Kerry Launching "Blowback Campaign"

[DrFunkenstein]

LOS ANGELES -- This is going to be one tough (and probably dirty) campaign. The official signal of that, I thought, was when Sen. John Kerry gave his victory speech last Tuesday night and did not mention that President Bush had called and congratulated him. He made a big deal, of course, about John Edwards' gracious concession call, then went down and dirty to trash Bush.

Kerry's speech asked no quarter and will get none. He will be hated, too -- probably is already -- and he will be vilified from coast to coast. He is, after all, running against people who attacked the patriotism of Sen. Max Cleland, who lost both legs and an arm in Vietnam -- the war that was fought while Cheney was a graduate assistant at the University of Wisconsin, saying he was too busy for war. He had, he said, "other priorities."

Perhaps this kind of "blowback" was to be expected. But even if that is true, it was surprising to see that the Democrats remembered how to run a truly nasty campaign. I, for one, was surprised to see them ready and willing to answer President Bush's Sept. 11 commercials last week, news-cycle by news-cycle. Talk about first responders -- the Kerry people had both firefighters and relatives of victims on the air immediately to complain about the president using four seconds of World Trade Center footage in his first "feel good" commercials.

"It's a slap in the face of the murders of 3,000 people. It's unconscionable," said a Twin Towers' widow, Monica Gabrielle. Her testimony and others instantaneously turned the Bush commercials around. The Bush ads seemed well within the limits of political taste to me, but that's not the point. The Democrats reacted and overreacted about taste and past promises not to politically exploit national trauma -- you would have thought they had become grown-up professional politicians, something they were not in the 2000 campaign.

The Democratic campaign, now the Kerry campaign, was good enough these past two months to force the president to come out of the White House to slug it out. But as soon as they touched gloves and Bush tried a jab or two, Kerry was on him, landing the first solid punch. We haven't seen that in a while -- neither press nor politicians have laid a glove on the "war president" -- and now it looks like we're in for a real political brawl. And it's about time.

http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&u=/uclicktext/20040307/cm_ucrr/thedirtyblowbackcampaign

[flpoljunkie]

1. Perhaps the media will follow JK's lead and try being watchdogs rather

than the lapdogs they have been since 9/11. It gives me hope to watch John Kerry take on the Bush administration and not back down!

Great post, by the way, Dr. Funk!

[asthmaticeog]

7. Sure.

And watchdogs might fly out of my butt.

When the likes of George Soros and/or Peter B. Lewis spend 30 years nurturing the news media like Richard Mellon Scaife did, THEN we might count on some truth in reporting. Until such time, we're going to be fighting uphill against conservative propaganda being spewed forth from damn near every media outlet.

[sangha]

2. "Talk about first responders"

There's been a lot of talk about defining and redefining the candidates. Kerry is going to try to redefine Bush* as the Stubborn Misleader, while Bush* is going to try to redefine Kerry as a flip-flopping, tax-hiking, weak on security Taxachussets liberal.

Just recently (yesterday or the day before) I read (in a political notes type piece in the NY Times) about how the late nite comedians are having a problem getting a handle on Kerry. They've tried the Rich Man, the Gigilo Man, the Aloof Man, but not of it seems to stick and work.

I'm getting the feeling that the media's need to caricature people is going to earn Kerry the role of Strong Man.

[blm]

3. I think Kerry's natural bearing, grace and obvious dignity make insults

ring hollow. He's too serious a man with too serious a life in public service to mock easily.

[Cocoa]

4. and his attackers are all slimy

Ed Gillespie challenging John Kerry's character? Karl Rove? George Bush? Give me a break!

[sangh0]

5. Yes blm, I do think that's a good part of it.

Kerry has gravitas. Some on DU would like to mock that and pretend that, like "electability", it's a creation of the media, but that argument rings hollow when you see Kerry in action. He radiates dignity and sobriety.

[fob]

6. In memory of GrovelBot...

DONATE TODAY!!

Give $86.43 to signal the intent for Kerry to 86 43(w*)!!

[IrateCitizen]

8. Ummm... the families responding to the 9/11 ads...

... had absolutely NOTHING to do with the Kerry campaign. Don't even make it out as if they did, because that is the point that all the RW radio hatemongers (i.e. Rush, Hannity) were trying to do -- and Monica Gabrielle and Kristen Breitweiser both issued statements saying that this was NOT the case.

I don't think this diminishes the Kerry campaign so far, but it does say something about how ill-conceived the attempted exploitation of 9/11 is, if independent groups are screaming about its tastelessness without any affilitation to partisan political causes.