Kamikaze Kerry
The New York Post's Deborah Orin comments on the apparent political futility of John Kerry's jumping on the sinking ship of CBS's attack on President Bush's National Guard record: "Kamikaze Kerry Rides Along With Loser Dan." Someday, I'd like to meet the Post's headline writer:
Ask outside Democratic strategists, and they all say it makes zero sense for Kerry allies to piggyback on the Rather attacks against Bush's National Guard service now that the anchor's credibility is melting like the Wicked Witch of the West.Worried Dems say it shows lack of discipline, lack of strategy, lack of message and freelancing — just what a slipping campaign can't afford. "It's stupid, it's stupid, it's stupid. Get off the National Guard and all that bull. Every day we talk about the National Guard and Vietnam is another day that George Bush wins. No one cares about 30 years ago," a top Dem says.
Another tells of a focus group of swing voters this week where no one even mentioned Rather's Guard flap but an unnerving number "parroted back" attacks on Kerry as a flip-flopper who lied about his Vietnam service. "The Kerry people think they didn't attack Bush hard enough. They're dead wrong. More attacks on Bush aren't a reason to vote for Kerry," this strategist says.
Others suspect the driving force in going after Bush on the Guard is a deep rage inside Kerry and wife Teresa...over how the Vietnam issue has backfired on the Democrat candidate. By this theory, Kerry simply can't accept the fact that the anti-Kerry Swift Boat Veterans for Truth seriously damaged him with TV ads challenging his war and anti-war record.
Kerry, they say, is fixated on getting someone to do similar damage to Bush.
Except that Bush didn't run as the "National Guard candidate" in the first place, and, given that he's been President for four years, no one thinks that what he did in Alabama thirty-two years ago will shed helpful light on how he might perform in his second term. But the Kerry camp apparently can't figure this out.
