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| Home Front: Politix |
| Victor Davis Hansen : Bullseye |
| 2004-10-22 |
| October 22, 2004, 8:24 a.m. Kerry's DilemmaOr, how to lose an election. There is a good chance that no matter what Kerry says or does in the final two weeks of this election — barring some major catastrophe in Iraq, a presidential gaffe, or massive voting irregularity — he will lose. And he may well take much of the Democrats' remaining control of government down with him. After all, Putin wants Bush, while Arafat prefers Kerry — and that is all we need to know. But besides the obvious concerns of national security and Kerry's own failure in any honest fashion to offer a coherent and principled alternative course of action to defeat the terrorists, there are more subtle, insidious factors at play that will, I think, preclude his election. I thought John Kerry clearly won the first debate, lost the second, and did worse in the third. Most Americans, however, apparently disagreed, since many polls showed that respondents thought Kerry won all three. We hear of mayhem daily in Iraq; news on the economic front is mixed; and an entire host of surrogates has defamed George Bush in a manner not seen in decades during a political campaign. Why, then, does Kerry gain little traction, trail in most polls, and perhaps even start to slip further? After all, he is a hard campaigner, has a razor-sharp memory, speaks well, looks statesmanlike at times, raises lots of money, and has a mobilized base working hard for his election. At least six reasons come to mind that have little to do with issues or substance, but everything to do with style, character, and judgment. First, he comes across, perhaps unfairly so, as an unfriendly sort. He seems to confirm to flyover America that the Ivy League East Coast is a cold place of holier-than-thou privileged reformers who live one life but advocate another. Kerry is a pleasant man, but he nevertheless presents himself as a ponderous aristocrat. His oratory, for all his undeniable mastery of facts and classical rhetorical tropes, is too often humorless, condescending, and pedantic. His photo opportunities that showcase hunting vests or windsurfing look forced, and they lack the natural ease of George Bush on the stump, twanging with his sleeves rolled up. Thus while Kerry does well in debates, he in some sense does not do well, since Americans feel he is either their smug professor or cranky grandfather, peeved that he had to descend from Olympus to impart knowledge to the less gifted. Somehow most would rather be wrong with Bush than right with Kerry. |
| Posted by:BigEd |
| #4 CFR? |
| Posted by: .com 2004-10-22 10:43:27 PM |
| #3 Front Page mag did some digging. Guess who was being CFR? Soros. |
| Posted by: anonymous2u 2004-10-22 10:30:24 PM |
| #2 God bless VDH! Always a breath of sane, fresh air to blow away the smoke. |
| Posted by: Xbalanke 2004-10-22 8:29:17 PM |
| #1 Hyperterrific, as usual! |
| Posted by: Ptah 2004-10-22 8:01:10 PM |