TNR on Kerry surge (also anti-Dean & Gep tax flyer)

[windansea]

playing the expectations game...plus an interesting tax flyer

THE KERRY SURGE: Last week at the bar at the Hotel Fort Des Moines, the after-hours watering hole for lots of campaign staffers and reporters, I encountered an unusual scene. On my right a Dean aide was telling reporters about how internal polls showed John Kerry surging. On my left a Kerry aide was explaining that in an effort to set high expectations for the senator, the Dean people were spreading rumors about how internal polls showed Kerry surging. It looks like there's no need for either side to spin this anymore. Zogby's tracking poll today shows a three-way race, with Dean at 24 percent and Kerry and Gephardt tied at 21 percent.

Why is Kerry moving? Iowans are clearly having second thoughts about Dean, and Kerry suddenly looks like a less erratic alternative. A Kerry aide attributes the traction to a crisper stump speech that focuses like a laser on "special interests," which the campaign says polls extremely well among caucus and primary voters. They argue the message also fits Kerry's biography better. "He hasn't been a great legislative guy," says an aide, "but he has done lots of investigations and gone after these groups. ... It gives him more of a fighting edge." The Dean campaign has taken notice. Today they complained that Kerry had co-opted Dean's message. They attacked Kerry as "just as beholden to special interests as the next Washington politician."

Fighting special interests is just part of the Kerry message. Below the radar, he is targeting moderate to conservative Democrats with an anti-tax message. Courtesy of the Gephardt campaign, here are a couple of mail pieces Kerry has been sending out:

click to see flyer
on edit: changed thread title to include tax flyer)

http://www.tnr.com/blog/campaignjournal

[Bread and Roses]

1. Wouldn't it be ironic

if after all the sturm and drang, that our candidate ends up being Kerry; as was predicted before the Dean phenom or the Clark entry?

Politics just boggles the mind.

I believe Kerry is a good man, but he isn't my first choice (no worries: ABB!).

[windansea]

5. I like Kerry too

but am not sure if his tax flyer is accurate

[Norquist Nemesis]

2. Hold it...

I can't get the flyer big enough to read, but from what I can tell, it's not accurate and is a scare tactic. Dean doesn't want to 'raise' taxes on everybody.

In the end, if a flying donkey won the nomination I'd vote for it over Bush. But the campaigning and strategies of Kerry has not impressed me.

[windansea]

3. flyer says Kerry "the ONLY leading candidate

who will fight against raising middle class taxes"

also says Dean and Gephart will raise them

[windansea]

4. is Kerry's tax flyer accurate?

is he the "ONLY major candidate fighting against raising middle tax increase?

or is he pulling a Dean??

[isbister]

8. Yup

ONLY major candidate fighting against raising middle tax increase


It says:

"ONLY leading candidate who will fight against increases in middle class taxes"

This article was written on the 14th so the things must have been mailed out before then. So, wouldn't that be accurate? the ONLY leading candidate?

[windansea]

6. truth kick

anybody??

[Norquist Nemesis]

7. Triple kick

Anybody?