March 1, 2004
LAST MINUTE APPEAL:
Voters See a More Belligerent Edwards (ADAM NAGOURNEY, 3/01/04, NY Times)
After a frustrating year in which his high-tone campaign won him precisely one Democratic primary, John Edwards took what perhaps was the biggest gamble of his candidacy at the New York debate yesterday. For 60 lively minutes, he strained to highlight differences with John Kerry, growing so exercised that he even sent a mug of soda spilling across the table. [...]To a certain extent, Mr. Edwards has found himself in a box of his own making as Mr. Kerry has rolled up victories week after week. He got where he is today — or at least, where he was when he won South Carolina nearly one month ago — by running a campaign in which he presented himself as the only Democrat in the race who was not attacking his opponents.
While Mr. Edwards was certainly tougher on Mr. Kerry yesterday than he had been before, it was by a matter of inches, rather than yards. And by the time Mr. Edwards escaped New York City and made it up to Albany for an airport rally, it seemed that the old Mr. Edwards was back.
"If you've been watching the presidential campaign one thing you've seen is some Democratic candidates attacking each other," Mr. Edwards said. "If you are looking for the candidate who is good attacking the other candidates, that is not me."
If he can't take out John Kerry why would we want him to be the guy going after al Qaeda? Posted by Orrin Judd at March 1, 2004 10:00 AM
Compared to Edwards over the last three weeks, Joe Lieberman was Rambo, the Terminator and Dirty Harry all rolled into one during his abortive presidential campaign. Maybe it was just the sight of Dan Rather that suddenly turned Edwards into a comparitive wild man (though at least he didn't run over to the moderator's chair, knock him down and ask, "What's the frequency, Kenneth?")
If reports at kausfiles and elsewhere that Kerry doesn't like Edwards are correct then Edward's nice guy act for the VP spot may have been for naught.
Posted by: AWW at March 1, 2004 12:31 PMIt looks like the nice guy act is more groundwork for 2008 than for V-P this year. Edwards can run as an outsider then, too. And he can go as negative as necessary on HRC, where it will be seen as 'toughness', because he already proved how nice he is.
Posted by: jim hamlen at March 1, 2004 2:53 PMI agree with Jim. It serves Edwards better to wait till 2008. It serves all of us better too for him to pose an obstacle to Hillary. As for Kerry in 2004, I am not sure. A purely Electoral College strategy would have made Edwards somewhat useless (not sure he would help pick up any Southern States).
Increasingly, I see Dems aiming to squeeze a victory using the 2000 Red vs Blue template aiming to pick-up two or three marginal Red states. This could lead them to pick someone who could swing MO, OH, WV their way. Conventional Wisdom would declare Gephardt to be that person. Without knowing how either Kerry or Gephartd thinks about this, a Kerry-Gephardt ticket would be easily the most liberal if not straight anti-business ticket in recent history. With proper GOP campaigning, it may end up NOT picking up those states AND losing CA to boot (where Arnold is making a big push out of the importance of being pro-business).
I am not sure what would happen if Kerry picked another Mid-Westener, like Bayh. Is a harder ticket to criticize, but it would do little to energize core constituencies of the party. In that scenario, Bush would only lose if he blows it. But if he stays the course, high Dem turnout alone would not quite do it.
I think that the Richardson angle could yield a higher popular vote (or avoid a true blow out), but I can't see them delivering the marginal electoral wins they need.
Posted by: MG at March 1, 2004 3:21 PMNobody casts votes for VP. With rare exception, voters don't even look at the VP---they basically make their decision based on the Presidential candidate.
The only people who I can possibly think would vote differently based on the VP candidate would be his home state. But even then it's a pretty stupid reason to change your vote.
Posted by: ray at March 1, 2004 9:19 PMA good VP candidate is one who is an effective surrogate, whipping up support for the top of the ticket while the Presidential candidate is campaigning elsewhere.
Thus, although the vote might hinge on the Prez candidate, the enthusiasm may be due to the VP candidate.
Posted by: Michael Herdegen at March 2, 2004 12:03 PM