Kerry aside, how would you grade the campaign itself. I give it a D-

[mtnsnake]

Sorry in advance for the length of this post.

I think what Senator Kerry's campaign handlers, supporters, and advisors let happen to this man is sad. All during this campaign, I caught myself wincing so many times that I physically ached. I kept saying to myself, if I were Kerry I'd fire all his main handlers and get some people who had a clue. Following his fine acceptance speech, nothing was being done to quell the onslaught of negative attacks from Chimpy and the gang, and it drove me crazy for months! We should've gone on the attack against the monster, Bush, right from the start but what did we do, we took the high road for WAY too long with this jackoff of a president. Wonderful.

During the first two thirds of Kerry's campaign it just ate me up. I sat there so many nights watching the news, wondering to myself how on earth can Kerry's campaign managers let this man go out there day after day in ignore mode and not go out once and for all and BLAST the myths that were being hurled around about him. Why didn't they instead turn the tables on the worst president in history?? WTF?

Anyway, as to the campaign:

1) He got suckered by the other side into making the campaign pretty much nothing but a war theme. Didn't anyone on our side realize that the war, albeit a wrong and crooked one, was Chimpy's one and only strong point?

2) Nobody on the campaign team answered strongly enough to the swift boat liars until well after the damage was done. What ever happened to sticking up for yourself? Instead of stopping in his tracks when the lies first started, and explaining in simple black and white to the masses of fools what these venemous swift boat fucks were up to, he instead got into a pissing match over who could be the better wartime president. Great.

3) His acceptance speech was fine, but after that I could never quite figure out who he was. I still don't really know if he'd get our troops out of Iraq or if he'd continue the war or what. All I heard was macho man rhetoric over and over again about how he'd KILL the terrorists, as if by emphasizing the word "kill" it would make all the war mongering fools in this country switch their votes from Chimpy. Yeah right. Kerry's over-emphasis on the word "kill" was a real turn-off to me.

4) His image makers weren't the greatest, and sorry folks, but this campaign was very much about image once Kerry focused on the war theme. Going goose hunting during the heat of the campaign was silly. As phony as Bush's image was, his image makers kicked the snot out of ours. On TV, they transformed a sissy of a cowardly liar into this macho, "roll the sleeves up on your shirt" smirking cowboy, that more than half the ignoramuses fell for. At the very least, if we didn't want to make this a battle of images, we should've exposed to the masses of fools what a phony piece of shit Bush was and explain in plain english how he was not really what he appeared to be. Sometimes it really does take going up to a chalkboard and putting it in children's terms for it to sink in and make people understand.

5) Whoever advised him to make the infamous lesbian comment in his closing debate speech, when it had already been tactfully addressed by Edwards, should've been fired on the spot. To me, it came off as a ploy and arrogant because of the timing. The way he said it, well it didn't sound like there was too much sincerity in it because it was sort of out of text. I turned to my wife and told her Kerry may have just taken a big step in losing the election.

6) The environment: Other than a few token references, he never really addressed this issue, and it's one issue that's extremely important to me. I've heard that Kerry has a good environmental record. Well if that's the case, then why the hell didn't his handlers have him out there exposing Bush for his obscenely drastic environmental record over his first 4 years with all the disgusting environmental rollbacks and all? It could've inspired a few hundred thousand or more voters to vote for him instead of Nader, or just to vote period.

I think Kerry was a nice choice for our candidate.....a capable, good, and honest man. However, I thought the campaign sucked. For much of that, I blame the people he chose to work for him.

If there ever was an ominous sign, it was when they couldn't get the freaking balloons to come down from the rafters.

[Walt Starr]

1. 7) Kerry lost the debates before he won them

I'm sorry if anybody gets offended by that statement, but it's absolutely true! Too many people had decided they could not trust Kerry after the SBVT ads defined him that way for his overwhelming victories in the debates to have any effect whatsoever!

[KittyWampus]

13. Kerry Won The Debates Resoundingly Cause Of The Smears

the smears and attacks made people think of Kerry as a boring, effete
traitor.

What they saw was an intelligent, concise President.

And Kerry then took the lead in polling after the debates.

So once again Walt, you're wrong.

[JI7]

18. right, he was behind before the debates

that's why he won on the issues such as iraq and he cut the large lead bush had on war on terrorism. he won independents and moderates.

the election was very close. much of bush's popularity vote gain came from solid red states where turnout increased because of the anti gay things on ballots.

[sonicx]

22. I'm sorry, but if i'm a candidate, I don't want smears against me in...

people's minds for a long period of time at all. Kerry would have won the debates anyway.

[KittyWampus]

26. Then You Better Not Run Against A Republican. Cause You'll Waste

your time responding to smears and never get your message out let alone attacking you oppponent.

[sonicx]

29. all the while, the population's opinion of me goes down the tubes.

There are still people out there that think Kerry smeared his fellow Vietnam vets.

[Walt Starr]

31. So Kerry won the election?

Sorry, I'm right, you're wrong. Kerry lost the election. The debates be damned, more people decided he lost that one in the only poll that mattered.

[Amaya]

45. Walt did you hit your head on election night?

Cause damn! just damn.... you're scaring me.

[LiberteToujours]

2. B+

Unfortunately, Bush ran an A+ campaign, thanks to Rove. They had no good news for them in the last year, yet somehow they were always able to keep the debate where they wanted it.

[montana500]

3. bullshit

Kerry ran a good campaign, I would say a B+. I would give the Bush campaign a C.

But it sure is fucking hard to run a good campaign WHEN YOU HAVE NO GOD DAMN MEDIA OUTLET FOR YOUR FUCKING TLAKING POINTS!


The Repubs have the ENTIRE radio dial to blast their crap on24/7. they have ALL OF the cable news channels defending them and giving them more speech time.

The dems DO NOT HAVE this. Could you IMAGINE the outcome if they did?

You just got fooled by the corporate press.

[cybildisobedience]

37. you hit the nail on the head

All this talk about how Bush's campaign was so "on message" overlooks the fact that they had a massive, nationwide, relentless media machine that did nothing but promote Bush and attack Kerry.
The real accomplishment was not that Bush was able to get his message out -- how could he not? -- but that Kerry was able to convince millions of voters of his message DESPITE the mainstream media.

[leftofthedial]

60. your post overlooks the fact that the massive media machine

was PART OF THEIR CAMPAIGN!

The Dems failed to counter this.

[erpowers]

54. News Media But

The news media played a part in Kerry not being able get his message out, but ultimately Kerry could have had a better and tougher campaign. When I say tougher I do not mean in terms of talking about terrorists. I mean he could have fought back against Bush more. I tink the media did a horrible job of pointing out Bush's lies and how many lies were told by the Bush campaign. However, I think Kerry's campaign should have pointed out the lies themselves. In the end I think Kerry could have done a better job. There were many things Kerry could have done that he did not do.

[Azure]

58. VERY important point.

In another thread, I responded to a "let's insult Bush" thread:

A fat lot of good it does us insulting Bush here at DU, where we are preaching to the choir.

Right-wingers get to insult us ALL OVER AM RADIO, in TENS OF MILLIONS OF HOMES -- ALL DAY, EVERY DAY. They get to engage in nearly-unlimited hate speech against us to their heart's content. With the exception of a few stations which have picked up Air America, we have NO VOICE WHATSOEVER.

I just took a 2-minute trip to the store for cigarettes. The radio was on when I started the car, tuned to a random AM station, and lo and behold, what do you think I heard? In the time it took me to go 1/2 mile to the corner store and back, Democrats were insulted multiple times by some RW host and his equally vicious callers.

Meanwhile, about the best we can do is get AAR in a few cities, and put some threads on Internet message boards that insult Bush. Does anybody really wonder why we are losing? Does anybody really wonder why they can (possibly) Diebold us and steal the election right in front of everyone and nobody bats an eye?

Is there really any mystery to why we are where we are? They get to bash us CEASELESSLY across the nation in their ENORMOUS propaganda machine, while we can't do much more than bash them on DU and get a few (already liberal) cities to pick up our radio network.

If we don't find a way to fight back in the MAINSTREAM MEDIA, expect to be out-voted, Diebolded, abused, and shit on for the duration.

[leftofthedial]

59. so the winner gets a C and the loser gets a B+

weird fucking curve

where were you when I was in college?

[Nimrod]

4. F on both sides

This whole thing made a mockery of our country. It was a vile, excrement throwing, pile of garbage that buried every important issue under one-line sound bytes. We had a year of people blowing raspberries at each other. If this is the way it's going to be from here on out (and I think it will be, if for no other reason than the Reps have discovered this works for them) I dread every upcoming election from now until the end of time.

I don't know who I'm more disgusted with. The people working on the campaigns or the stupid ass Americans who swallowed this shit and called it ice cream.

[waldnorm]

5. You Can't Give Grades When There's Cheating . . .

By having a conglomerate media behind you, with talking points filtered throughout, putting Al Qaeda script below Kerry's acceptance speech, spinning Mary Cheney after Kerry won all three debates, preventing voters from voting, or changing their votes?

How can we give out grades? Time to petition to the Academic Fairness Committee I say.

In the meantime, we need to evaluate the teacher-- you know the media, has been accepting too many of those damn apple pies from Bush and just smiling, that teacher's pet, what with Tom Brokaw claiming it's a "clean election" and what's his name from Face the Nation throwing stupid/softball questions such as Faith at a debate? And Candy Crowley just criticizing and putting any single red mark on Kerry's paper she can think of, along with Bush's cousin.

So, I'm sorry. I can't give out grades since all I have are what the media tells me. And I didn't realize 2+2=5.

[noamnety]

6. This was in an email I got after the election

"it's sad though, and i talk about this, how like... the only really good things we know about kerry we know from you, and not from the democrats or him."

sigh.

I kept watching the talking heads on tv screwing up, and shouting out to the tv "send me! send me!"

A few months earlier I had said if he didn't start talking about Iran Contra, I was going to personally get on a plane and fly out to wherever he was and kick his ass. I should have done it.

The people doing the talking sounded like they were spinning facts. And in some cases they were - we should not have had a single issue contested on factcheck.org. We didn't need to stretch anything to make Bush look like a disaster, and Kerry a godsend. And we needed people who believed in him with a passion to do the talking - people who could go on tv and explain why they felt so strong about him, not people who sounded like professional marketers. We needed more informed people who could just talk honestly from the heart, like Jon Stewart did on Crossfire.

Senator Kerry if you run again, put me on tv for you.

[sonicx]

7. biggest mistakes of campaign

1. refusing to kill the 87 billion crap(bush wanted to veto)
2. not talking about BCCI or Iran Contra
3. not doing a billion bush flip-flip ads
3. not doing attack ads on rediculous things bush said ("osama is contained" "group homes for pregnant women" "flu shots from canada...but no drugs from there)

[Senator Lamb]

8. he is a good man

a lot of mistakes. he should have kept poking fun of the word flip flop and the hypocrisy of bush's own flip flops to the point where it would not be taken serious by the public, a childish insult. he should have crushed those veterans for truth immediately ripping them apart.

[neener3]

64. SHRUM & CAHILL --- F

[zulchzulu]

9. B-

It definitely could have been better, but going up against a media that refused to responsibly allow his message to get out makes all of this a tad trivial.

When you run against Karl Rove, you have to have plenty of firepower to strike back immediately when he spawns lies. Sometimes the Kerry campaign could not shoot with all barrels wide open, especially in August when there was a two-week period between conventions and only $75 Million to play with at that point.

That's when Rove knew to release the lying dogs of Swift Boat Lies. People bought it hook, line and sinker.

OK, two hunting references...

That's because running for President now costs nearly a half-trillion dollars to happen in all its ugly, devisive and negative way. It's a Hunt For the Ignorant, Lazy Voter. And the bribe money from special interests. And all the negative lies go unchallenged for the most part, unless you tell Grandma to check it out on Factcheck.org. She votes...and she has no idea what you're talking about.

Despite all the naysayers and Monday morning quarterbacks that the thread seems to attact, we did a damn good job. We just got Diebolded.

Things we need to obviously work on:
- Election voting reform
- Political ad standards and practices (with review before release)
- Doing the state lineup differently in the primaries
- New DLC leadership
- Ahnuld workout program for Kucinich :->

[Lerkfish]

11. !!Kerry is a good man, but the campaign was hobbled by Rovian tactics.

which forced Kerry into either directly confronting the lies, and then getting into sticky traps that were laid there, (which you KNOW Rove had waiting for a direct response) or by ignoring it (which he did the first half) and allowing it to fester through unchalleged repetition.

Were I in charge, I would have gone directly for Rove's jugular, completely apart from Bush. I would have gone full tilt into EXPOSING at EVERY opportunity, the known tactics he has employed, and kept HAMMERING them...that way, no matter what Rove did, it would already be perceived as more dirty tricks.

That's what I would have done, and was hoping they would do. As we saw in the last week, when several things happened that pushed Rove, he got very sloppy (ahad the american terrorist). If we had done that at the BEGINNING, we could have been attacking Rove, which would have hamstrung him, and at the same time, we would not have been attacking BUSH, and garnering him backwards sympathy.

I think this is incredibly important, for next election, because since Bush got reelected, you know Rove or at least Rovian tactics will be employed against us again.

What we should do is RESEARCH all their dirty tricks guys...you wonderful folks at DU did that on your own during "rathergate" and other instances, but it was too late...it was reacting to attacks ALREADY in play, so it appeared at best as sour grapes.
INSTEAD, we should have entire dossiers at the ready, IN HAND, in folders as press handouts. Every time a Rovian tactic is employed, immediately hand the press the dossier on that type of tactic being used in the past.

[KittyWampus]

17. This Is The Only Post Here That's Really Worth A Read

[mtnsnake]

23. I agree and the point of this is to learn a hard lesson and be prepared

for it next time. Like you say, research is vital.

We need to be prepared with pre-arranged responses for everything we think they might throw at us, and then we'll be able to come back at them immediately, instead of waiting two months with our heads in the sand.

To me, this campaign was not prepared with answers for the impending avalanche of dirty tricks that was about to fall on them and it completely caught them off guard. That can never happen again. In the future, we need to respond quickly and visciously.

[leftofthedial]

61. "Rovian" tactics have been used since Lee frigging Atwater

We have no answer for them because we have no simple, emotional positions and because we play relatively fair.

[sonicx]

10. Also, Kerry had bad dem surrogates.

Yes, the media sucks, but Dems needed to be vetted with strict, strong talking points.

When you see Pukes out there, they all say the same bullcrap on every talk show and the shit sticks (with some help from the hosts, i should add).

[KittyWampus]

16. HELLO, The MEDIA Books Democrats For TV... NOT KERRY.

[sonicx]

20. I know that. I'm saying they need to be better prepared

and attacking in lockstep like all the Pukes were.

They are representatives for Kerry, whether he sends them or not.

[Awsi Dooger]

12. Any losing presidential campaign is probably an F

Regardless of what transpired. I'm a bottom line guy.

Everyone gave tremendous effort, no doubt about that. But this is one way to look at it, something I mentioned all year: both sides had 45% locked up going in. Of the remaining 10%, this campaign secured 3.3% If I remember my schooling, 33% is an F. Bush got an A with 63%.

I realize no one agrees, but I would have ignored Bush completely, other than the debates. We wasted days and weeks and months and millions bashing him, when opinions of the incumbent were locked in stone. Kerry's favorables and message were always the problem. He needed to respond to the Swift Shit because that reflected on Kerry, jumping his negatives. We needed simplistic themes, not sentences with four or five commas. Mostly we had to satisfy white women Kerry was strong enough on national security. The 55-44 deficit among white women is evidence of failure.

[sonicx]

19. I disagree about ignoring Bush.

The problem is Kerry and 527s didn't attack him the right way. Bush throughout the campaign said so many rediculous things, Kerry could have have made at least 5 attack ads a week. And i don't mean the typical Bushism gaffes ("we will not have an all-volunteer army").

I mean legitamate statements, like the issue of drugs vs flu vaccines form canada. And saying that Osama was "contained" (as if we shouldn' worry about him because of that). And the "Bring em on" quote, while our brave men and women were in harm's way.

And a 527 should have attacked bush's phoney Christian image ("pro-life but it for the death penalty?" "Never apoligetic or admits mistakes" "drives people to poverty" "ABORTION RATE INCREASED UNDER BUSH!!!""Never goes to church""how is arrogance a christian value?"). Cracking the christian image would have hurt him good.

[KittyWampus]

14. Kerry Got Bush To Change "Prosperity Just Around Corner". He FORCED

Bush to change his message NUMEROUS TIMES>

And by reponding to the LIES directly, Kerry would have been REACTING which is NOT WHAT A WINNING CAMPAIGN DOES..........

Thank GOD people who pontificate on this blog don't fucking EVER actually run real campaigns.

[sonicx]

21. Yes, not responding to the Swift Liars worked great...

[KittyWampus]

25. Kerry Had Money Later In The Campaign WHEN HE NEEDED IT

[sonicx]

30. Talk Show appearances and Press Conferences are free

Surrogates are too.

[mtnsnake]

24. Gotta disagree. By not reacting, it cost him dearly.

It might not have swayed us, but it sure swayed the naive and the ignorant.

To them, not reacting was like saying, "maybe there's something to it."

[Catt03]

15. I think Kerry did a great job

When he "became" a fighter, the last two months, he was great. I think of what he had to fight against:

Daily character assassination by the Republicans and GOP 527s

No media support either on television or print

No media appearances while Bush got daily exposure

Cable pundits who ridiculed him nightly

An entire 24/7 news station that demonized him constantly (Fox)

Attacks by the Catholic Church, condemning him weekly

For months, there were few democrats to help him

With all the above, he had hugh crowds and enthusiastic support everywhere he appeared.

I did not start out being a Kerry supporter, I was for Dean. But I think he was a good candidate and he did a great job with what he was up against.

[mtnsnake]

28. I agree w/you, Catt, that Kerry fought. It's the campaign I have problems

with. I think his managers and advisors left him out there pretty much to fight his battles all on his own, as I pretty much implied in the OP.

[Moonbeam_Starlight]

27. I give the campaign a B+

but it doesn't matter if the other side steals votes. You can run a fucking A+++++++ campaign, and if the other side hacks votes, no dice, you will NEVER WIN.

WE HAVE to get the voting problems fixed. Have to, have to, have to. Nothing else will matter.

[Obviousman]

32. c-

for me, im a message person. they had a hard time defining and controlling their messages. after reading that newsweek article i realized how bad things truely were. i think kerry is still the brave person who turned his boat around, and hes still the rebel who testified before congress. he just put himself behind his bumbling campaign managers. he hid his true self from the electorate.

[depakid]

33. I give it a"D" for Dukakis

Kerry PROMISED during the primaries that he wouldn't run a Dukakis style campaign- and as soon as he had the nomination sewed up- that's exactly what he. On purpose. I couldn't believe what I was watching.

[The Flaming Red Head]

42. I give it an A and read about BBV

and get off the Depakote. Bush wants all us liberal hell raisers to take it.

[Generator]

34. Fuck all the bullshit

Kerry won.

But next question, I'd give it a B.

But, really when you are up one of the best propaganda machines since oh say 1930-I think he deserves an A.

But anyhoo-If he lost I'd still give him a B.

And the rest is bullshit. Because you can't win over ignorant people with FACTS, evidence, or capablity. Kerry is one of the best qualified people for President this country has ever seen.

Bush has proven himself to be clearly barely capable of being the dog catcher.

This worship of STUPID does not make you a winner.

Just cause you won, doesn't mean you are morally superior.

We will win in the end. Big time. Here's the deal with the whole premise of your post: way too much analysis.

Stupid is as stupid does. This country WILL reap what they have sown.

And I personally (growing into middle aged housewife turned radical) would rather live in a third world country than surrender this one to these liars, thieves, and homophobes.

Way too much analysis. Here's the deal. Fight them with everything you got or go away. They are liars and have no REAL values.

I will never give up my morality for these scum.

EVER. Got it? Over and out.

[Moonbeam_Starlight]

35. Most

fan-fucking-tastic post I've read all freaking WEEK.

BRAVA, my dear, you took the words right out of my mouth.

[RobinA]

43. Agree Completely

It's not always about the campaign, stupid. Hell, in this case, it wasn't even about the current events.

I thought Kerry ran a fine campaign. Bush just has the product more people think they want. PLUS he got a couple freebies, i.e. the Swift boats.

I think it's interesting and worth looking at how these dudes manage successfully smear, in the most disgusting way possible, every Vet that gets in their way. They now have Cleland, McCain and Kerry notches in their belt. How is this possible?

[lakeguy]

36. B while bush gets an F unless you count cheating and then he gets

an A+++

[demokatgurrl]

38. I agree, D-. but I don't agree

that the war was Bush's strong point. It's his weakness, as well as national security, he absolutely BLEW it, and Kerry should have hammered on it from Day 1.

[Malva Zebrina]

39. I thought the war theme a strong one and an opportunity to make at last

all those despicable lies get out on the table. Alas, he was his own worst enemy when he voted that vote. Don't tell me he was not electable unless he did so--he was still a strong man with much experience and good candidate even if he would have voted against it. That one mistake, imo, forever limited his ability to expose the warmonger as the insane man that he is, the futility of the war and his running partner also voted the same way.

On the other hand, perhaps he really did want the war to go ahead. I'll never know . I'm just assuming he would have been against it if it were not for political expediency.

All excuses fell flat, If he said he was hoodwinked, that made the others who voted against it look like dumbasses. As it is it turns out they were right, even if not electable. LOL If he said he was respecting the office of the Presidency, intead of making him look patriotic, made him look like an underling to Bush.

SBV ads were not sufficiently addressed either.

[theangrydem]

40. A BIG FAT F

In all of the post-election spin about how "moral's voters", no one is talking about how badly run the Kerry campaign was, The U.S was willing to replace Dubya, but that had to have someone to replace him with. The Bush people creamed Kerry from beginning to end. Black was white and up was down. A big F for the Kerry campaign.

[AP]

41. A++ the last six weeks. Before that, maybe B+

[leftofthedial]

62. I don't agree with your votes, but I do agree

that Kerry improved near the end, except for one disastrous mistake--raising the issue of cheney's daughter. Right, wrong or otherwise, this served ONLY to arm the repukes with the wedge issue talking point they needed to slander Kerry with his own words and energize their religiously insane and bigoted base.

[mvd]

44. B-

I thought that not responding to the Swift Boat Liars right away was a big mistake. Call a press conference - anything!

In retrospect, Kerry bringing up Mary Cheney was probably a negative, though I thought Kerry won all three debates easily.

It was also a mistake to focus so much on the missing explosives the last few days. We needed to sum up our argument.

We should have lobbied to put things on the ballot that would energize some of our base - lowering the drinking age for instance.

I thought the campaign was decent considering we were running a Senator from Massachusetts who wasn't well liked (though I'll never understand why he wasn't - being Presidential is a good thing!) And decent considering that fraud was likely involved in the results.

[flaminbats]

67. wow, I agreed with a moderator..

Bush gets an A for his campaign, but an F for running the country. If he had run the sorry campaign his father ran in 1992..Kerry would have won with a majority.

The irony was in 1992 Bush got a C- for running the country, but a F on his re-election campaign. In 2000 Bush ran a B- campaign while Gore IMO ran a C+ campaign.

[MrTriumph]

46. F convention, A+ the last 6 weeks

And the party gets an F for not having any counter to the 11 state ballots that had gay marriage bans, although one wonders what, if anything, could have been done. But, you play the cards dealt ya.

[mvd]

48. Agreed about the convention

Kerry's Vietnam service should have been mentioned, but all the focus turned people off. Also, I heard that they were hiding people like Maxine Waters - argh!

[neener3]

63. Agreed....

Starting his acceptance speech with a salute and "reporting for duty" was a huge mistake.

[Walt Starr]

47. F it was a failure

That's about it.

[leftofthedial]

49. ultimately, an "F"--he lost

and quitting prematurely did nothing to soften my evaluation.

truthfully, I believe the fix was in and the "election" was another sham. The Coup of 2000 killed our democracy.

Still, Kerry made many mistakes:

1. raising the issue of cheney's daughter did nothing for Kerry, but it gave the repukes a wedge issue to bludgeon him with late in the campaign. It doesn't matter whether it was right, wrong or what. It was stupid, stupid, stupid and amateurish politically.

2. Allowing the Viet Nam bullshit to become the overwhelmingly dominant issue of the campaign was the major mistake. "I'm not worried about the record in the Viet Nam War. I'm worried about my opponent's record in the current war."

3. Being so noncommital about Iraq. It's wrong. Period. The majority of Murkans agree it is wrong. Kerry's position was weak and fed the perception that he is a flip flopper.

4. Not making the economy more of an issue. How stupid is that?

5. Allowing his record to be painted as out of the mainstream for the last 30 years. "It is not my record 30 years ago that should concern Americans, it is my opponent's record for the last four years."

6. Allowing issues that don't matter to the vast majority of Murkans, but which are potent wedge issues the repukes can use to inflame their religiously insane and heartland idiot base to become major issues in the campaign was inexcusable. More than 50 million Murkans have no health insurance. Tens of millions of Murkans are unemployed and close to 100 million are underemployed. Tens of millions of Murkans have lost their homes, their life savings and their hope for the future. The list goes on and on, yet the Kerry-ites let the campaign become a Murkan referendum about gay marriage and stem cell research. They could NEVER win Murka by being enlightened on that issue.

The repukes picked the battleground, they picked and controlled the debate, they forced Kerry to the defensive and made the campaign about bullshit instead of bush-shit.

In retrospect, if Kerry had been any more incompetent, one might almost believe he was on the little bushturd's side.

[mtnsnake]

56. "made the campaign about bullshit instead of bush-shit"...Well said!!

All your points are right on the money, but I LOVE #6. I hope everyone reads your post and all the other insightful posts in this thread, too. Also, I couldn't agree more with what poster #51 said about the Kerry staffers. Great stuff all around.

[ObaMania]

50. C because he didn't respond to criticism, and F because..

.. he lost his ass and conceded.

[DoNotRefill]

51. F-

There were some pretty stupid things done by the campaign. First and foremost, Kerry should have either posted all or none of his military records. He posted some which obviously weren't all (for instance, an endorsement to a statement, but not the original statement), and they raised as many questions as they answered.

Secondly, Kerry staffers completely bolluxed the Outdoor Life "interview". Once that was done, there was no chance that pro-gun people would vote for him. "Chinese Communist assault rifle" that was really a 100 year old bolt-action rifle? If they are EVER allowed to work on another campaign, their candidate DESERVES to lose. Stupid, stupid, stupid. And the campaign's "clarification" just made them look even MORE ridiculous. The Goose Shooting incident merely reinforced this. And Kerry's posing with Kennedy, Schumer, and Feinstein after the AW ban renewal vote didn't help at all.

In the lingo, it was "charlie foxed".

[erpowers]

52. C

I would probably give his campaign a C. First, I do not think he fought hard enough. On many occasions he allowed Bush and Cheney, two men who did all they could to avoid military, question his judgement because he went to war and then realized the war was wrong. On each occasion his judgement was questioned Kerry should have pointed to the fact that Bush and Cheney both avoided Vietnam even though they both supported the war. Kerry should have pointed out that Bush's and Cheney's judgement was much worse than Kerry's.

Second, Kerry allowed Bush to lie too many times. I watched the Today show on two different days. On each of these days I saw Liz Cheney lie on just about every issue and mislead the public on other issues. The people from the Kerry campaign on those days did very little to point out that Cheney was listing lies that had already been debunked on numerous occasions. In addition, I heard that many of the people who voted for Bush mistakenly believed that he supported issues that he did not, like the Kyoto Protocol. Kerry should have made sure that as many people as possible knew what Bush supported and what he did not.

Finally, Kerry did not talk about his Senate record enough. Kerry was a trailblazer in the Senate on certain. If it were not for Kerry no American, except for those that worked in the CIA, would have know anything about Iran-Contra. In addition, we would not have know about the link between the BCCI Bank and terrorist. Nor did he talk about Cheney's Congressional record or Bush's record as governor of Texas. I know that Bush's gubernatoral record is that completely relevent, Kerry could have linked Bush's record in Texas to his record in Washington. As far as Cheney goes Kerry should have continuously pointed out that Cheney voted against the same weapons systems Kerry voted against and that Cheney went on to vote against raises for troops and against funding the Veterans Administration.

In conclusion, Kerry should have fought harder. Kerry allowed many occasion go by where he could have shown that he was a better candidate than Bush. The major problem with the Kerry campaign was that they took too much from the Bush campaign. The Kerry campaign did not fight back enough against the Bush Campaign. If Kerry had fought a harder campaign he probably would have beat Bush by a large margin.

[ever_green]

53. D

So many times I was pulling out my hair at his ineffectiveness. He was not attacking Bush like the SOB needed to be attacked. Bush was confident and unphased. Kerry just didn't seem to care. Not to the extent that you or I do.

[Cuban_Liberal]

55. "Gentleman's C" n/t

Great candidate, pretty bad campaign.

[Azure]

57. I'm giving it a C-

Repukes are right when they say that we don't learn from history. Our first mistake was to run another Northeastern liberal from "Taxachussets." The second mistake was to devote so much of the campaign to Bush's one (percieved) strong point - war. This ties into the third mistake -- letting the opposition frame the issues and the debate.

On the plus side, Kerry himself was an asset. He projected a Presidential image of strength, intelligence, and commitment. If he had been a Southern governor rather than a Northeatern Senator, we would have won easily (discounting possible fraud). John Kerry the man saved this campaign from getting a D- in my mind.

[Awsi Dooger]

69. Extremely accurate

The entire second paragraph is probably worthy of an individual thread. I completely agree.

My frustration throughout the fall, mentioned on DU many times, was we seemingly overlearned the so-called Willie Horton issue from '88. We mindlessly reacted to everything from the Bush camp instead of ignoring them and framing the issues and the debate on our our terms. Exactly as you wrote it. Whenever I saw a Bush speech on Monday, I automatically knew what our Tuesday commercials would focus on, some meaningless dig by Bush that we felt compelled to respond to. Sheer idiocy.

I saw a program today implying Kerry's background is military and that's what he is most comfortable speaking about, war and foreign affairs. Later today, on a different network, they mentioned a poll which indicated a decent percentage Ohioans were shaky in support of Bush, but hadn't heard enough domestic and job specifics from Kerry to vote for him.

[Carolinian]

65. A+ Kerry, Edward, Terry Mc were all great as were Dean, Clark, K, Lieb.

We have a lot to be proud of. Don't sell these guys short. They put their hearts and souls into the campaign. I love them all.

[Blue_Tires]

66. B-

[dolstein]

68. I give him a B+

I always considered Kerry damaged goods. He's a liberal from Massachusetts whose claim to fame is being one of the leading anti-war protestors. He was despised by the press to nearly the same degree as Al Gore was in 2000. He's politically tone deaf. That's the kiss of electoral death three times over. The fact he nearly won in spite of his many handicaps is nothing short of a miracle.

[liberalpragmatist]

70. B-

First of all, any campaign has major mistakes. There is never going to be a perfect campaign, and I don't think Bush ran a brilliant campaign either. In the end, it was close, and anything could have tipped it one way or the other.

I also think Kerry was actually quite a strong candidate. He had a lot of strengths, and in the last few weeks of the campaign, he was excellent.

I don't think we should sell Kerry's achievements short. He had a lot of them. He got voters who were focused on Iraq and the economy. He made major strides towards making the Democrats competitive on national security. He bested Bush in 3 debates. He represents the votes of 56 million Americans. Those are all great achievements.

In the interest of learning from our mistakes, however, we should list some of the key misjudgements.

1) Letting the GOP Define Us: I realize that Kerry's campaign was broke in the spring, so I'm not sure if there's much they could have done here. If at all possible, however, the campaign should have bought a massive positive media buy and also responded early and often to the Rove flip-flop theme. They should have highlighted his senate career, BCCI, Vietnam POW, and other issues.

2) Having a Theme: Kerry should have early on clearly critiqued the Bush record like he did in the final few weeks. He should also have spoken out much more strongly on terrorism and Iraq, especially Tora Bora and the Abu Ghraib incident. What would have really sealed the deal, however, was having a theme. Voters know that the specifics of a candidate's plans are almost never borne out. Instead, they want to see general guiding principles, and a theme that defines one's presidency. Kerry should have stressed responsibility and fairness. Kerry could have truly hammered Bush on responsibility and, related, accountability. He should have called the Bush administration reckless and stressed "common-sense, responsible, American values" as opposed to the "reckless, don't-ask-questions-style" epitomized by Bush.

3) Iraq: Kerry clearly wanted to speak out on the war, and he finally had had enough by September. He ought to have remained critical of the war from the start. Abu Ghraib was an incredible lost opportunity. He should also have made major hay out of Richard Clarke's charges. Such a strategy would have kept Kerry from looking like a flip-flopper.

Also, in August, when Kerry was asked whether he would have still voted to authorize war, Kerry should have said, emphatically
"An OBVIOUS No!" A "No" because it was consistent with his critique. Adding the "obvious" would have showed resolution and mocked the president for his simple-mindedness. It wouldn't have looked like the pandering of a flip-flopper.

4) Staff Changes - and NO Bob Shrum: After the primaries, Kerry's campaign should have made some limited staff changes. It should have kept the staff small as possible, and changed some of the roles. Now, many of the Clintonistas didn't join the campaign until later, but if possible, they should have been persuaded to join sooner. Sasso should have been general campaign manager and chief strategist. Cahill should have been moved into merely managing the staff. Begala and Carville should have been used. And Shrum should have been demoted to ad-man. Throughout the campaign, Shrum's insticts were often wrong. Kerry would have been better off advised by Sasso, whose instincts were better. Besides, Kerry should have followed his own gut, too, and not let Shrum get in the way.

5) The Debates and Mary Cheney: Kerry's debate performances were excellent. I can't find much to complain about them, although I do wish Kerry had knocked Bush out in the second debate when Bush was challenged about 3 mistakes. Kerry ought to have said "Mr. President, you are STILL Not levelling with the American people! You say you embody leadership, well, Mr. President, true leadership is recognizing your mistakes and promising to correct them. That's what FDR did. That's what JFK and Reagan did. That's what I will do, because the first step to solving a problem is recognizing that a problem exists."

The whole Mary Cheney flap was asinine, but I wish Kerry had never said it. I totally agree that the statement was completely innocuous, but unfortunately, huge numbers of people in the country do not realize that. It became a stupid-media-obsession, tested badly in focus groups, and hurt us with undecideds and conservative swing-voters. It dominated the news cycle and blunted Kerry's momentum out of the third debate. It was such a small thing, I'd hate for that to have been what ultimately did us in, but I can't help feeling that it may have. The debates helped Kerry a lot. And in the end, the result was SO close - any little thing might have helped. I fear the Mary Cheney flap may have cost Kerry a couple points. And a couple extra points would have won us the race. I have no proof, and it's possible it had no effect or a negligible effect. But I fear it did have an effect and that had it not been for the Mary Cheney thing, we would have won, even with all the other failings from earlier on.

[makhno]

71. D for "idiots"

In the words of the republican campaign manager Mark Goodin, "I will never make this mistake again. Next time I will be negative. I will cut the other guy's balls off." Perhaps A Perfect Candidate should've been required viewing at the Kerry campaign HQ.