Okay ZEB, you asked for my rebuttal to your points. I am aware this is mostly a matter of opinion guys. Who knows who will win. There’s a news story out saying that the US is pressuring Pakistani intelligence to cough up Bin Laden during the Democratic primaries (stealing the spotlight). So who knows what will happen.
The recovery is soft (weak) and it is mostly geared to Wall Street and not towards middle class America. All of the actual job numbers are well below the predicted numbers (we see this kind of news manipulation constantly from this administration! They are constantly revising their estimates downward, after a big PR announcement). Almost all the “new” jobs are in the service sector… in other words “McJobs” as hamburger flippers, etc. (Team Bush wants to call those burger-flipping jobs “manufacturing” jobs! Hey, when you put a pickle on a burger, you’ve built something… a Whopper). Even if the economy comes roaring back in the last few weeks before the election, that will not change the average person’s mind about their experiences over the last 4 years
John Kerry is not as boring as the GOP would like to stereotype him as being. I honestly doubt you’ve seen enough of Kerry to have formed that opinion on your own ZEB! As far as Kerry’s state of origin, I don’t see it as a factor. I just don’t think it will matter in swing states.
I don’t think things are going to change that drastically in the next few months in Iraq, unfortunately. Iraq is going to be in turmoil for years, not months.
The Bush campaign is incredibly negative. That tends to turn people off. Negativity does work, to a point, but it can certainly blow up in the president’s face.
Bush leads in total warchest but Kerry is close enough that it is not going to trump any other factors (like the President’s record, for example).
This is my favorite reason, ZEB. Kerry is a master debater (there’s a joke there) and he is going to make Bush look foolish. Bush will come off looking like a poseur without any real handle on the facts. Edwards will also come off with big wins against Cheney, who strikes people as a scary and irritable grouch. Debating is how John Edwards earned a living as a trial lawyer. I can’t wait to see these debates!!!
First, not too many people will cast their vote in a presidential election based on the Vice Presidential choices. Second, John Edwards seems to have a disposition that people really respond to. If anything, he will be a plus. A lot of people like John Edwards as a candidate… you may not like him, but he was a popular choice with other people.
“Interesting” is one way to describe Bush’s poll numbers. Other people might use the words “alarmingly bad” to describe these pre-election poll numbers for an incumbent president.
The bottom line will be Bush’s record. Bush does not have a record of clear accomplishments he can point to, that do not appear tainted. Every so-called accomplishment could also be described as a liability: The Patriot Act, the war on terrorism, the tax cuts, the prescription drug bill, and so on. These are not clear accomplishments, because many people would describe them as negative (either handled badly or just plain wrong).
Bush also hasn’t spelled out a positive message for the future, at least not yet! Bush doesn’t seem to have a plan, other than “just wait until those tax cuts kick in, and spark a big recovery”. That is Bush’s plan for reducing the trillion-dollar deficits he ran up. I think many people are starting to see that waiting around for the tax cuts to kick in is not enough of a plan.
-Kerry rates evenly with Bush in the polls on security.
-Democrats lead in polls on “who does a better job with the economy”.
-More than half of all Americans believe that the Iraq war is not worth it, and that Bush mislead us into getting involved.
-Well over half of all Americans believe “the country is headed in the wrong direction”.
Those are not good indicators for a second Bush term. Most voters know nothing about Kerry at this point. But a second-term election is a referendum on a President’s first term, and I don’t think Bush will receive a passing grade.