An election campaign is like a baseball pennant race: While all eyes are on the importance of the stretch run, it is in the dog days of August where hopes often die.
No matter how close the polls are, John Kerry is already toast. The signs are all there: the changes in those running his campaign, the arguing over which issues he should emphasize, and the feeling of despair settling over his followers. And it all can be traced back to August when Kerry lost momentum to George W. Bush and wilted like the last rose of summer.
The election should have been a referendum on Bush’s first term, but in August it became a referendum on Kerry. Why is that so important? Because when the election no longer became a referendum on Bush, it also no longer became a referendum on the botched peace in Iraq, the record deficits or lost jobs.
The campaign instead became a referendum on Kerry’s perceived uncertainty on the war, on whether he deserved the Purple Heart, and whether his wife is too bitchy to be First Lady. Momentum lost in August may be regained, but rarely in time to win elections.
The prospect of four more years of the Bush administration is enough to drive some of us into melancholia. The second terms of presidents are rarely an improvement over the first. Often the seeds of failure are planted in the first four years, even though the incumbent wins reelection.
The cloud of Watergate hung over Richard Nixon even as he defeated George McGovern for reelection by a landslide. Ronald Reagan’s second term was marred by Iran-Contra. Bill Clinton’s sexual affairs were not unknown when he won a second term, even if Monica Lewinsky was not yet a synonym for oral sex. Clinton’s last four years were spent fending off Ken Starr and impeachment.
In much the same way, the specter of a failed war in Iraq and a budding budget crisis hang over George W. Bush, and those issues are almost certain to ensure failure if he wins a second term. Bush’s mistakes invite catastrophe (an adjective he weirdly uses to describe success but which means abject failure). Even if Kerry won, he would likely have to spend his first term digging out of the deep hole that Bush has created. The solutions would be difficult to get through a likely Republican Congress and equally difficult for the public to swallow.
But at least Kerry would not carry the baggage of having a vested interest in failed policies. True, there would be little chance that a Kerry administration could roll back the Bush tax cuts. This would mean that Kerry would face the choice of abandoning his social programs or increasing the deficit. But at least a new president would have a chance to mend international fences. And a stalemate between Kerry and a Republican Congress would at minimum stop the shift in the tax burden away from the wealthy and onto the back of the middle class.
Bush, on the other hand, is caught in an ideological trap. He has ticked off nearly all of our major allies, which plays well in the red states but dooms us to paying almost the entire human and financial cost of the war. Remember all the jokes from the right-wing talkers when Kerry claimed to be the favorite of foreign leaders? The joke unfortunately is on Limbaugh and company, because a recent poll overseas favors Kerry by a wide margin and also shows the stunning contempt in which Bush is held.
None of this would change in a Bush second term. After all, Bush has campaigned as the leader who never doubts the wisdom of his policies; the one who never admits a mistake, who never changes. He is promising us more of the same in the next term.
Bush is wedded to making his disastrous tax cuts permanent, eliminating any chance to get our fiscal house in order. He continues to wear blinders when it comes to securing Iraq, dishing out sunny optimism while the country heads for civil war.
But Kerry has not been able to take full advantage of either issue. Some of it is Kerry’s own fault. His statement that he would still have invaded Iraq if he knew what he knew today undercut his own rationale that we desperately need a change of leadership. The new details over whether Bush served honorably in the National Guard only serve to distract the media and the voters from the real issues of this election.
We obsess over Vietnam while Iraq burns. Media coverage tends to focus on the campaign as horserace rather than examining the truth or lack of it behind the attacks by Bush and Cheney on John Kerry’s record. Even the weather has hurt Kerry: The extensive coverage of this active hurricane season leaves you wondering if there is an election in six weeks. And it doesn’t help Kerry when Bush is given the opportunity to act presidential in all-important Florida, visiting the ravaged state and handing out federal help.
Kerry is not the only one who is toast. So is Dan Rather. For years, Rather has been on the Republicans’ hit list. The growing certainty that Rather has been had on the Bush Guard documents has given his enemies a sword. It won’t be long after this election that Rather will be announcing his "retirement."
These have not been good times for CBS-Infinity. The radio side of the house has been in deep doo-doo for a while. (In the interest of full disclosure, the columnist worked for a local radio affiliate of CBS-Infinity and his contract was not renewed last year).
Infinity star Howard Stern brings in huge dollars, but also fines from the FCC for obscenity and a threat to its license to operate. Stern has become a severe critic of Bush, openly pleading for his considerable audience to vote against the president.
It may be cynical, but Stern’s attacks on Bush work two ways: If Bush is defeated, Stern will take the credit; if Bush loses and the Republican-dominated FCC continues to give Stern and Infinity problems, Howard can claim it’s a blatant attempt at payback. Stern is not toast yet, but his star is on the descent.
Locally, another Howard working for Infinity is also in trouble. Howard Eskin finally bad-mouthed the wrong attorney. Richard Sprague has exacted the kind of revenge that Eskin’s many enemies in the media have only dreamed about.
The big fines against WIP and Infinity come at a time when the corporation is already reeling from the Stern fines and threats to its license to operate. (Don’t forget the Opie and Anthony debacle that resulted in the banishment of those two clowns, reprimands from the FCC and the firing of Ken Stevens, the general manager of three Infinity outlets including WYSP).
Eskin will return in mid-October, no doubt amid much hype. He will probably posture and make his suspension sound like a paid vacation. Don’t be fooled. He will be on a short leash. Another mistake and Eskin will be toast.
Note: In good humor, a friend recently reminded me of a couple earlier columns that I wrote supporting an invasion of Iraq. He had even underlined some of my key statements. Now I know how John Kerry feels, and I found myself sounding like Kerry when I defended myself.
The truth is, I believed the Bush administration regarding the "threat" that Saddam Hussein posed. That threat turns out to have been a series of miscalculations and outright lies. The rationale was false. And while ridding Iraq of a cruel dictator, the war has served to drain our resources — which should have been used to finish off bin Laden in Afghanistan.
Unlike the president and his men, I don’t see changing your mind when the facts change as a weakness. Like many others, I won’t make the mistake of believing Mr. Bush again.
