Charlie Cook: Kerry off to a slow start in race for the presidency

[question everything]

(snip)

Kerry did not so much win the Democratic nomination as survive the murder-suicide pact in Iowa between former Vermont Gov. Howard Dean and Rep. Richard Gephardt of Missouri that effectively removed the number one and two contenders, allowing numbers three (Kerry) and four (North Carolina Sen. John Edwards) to move to the top two positions. An interesting parlor game would be to contemplate who would have won the Democratic nomination had Kerry not mortgaged his Beacon Hill townhouse and been the best funded and organized candidate after Dean and Gephardt savaged each other on the Iowa television airwaves.

Some now wonder whether – without his Des Moines primal scream on caucus night – a Dean candidacy, with its more straightforward position on the Iraq War, would have made for a clearer contrast and a more moderate record in elective office that would have been less vulnerable to attack. But that is all water under the bridge. Kerry is and will be the nominee.

(snip)

But the fact that Kerry's negatives have soared also should affect the ballot test. At first it didn't. But a just-released CNN/Gallup/USA Today poll suggests it finally has. The April 16-18 national poll put George W. Bush ahead by five points in a two-way trial heat with Kerry among likely voters, 51 percent to 46 percent. Bush was ahead six points in a three-way trial heat, 50 percent to 44 percent, with 4 percent for Ralph Nader. The poll had a four-point error margin.

To a certain extent, the answer might be while Kerry's negatives have gone up, so have Bush's. The percentage of people who believe the country is heading in the right direction – the so-called "Dow Jones indicator of American politics" – is declining, while the percentage that say the country is on the wrong track is increasing. Hostilities and casualties in Iraq have gotten considerably worse in the past 60 days, and some voters express growing doubts about whether we should have gone to war with Iraq, while others support the war but are extremely critical of the Bush administration's handling of it.

Neither is a good thing for Bush. While it's certainly possible the situation in Iraq will improve between now and the election, this is more an article of faith. There is certainly no tangible evidence it is the case. At the same time, the March jobs report released on April 2 was welcome news for Bush, but soaring gasoline prices and the threat of inflation seem to have undercut that economic enthusiasm.

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Cook is a political analyst for National Journal Group and editor and publisher of Cook Political Reports.


Find this article at:
http://www.signonsandiego.com/uniontrib/20040425/news_mz1e25cook.html

[DFLforever]

1. This is an interesting article.

and relatively unbiased. Thanks for the link.