Batfink's Beep -- 9-20-04

Archive: What would have made a difference?

September 20, 2004

"We have to reach a comfort level with the American people--they have to view John with a certain level of respect, an appreciation of his own strength, values, and character, a feeling that they can trust this person for the next four years. I don't know how you do all that. It's an evolving process. But we need to do it quickly."

-A Kerry Senior Advisor (hat tip: James Taranto)

You think you've got problems? John Kerry has 45 days to get a public that knows him well to decide that they have him all wrong; that he really is a decent, likeable fellow.

How is that done, exactly? That's a good question, since it's never actually been done before. It never needed to be. Politicians being what they are, there's never been an actual presidential candidate with this particular level of personal unlikeability. Even Al Gore was the life of the party next to the Democrats' latest champion. And that was before he went completely barking nuts on TV.

In any case, the strategy apparently involves getting the candidate, not in front of reporters, who, after all, might actually ask him stuff, but rather (no snickers... oh, what the heck: go ahead) before the likes of Dr. Phil, David Letterman, and Jay Leno. And that's all very nice, as far as it goes, and assuming that he can be strictly scripted enough to keep "would that it were"-type stuff from creeping out. After all, Leno may be the only man alive with more chin than the top Dem. And next to Dr. Phil, Kerry's the good-looking one.

But is it enough? To check against the bar set by the unnamed senior advisor, does it show "strength, values, and character"?

Well, Bush isn't an easy act to follow by that measure. Agree with him or not, you can't call him indecisive. And he stayed with it on the dark days, when any politician's instinct had to be screaming, "Who needs it? Cut your losses!" As to his values, we know what they are. Again, agree with him or not, they stay the same, on bad days as well as good, which is pretty much what character is. Which brings me to my point: What could Kerry, even theoretically, have done different, to actually have a prayer at this point? What would have made a difference?

Granted, Kerry made an awful lot of what look like incredibly bone-headed errors: the 'All VietNam, All The Time' convention, the 'foreign leaders want me to be President, but never mind who they are' nonsense, the 'Voted for the $87M before I voted against it' waffling, the 'Bring It On' bluster, which he then followed up with a couple weeks of whining to the President to please make them stop. But what if he hadn't?

Think about it: Let's say he hadn't made Viet Nam the focus of his campaign. Let's say he ran as a sober, seasoned Senator, who knew how Washington worked. Hey, 20 years of experience shouldn't ought to be a bad thing, should it? Granted, it's hard to sell without any self-named bills in that period, but let's say he stayed on message, and it seemed plausible enough. Let's say he picked a position on Iraq, and stuck with it. Either way. Just so it seemed that he had something like an actual, honest opinion. Let's say he weren't the single richest man to ever run for President, and by marriage, for crying out loud, claiming that Bush was the rich man's candidate. Let's say he didn't have a personal butler following him around, making him sandwiches. Let's say that when he claimed to be against gun control, people didn't know he was lying...

OK, we're going pretty wide of plausible with that last one; If nothing else, 20 years as a Senator means the people have a pretty good bead on how a guy actually goes on the big issues of modern American politics. But let's bring it home: What if he ran as what he is -- a capital "L" liberal, minus the off-putting anger, minus all the insults and manifest disrespect for the office he's after all running for, just plain, well-articulated, "Let's let the left take a whack at it for a while"? Bottom line: could anyone have beat a decisive, no-apologies-American, war-winning President, in wartime, who also turned around the economy in spite of the worst homeland attack the nation ever suffered, right in the heart of downtown Manhattan?

It's often said, among Democrats casting about for any reed to grab onto, that Kerry is a good closer. As someone with more than 3 months of memory, though, I remember the primary. Kerry got in by default, when Dean burst into flames that night. Before that, he was, if you'll pardon the expression, leading with his chin. It's his very dullness that made him the only man left to turn to in that lot, the least obviously crazy inmate in the asylum. And, let's face it: with 40-odd days to go, it's time to start closing. If he thinks he's going to do it on Letterman, well, maybe CBS can get him a gig doing late night comedy after election day.

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