Politics Blog

“In 30 seconds, this ad distorts the Democrats’ views and impugns their motives more crudely than the Democrats have done to Bush in two years.”

– Slate’s William Saletan on the RNC ad that’s currently running in Iowa and New Hampshire.

Really, Mr. Saletan? Let’s compare it with some of the things Democrats have said about President Bush.

Ted Kennedy: “This [Iraq war] was made up in Texas, announced in January to the Republican leadership that war was going to take place and was going to be good politically. This whole thing was a fraud.”

Howard Dean: “John Ashcroft is not a patriot.”

John Kerry: “We have a fraudulent coalition, and I use the word fraud.”

Weasel Clark: “The party that stole the election in 2000 now wants to steal patriotism from us.”

Dick Gephardt: “[Bush has] declared war on the American people.”

And this is just scratching the surface. If you go through the innumerable Democrat presidential “debates,” you’ll find bilious political hate speech of a truly unprecedented shrillness and volume.

Against this barrage, the RNC (not the president!) runs one mousy ad referring to “some” who’re “attacking the president for attacking the terrorists” and this is supposed to be a negative ad? If anything, I expect and want the ad campaign to be much harsher than this. I hope you ain’t seen nothin’ yet.

– PoliPundit

Weasel Clark had a novel idea to raise money online: Promise a visit from the candidate himself to the zip code that raised the most online donations.

The Clark campaign has been very quiet about the results. You can see why from this table of the top 10 zip codes:

 Rank  Zip Code City  # of Donors
1 20009 Washington, DC 80 2 10025 New York, NY 31 3 10024 New York, NY 31 4 10011 New York, NY 27 5 20008 Washington, DC 21 6 72205 Little Rock, AR 19 7 10003 New York, NY 19 8 06511 New Haven, CT 19 9 10023 New York, NY 19 10 02138 Cambridge, MA 18

As you can see, Clark derives his support from the quintessential heartland cities of … Washington, New York, New Haven and Cambridge. The only city on that list that isn’t a bastion of I-hate-BusHitler liberalism is Clark’s home town of Little Rock.

And those zip codes aren’t just any zip codes. They’re among the most ultra-liberal zip codes in those cities.

A post by a Clark fan on the campaign’s official blog sums up the list nicely:

Sitting in front of my computer here in Central Minnesota, every day I look at the Zip Drive report and am always struck by how all of the locations except Little Rock are East and West Coast. Something that probably could have been predicted. Unfortunately, the immediate impression that I get is that this is another “Coast” politician, probably out of touch with the country as a whole.

That’s not just an “immediate impression,” dear blogger. It’s the truth. Here’s a revealing post by Clark himself, titled “The Repubs stole the election, now they’re trying to steal Patriotism”:

I’m attacking Bush because he ISN’T attacking terrorists but has put us in a mess in Iraq instead..in 2000 the Repubs stole the election - now they’re trying to steal Patriotism–i won’t let them get away with it!

The only way to get that shrill is if you’re spending all your time with the sort of people who live in those top-10 donor zip codes.

– PoliPundit

“They’re just carving each other up. I’ve never seen anything more effective than when they go at each other about who did what 10 or 15 years ago. But the problem I’m worried about is today, tomorrow, next year and the future.”

– Weasel Clark, bemoaning the negative campaigning of his fellow Democrat presidential contenders.

“I didn’t have as much practice skiing as the governor did. He was out there skiing when I was recovering from my wounds in Vietnam.”

– Weasel Clark, taking the most unsavory of potshots at Howard Dean by “questioning his patriotism.”

— PoliPundit

Jonah Goldberg says we have much to be thankful for.

— PoliPundit

If you’re a Stanford alumnus, you might be interested to know that your alma mater is using your donations to build tunnels beneath roadways so that salamanders don’t have to cross the road. The project iscosting $200 per salamander.

— PoliPundit

As I’d noted was likely, GDP growth for the third quarter has been revised upward to an almost-absurd 8.2 percent!

— PoliPundit

Posting will be light today. So here’s a question for you to discuss: What will President Bush’s victory margin (electoral and popular) be in 2004? Click Comments and spout off to the thousands of people who read this blog.

To help you along, here are past presidential election maps. Keep in mind that the electoral map in 2004 favors Bush because of redistricting. Here’s an interactive 2004 electoral map that scales states according to their electoral votes.

— PoliPundit

In 2001 Bret Schundler, the smart Republican candidate for governor of New Jersey, went down to defeat against a mediocre Democrat opponent because Democrats succeeded in painting him as “too conservative for New Jersey.”

Bill Pascoe, who managed Schundler’s campaign, says the lessons of that defeat can be applied by the GOP to crush Howard Dean in 2004:

First, understand why your opponent has problems with significant elements of his base, and drive wedges where you can, to the maximum extent possible; second, recognize that it is not your campaign’s job to tell the objective truth, it’s your campaign’s job to tell the version of the truth that puts your opponent in the worst light possible (it’s his campaign’s job, after all, to do the same to you); third, don’t get suckered into the trap of only talking about issues the media says are important – instead, choose the issue matrix over which you want to wage war, and stick to it no matter what; and fourth, if need be, if you can’t make a legitimate argument against your opponent on a key issue, use your opponent’s party’s position on the issue as the battleground, and wrap it around his neck. Make him pay for the sins of his party. Guilt by association still works, so don’t be shy in exploiting it.

In other words, “Schundlerize” him.

Dean will present such a fat target in the general election that it’s hard to decide where to start attacking him. On his hardcore opposition to Iraq? On his opposition to the PATRIOT Act which, despite the elites’ disdain, enjoys overwhelming support among voters? On his desire to raise taxes on the average American family by well over $1,000? On his desire to reduce the child tax credit, reinstitute the marriage penalty and bring back the death tax? On his signing a civil unions bill? On his support for partial-birth abortion? On his opposition to parental notification when minors have abortions? On his opposition to the medicare prescription drug benefit just passed by Congress? On his call to impose more bureaucratic regulations on businesses? The list goes on and on.

Pascoe also suggests interesting lines of attack on issues where Dean is supposedly less vulnerable, like gun control.

He concludes:

Finally: The media Bigfeet are already projecting your strategy next fall, arguing that Republicans will be running a race against McGovern and Mondale – soft on war, big on tax increases. Don’t limit yourself to these issues just because they’re seen as “more important” by the media. Neither one of those issues makes Dean appear “too extreme” to deserve the Presidency. Neither brings in the cultural value questions that will bring out to vote the four million religious voters who sat out the 2000 presidential election. Neither will convince suburban swing voters that he doesn’t represent their values. Instead of McGovern and Mondale, think Carter and Dukakis – too wimpy to be trusted with our defenses, outside the mainstream on cultural values.

– PoliPundit

Mickey Kaus says that Howard Dean’s campaign needs to start helping the fast-fading John Kerry:

It seems as if the more serious threat to Dean would come if Kerry fades so quickly that a) beating him in N.H. doesn’t look like a big deal and b) someone like Edwards gets to move up and mount a more credible anti-Dean challenge. … In 1984 terms, Kerry is John Glenn; Edwards is at least a potential Gary Hart. … Memo to Dean manager Joe Trippi: Time to start building Kerry up!

— PoliPundit

In the 2004 predictions thread below, reader Scott Elliott points out an interesting presentation by Republican pollster Bill McInturff. The presentation predicts a Bush landslide in 2004. It’s from June 2003; but its predictions are holding up extremely well so far.

— PoliPundit