accomplish before a
second President Bush term drafts me for his pre-emptive
invasion to rid Spain of their weapons of mass socialism.
A return to early nineteenth century campaigning may
be all that stands between us and an afternoon next
January when we get to see what Bush’s trademark
smirk would look like as Kerry takes the oath of office.
As it is, I may have William Henry Harrison to blame
when I’m slugging it out with socialists under
a sizzling Spanish sun.
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