If you were John Kerry's campaign manager what would you have done different?

[Republican Michigander]

I would have told him to withdraw and have Clark be the nominee.

[adam]

What would your message have been?
I'm going to finish the war on terror in a timely manner and I'm going to do it without eroding your civil liberties.

Who would you have pushed for as VP?
Gephardt, better midwest appeal. I would have liked to see Lieberman more, but realistically that could have been bad for the numbers.

What would have been your platform?
* Indifferent on social issues (pro-states rights kind of thing)
* Economic conservation
* Tough war stance that DIDN'T CHANGE EVERY 30 MINUTES

How would you have reacted to the Swift boat ad's?
Would have spun it into slander.

Would you have written off the entire South?
The only state in the south that Kerry would have had a chance at is Florida. I would have run a few ads there, maybe set up a barnstorm or two. But I would have avoided whining about 2000 like the plague.

Would you have spent less time in Ohio and more in the midwest?
No, other way around.

[Nym90]

Have him back off of abortion entirely.

P.S.: Kerry won PA by 2.5% exactly.

Or maybe he should have refrained from gratuitously mentioning Mary Cheney's lesbianism during the debate.  He was trying to send a signal to vociferous gay rights groups who hate Mary Cheney because she hasn't condemned her father's politics, but I think it backfired.

I always figured he was trying to do the opposite, and hope that the GOP base would sour on Bush/Cheney since Cheney hasn't condemned his daughter for her homosexuality. But yeah, in any event it was a stupid and not so nice thing to do; someone's personal history in that area should have no relevance on a Presidential campaign. Unfortunately both sides tend to revert to that kind of mudslinging in every election campaign.

[Secretary Polnut]

Frankly I think Edwards handled the Gay issue better than Kerry did.

1. Message: Bush is bad for the economy - outsourcing, tax breaks. Republicans do not hold a monopoly on patriotism.
- Much better ads.
Issues
- The economy
- Domestic security
- healthcare
- education

2. Vietnam is important, but because it forced front and centre to compare w/Bush - it opened Kerry up to the swiftboaters. In response Kerry should have come down like a ton of bricks.

3. VP Choice. I still think Edwards was a MUCH more effective campaigner than Kerry overall - Bayh would have been a safer choice.

4. Forget WV and the South.

5. Priority states. With special campaigners
Ohio
Pennsylvania
Wisconsin
Iowa
Michigan
-------------
Colorado
New Mexico
Nevada
New Hampshire

Make token efforts in Florida, North Carolina, Virginia, and Tennessee and Missouri.

Have Richardson, Napolitano and Hart as Kerry's SW Taskforce.

- Establish a WarRoom.

[Joe Republic]

3. VP Choice. I still think Edwards was a MUCH more effective campaigner than Kerry overall - Bayh would have been a safer choice.

Not sure I follow.  Edwards was an effective campaigner, so Kerry should have picked somebody else?

[Secretary Polnut]

What I mean is, Edwards was not popular in NC - he was good at connecting with people one on one. But Bayh might have made IN competitive for the first time since the Johnson landslide or Perot sucking away the conservative vote in 92 and 96.

Edwards is a better campaigner.... but his dowry so to speak is not as useful. Bayh would bring a fatter cow? Probably would have helped with OH also.

[patrick1]

What I mean is, Edwards was not popular in NC - he was good at connecting with people one on one. But Bayh might have made IN competitive for the first time since the Johnson landslide or Perot sucking away the conservative vote in 92 and 96.

Edwards is a better campaigner.... but his dowry so to speak is not as useful. Bayh would bring a fatter cow? Probably would have helped with OH also.

Indiana is not in play, a VP candidate does not make up a 20 point gap. 

I agree that Bayh may have helped in OH.

[dazzleman]

Have him back off of abortion entirely.

P.S.: Kerry won PA by 2.5% exactly.

Or maybe he should have refrained from gratuitously mentioning Mary Cheney's lesbianism during the debate.  He was trying to send a signal to vociferous gay rights groups who hate Mary Cheney because she hasn't condemned her father's politics, but I think it backfired.

I always figured he was trying to do the opposite, and hope that the GOP base would sour on Bush/Cheney since Cheney hasn't condemned his daughter for her homosexuality. But yeah, in any event it was a stupid and not so nice thing to do; someone's personal history in that area should have no relevance on a Presidential campaign. Unfortunately both sides tend to revert to that kind of mudslinging in every election campaign.

If that's true, then he seriously misjudged the GOP people.  Few people, including the most conservative evangelical Christians, would expect a father to condemn his daughter in that manner.  The issue is much more about public policy toward gay marriage than it is about behavior within families.

What Kerry said was totally ridiculous on many fronts.  We really can't say that homosexuality is innate, as he suggested.  It may be, at least in some people.  It can also be a reaction to environmental factors.  Or some combination of the two.

Kerry was simply blindly asserting the doctrinaire gay rights movement dogma about homosexuality.  And I stand by my original analysis, that he was sending a signal of support to nasty gay rights groups by going after Mary Cheney.  I think you're right also about what Kerry hoped to do, but that was not in conflict with what I said, but additive to it.

[dazzleman]

What I mean is, Edwards was not popular in NC - he was good at connecting with people one on one. But Bayh might have made IN competitive for the first time since the Johnson landslide or Perot sucking away the conservative vote in 92 and 96.

Edwards is a better campaigner.... but his dowry so to speak is not as useful. Bayh would bring a fatter cow? Probably would have helped with OH also.

Edwards is a shallow phony.  The nickname "the Breck girl" suits him perfectly.

Kerry had to make a choice between trying to crack the south, or going after the midwest, or possibly the southwest.

He decided that if he could only crack the south, the rest would fall into place.  It would have worked had he been successful at it.  But he should have realized that it probably wouldn't work, since that was the area where Bush was least vulnerable.  He had a much better shot I think of capturing a couple more states in the midwest, or in the southwest, that would have put him over the top.