9/06/2004 10:43:02 AM|||Nathan Moore|||

John Kerry's self-destruction isn't quite complete, and isn't what one would call "pretty", but like watching a train wreck, my eyes cannot avert themselves.

The Note, ABC's daily must read for all who are politically interested, sums it up nicely

Are John Kerry's chances of winning the White House imperiled by the fact that there were more frustrated-blind-quote-driven, sausage-making-process-oriented stories from inside his campaign this weekend than there have been cumulatively about the Bush campaign this entire cycle?

The answer thus far is "Yes!".

And the interesting follow-up is the Kerry campaign's response to the GOP convention. The Kerry response to President Bush's speech on Thursday was perhaps the most pathetic thing I've ever seen in politics. It seemed desperate, likely because it was, and desperate is not a quality the American electorate looks for in a president. Bob Novak does it best

[The Republicans] figured Kerry would want to close the door on investigation of his own combat record. He instead delivered a glancing blow at Cheney's student draft deferments 40 years ago and then, in a meandering stump speech, drifted from health care to Iraq and back to health care. His late-night audience, in the picturesque Ohio town square, seemed anesthetized."

The new Kerry message-of-the-week is even better

The campaign is spending its Labor Day talking about the economy, jobs, and health care with a new report entitled "A Failed Record: Jobs Quality," which slams job creation and workers' benefits under the Bush Administration, complete with a conference call with former Labor Secretary Alexis Herman and the campaign's economic policy adviser, Jason Furman, to explain it.

Just what the Kerry camp needs - a further emphasis on nuance, which combined with a poorly conceived uber concentration on Vietnam, has gotten him into such a political quagmire (or mush, as the Senator from Georgia might prefer it).

To wit

Coming out of the Republican National Convention in New York, President George W. Bush now holds a 11-point lead over Democratic challenger Sen. John Kerry (52 percent to 41 percent) in a three-way race, according to the latest NEWSWEEK poll. The poll was taken over two nights, both before and after Bush’s acceptance speech. Respondents who were queried only on Friday, after Bush’s speech, gave the Republican a 16-point lead over Kerry.


That's right - those polled after Bush's speech preferred the President by a 16 point margin. A quick read of the rest of the article on the Newsweek poll shows Bush gaining ground on all key subquestions. The best part is this - it's a registered voter poll. Polls of registered voters, as opposed to likely voters, tend to sway Democratic. So the minimum that Bush is up is 16 points after the speech.

Chew on that John Kerry.

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