Herbert: Looking Beyond Charisma

[RamboLiberal]

http://www.nytimes.com/2004/07/09/opinion/09HERB.html?hp=&pagewanted=print&position=

At some point, if we're sane, we'll get past the explosion of superficiality that has accompanied John Kerry's selection of John Edwards as his running mate.

Right now we're consumed with who has charisma and who doesn't, and such compelling matters as whether the candidates' wives get along.

<snip>

When we finally get serious, we'll see that we're facing one of the most important elections in American history. The nation is locked in a war in Iraq that we don't know how to win and don't know how to end. And the White House sent another tremor of fear through the country yesterday when it announced, with its usual absence of details, that Al Qaeda may try to disrupt the election.

Domestically there are two very divergent paths looming on such issues as the economy and jobs, taxes, health care, Social Security and government support for education. It is in this area that the differences between the two major parties are starkest, and as the campaign unfolds it's likely that the clearest evidence of the divide will come not from the top of the respective tickets, but from John Edwards and Dick Cheney.

<snip>

This will not be an election between tweedledum and tweedledee. Charisma and hairstyles aside, by November it should be apparent that voters will have a clear and unambiguous choice about the direction this nation is to travel over the next several years.

[keta11]

1. Yeah. Like Dick Cheney did

any real work in the last 3+ years besides hidind in an undisclosed bunker all 3+ years, fabricating evidence to invade a country that was of no imminent threat to the US.

Heck, did he even attend one foreign state funeral, a traditional VP duty?