Time mag with inside campaign dirt. I'm disgusted beyond belief.

[Kagemusha]

I hate to do this but...

http://www.drudgereport.com/flash5.htm

I'm not a Time subscriber (forgive me) but, this is a matter of legitimate discussion now, not later.

Specifically:

- How Kerry fell for the Iraq vote bear trap that Bush set.
- How Bush aides wondered if Kerry was stupid enough to fall for said trap.
- How Kerry was gamed because he can't resist proving "how smart he is". You know, nuance, education, upbringing...
- How McCain had the riot act read to him.
- How Bush pounded the Osama tape to get security moms voting for him. (He must've gotten some in hindsight.)
- How Clinton's advice to Kerry leaked real fast and put Kerry in a bad light. Someone likes the spotlight but, I said that here two years ago.
- And most of all, how Shrum totally blew it on the Swift Boat ads, which were defining Kerry's candidacy. Afterwards Kerry said many of the right things on defense, and seemed absolutely not credible saying them.

I'm left wondering, who are these bums that Kerry had running his campaign?... And how did he let himself get baited so? How did his handlers let him get baited so? Who the hell was running this disaster? (If there are multiple answers, isn't that a problem in itself?)

Forget the conspiracy bs. This is just plain incompetence. Once Kerry was The Man, the time for excuses ended. I'm coming off with the impression that the better candidate lost and the better politician and campaign team won.

Hence, my disgust beyond belief...

[drhilarius]

1. I must be said again:

This is a failure on the part of the American people.

[davepc]

4. Failure of the party.

write people off, then get angry when they don't vote for you. What a winning strategy for the next 4 years.

[drhilarius]

9. I wrote no one off.

I was out there spreading the info, pointing people to the websites, plastering articles where i could. No one listened. WE were written off, and that is painfully obvious now. I'm sorry, but I truly believe, and this may just be the anger of the moment, that the only way to effect real change is if this country hits rock bottom.

[davepc]

12. How many times did John Kerry visit the South?

[JI7]

13. he visited north carolina, louisiana,florida, west virginia, virginia

arkansas during the campaign.

during the primary he visited all southern states .

[theHandpuppet]

14. Or...

How many times has Bush visited the South? I guess that doesn't matter, though. I'll bet Kerry visited more Southern states than Bush.

[drhilarius]

16. Wouldn't have made a difference.

No offense, but I think you're being far too idealistic-the old canard that if maybe we just gave them the truth they'd understand. Screaming jesus freaks decided this election. I know, I know, calling them screaming jesus freaks is elitist and it's no way to win converts. Well, I've got about as much of a chance of converting a SJF than a muslim cleric. Kerry was the devil to these people, and nothing he could have done would have changed that. Unfortunately, the best lessons are learned through hardship.

[SoCalDem]

22. yep.. they would have voted for a tree-stump if "the pastor" told them to

WAIT ..... They DID vote for a tree stump

[Ms. Toad]

25. Agree.

That was precisely my reaction yesterday, as I was wiping the figurative spittle off my face from the millions of voters who hate me enough to change the costitution to ensure my marriage was not recognized. We must not have sunk low enough for the masses to recognize we must change for teh better.

[Sterling]

35. Who do you mean, the anti war people, maybe

but writing off die hard Bush fundies is the smartest thing we could do, we just need to do more of it.

That lifestyle must be discredited.

[arewenotdemo]

2. the Iraq vote bear trap: seems to me it was a no-win situation that

required finessing. A "no" vote and the Nazis would have simply hammered the traitor/reluctant defender theme even harder.

I feel like Dean could have fought that battle more effectively. Kerry needed to show more heat, but it just isn't in his personality.

I don't care though. I refuse to blame Kerry. This fucking country deserves the piece of shit it chose.

[Kagemusha]

3. I don't see it as either/or.

Kerry wasn't the better politician but the country turned down the better candidate with a clear choice so, whatever. The president it richly deserves.

But, the campaign staff incompetence is hard to stomach on top of that.

[high density]

5. What's Bob Shrum's record now?

How many straight losses?

[fujiyama]

7. Has he had any wins?

Why do they keep bringing this hack back over and over again?

[elcondor]

30. 0-8 If I recall correctly

Remembering this from off the top of my head . . .

[theoceansnerves]

6. i'd have to see some numbers

but all indications are that what really brought people out to vote was hatred of gays (i.e. "moral values".) and in my estimation there's absolutely nothing kerry or his people could have done differently to change that.

[JI7]

8. yes, Kerry led with independents, moderates, liberals,

the numbers were good for him. he got a high turnout. but the hatred of gays of the "morals" crowd came out even more .

[theoceansnerves]

11. exactly.

people were blaming young voters until the numbers came out that they were the only group that had a majority vote for kerry. i saw someone on tv say there was a TON of "under the radar" type GOTV at churches that just totally blew away everything else.

[JI7]

15. yes, the Republican GOTV effort in churches was a huge thing

and a single issue like gay marriage unites them all with passion to get out there.

[Kagemusha]

18. He could've not mentioned Mary Cheney like that.

I held out hope he knew what the hell he was doing there.

Guess not.

[arewenotdemo]

19. I don't think that lost him any votes

but it obviously didn't cause the cognitive dissonance in the morally upstanding that I thought it might. They apparently all voted.

Correct me if I'm wrong, but didn't Kerry pick up less of the Catholic vote than Gore? We can thank the bishops and priests for some of that.

[lynintenn]

37. I know 2 peopel who voted for Nader due to his

statement....they thought people's children should be off limits. I reminded them how the right wing trashed Chelsea Clinton but they had already voted early.

[TheWebHead]

10. I don't see anything on that list that's news

there were errrors in Kerry's campaign, as there were in Bush's, and none listed there come as some surprise. We knew Bush wanted Kerry to respond to the Iraq now question, and he had to respond at some point to it or it would have dogged him and sucked the air out of other issues he could discuss.

[Kagemusha]

17. The other issues didn't help him at all though.

The whole Iraq mess seems to have doomed the whole campaign before it even began... and wasn't this guy nominated because he was strong on defense? So they let Bush define him as weak on defense? Brilliant.

[chappaquadem]

20. New campaign managers

We need to find people who know what they are doing to run these national campaigns. Neither Donna Brazille nor Mary Beth Cahill had any idea what they were doing. While it is wonderful to have a woman in charge of something like this, it would be better to have a PERSON who could lead responses to attacks, know how to KEEP momentum, and who had some personality so the major networks would talk to them and cover the candidate better.

[Kolesar]

21. Another dumb-shit republican writer obsessing about Hillary '08

That article has zero credibility:

Clinton told Kerry. "If he’s the issue in this campaign, you win. Stay in his face." News of the call was all over the papers by Monday. Kerry was furious. Some believed that Clinton’s real interest was in clearing the way for Hillary to run in 2008.

[crickets]

23. Egg-zackly

It's a smelly mish-mash of BS and projection, amplified by Kerry's current situation. Can you say propaganda, children? Very good!

:eyes:

Can you say dirty tricks, sore 'winners,' lying sacks of shit? Good!

[Kolesar]

26. Projection indeed! ... eom

[HamdenRice]

24. Shrum has never won a national campaign -- why did Kerry hire him?

There was a long profile of the campaign manager in I think New Yorker about 4 months ago and it highlighted that this guy has NEVER won a campaign. It was very unflattering and showed that Kerry's campaign was in almost constant chaos.

[candy331]

27. SORRY, wrong horse picked in this race and he did as expected, LOST.

[polpilot]

28. Dean would have killed him. 'Mr. President you lied and it's time to tell

that to the American people' = President Dean.

[lynintenn]

38. hate to break this to you

If Dean can't get elected in the primaires hoe would he have done any better in the election. He would have still been seen as a northern liberal in the "heartland"

[DemocratSinceBirth]

29. "Success Has A Thousand Fathers

Failure is an orphan"

[Tierra_y_Libertad]

31. It was his pathetic IWR vote that cost him the election.

His politically expedient vote for the war (spin it as you will, it was a vote for war) effectively took Iraq out of the debate. That was Bush's biggest vulnerability. An illegal, immoral, murderous, war, run by inept politicians and an inept military. Every time Kerry brought it up - "But, senator, you voted for it."

Kerry spent the rest of the campaign trying to defend his vote "I have a plan...", instead of being able to point out the obvious failure of the whole mess. Or, trying to change the debate to other issues, that were trumped by "traditional values".

He came across as a wishy-washy, kind of liberal, moderate pure politician.

The wrong man at the wrong time.

[Bread and Circus]

32. Hey, guess what. The Dem leadership is a bunch of Bums.

And this current band of ass-brains aren't getting another
nickel from me. It's time to clean house.

[GOPFighter]

33. These are not normal opponents

America has never seen politicians as ruthless as the present GOP. These are not normal politicians. NO ONE, with the possible exception of Clinton, could have beaten this group. I think for the first time ever, we have a national administration that doesn't give a damn about what's best for America, they only care about one thing, POWER. They are ruthless and will do ANYTHING to win. Until the majority of Americans catch on they they are being used, we are not going to beat them.

[Sterling]

34. His campaign was run by the firm of

Skull and Bones, let the Crusades continue!!!!!!

[EstimatedProphet]

36. There is one factor, and one factor only, that lost the election for us

Fanaticism.
Fanatic dominionists that want to be raptured, and don't care what the costs are.
Fanatic paranoids who want to believe that the world is supposed to be completely safe, regardless, and feel threatened by the bad nasty terrorists who haven't had to attack us since 9/11 for us to do exactly what they want.
Fanatic bigots who can't wait to tie another gay to a barbed wire fence and leave them to die, and deep down inside just can't wait to get their hands on an arabic baby so they can poke it with needles and watch it scream in pain.
These are the people that came out in droves on Tuesday. These are your fellow Americans. Have fun trying to unite with them.
I used to think that the American people were predominantly good. I can't anymore. I just feel sick now.

[theboss]

39. The Iraq vote is simply the risk of nominating a Senator

Senators build up long and controversial records. In some respects, the Republicans went easy on Kerry and his votes - though I think the ads at the end talking about his voting record during the Reagan years hurt him.