Rate Kerry's Campaign

[dazzleman]

I would give Kerry a C for his campaign.

On the one hand, there were certain elements that were well-run, and he definitely gave the president a better fight than anyone would have anticipated 1-2 years ago.

On the other hand, he never offered a coherent alternative to President Bush.  He flip-flopped to the point where even his closest supporters couldn't possibly anticipate what he would do as president, or make sense of his varying stands on the issues.  He criticized President Bush, but spent more time saying what he would have done up to this point (after voting mostly in support of what the president did) rather than saying what he would do going forward.

A fairly good campaign can't make up for a lack of intellectual consistency by a candidate.

[dazzleman]

One thing that I don't think has been mentioned is that both the Democratic candidates' wives turned out to be a liability, in my opinion.

Initially, I liked Teresa Heinz because she wasn't afraid to say what she thought.  But after a few times, her statements started to rub me the wrong way.  She reminded me a lot of Betty Ford - being applauded for her "outspokenness" without regard to the nonsensical content of much of what she was saying.  I strongly suspect that she has some of the same problems that Betty Ford was suffering from (alcoholism, prescription drug addiction, or both).

Mrs. Edwards really rubbed me the wrong way when she said that the Cheney's were upset about Kerry mentioning their daughter's lesbianism because they felt shame.  It was a nasty, catty little comment and revived unpleasant images of other people I have known who have gone around sticking their nose into other people's business without being invited.

The reality is that a political spouse, for the most part, can only be a neutral or a negative.  Laura Bush's extreme popularity probably was a small net plus, but I doubt too many people who weren't already planning to vote for Bush switched to him because of his wife.  On the other hand, she sure didn't drive away any voters, which I suspect the wives of Kerry and Edwards did, with their comments.  

[dazzleman]

The problem was not so much his campaign, per se, but some of the actions he took and statements that he made that boxed in the ability of the campaign to send out a clear message, especially on national security.

His Iraq position was all over the boards, and there's not that much the campaign could have done about it.  He flip-flopped on his support of the war and on the $87 billion appropriation for the troops, and the campaign itself could not correct this.  Kerry was in a catch-22 of having to either (a) firmly repudidate past positions on issues (such as his vote for the war) in order to have a clear message, but appear even more of a flip-flopper; or (b) try to argue, falsely, as he did, that there was some type of consistency among his positions.

Adding to the problem was his past anti-defense voting record going all the way back to his first days as senator.

There wasn't much the campaign could do to get around these issues, which were created by the candidate himself.