THE DEAN DOUBLE DIPS:

Punting on First Down (David S. Broder, August 5, 2004, Washington Post)

As one of the distinct minority of journalists who was not blown away by Kerry's performance, I was not surprised at the apparent lack of progress by the Democratic challenger. I thought it was pretty clear that Kerry had not bombed but also that he had not hit a home run -- and I said exactly that on PBS's "Washington Week" on Friday evening and in a column written in the predawn hours on Friday for Sunday papers around the country.

What strikes me now is that many of my colleagues -- and perhaps the Kerry campaign itself -- are missing the significance of Kerry's lost opportunity.

The importance has relatively little to do with the polling numbers. Those will change. What is vital is that this was the first test -- and in some ways the easiest -- for the truly unconventional campaign message strategy Kerry and his advisers have adopted.

Normally the challenger to an incumbent president has two main tasks to perform during convention week. The first is to present a fuller picture of himself, one that is more comfortable to the voter. The other is to lay down in strong terms the case why the man in office should be replaced.

Kerry and other speakers fixated on one brief shining moment in his pre-political career: his valiant service as a Navy officer in Vietnam. It became the all-purpose metaphor -- "I'm John Kerry, and I'm reporting for duty." But it never really merged with the story of his later life, and the American people are plenty smart enough to remember that throughout the 1990s, Democrats insisted that Bill Clinton's avoidance of military service during Vietnam was no disqualification for his serving as commander in chief.

Left largely unanswered -- or only vaguely outlined -- was the question of what Kerry had done with his life in the decades since he came home from Vietnam, particularly in his 20 years of Senate service. President Bush immediately pounced on the omission, suggesting in his very first speech since Kerry's nomination that the senator has few "results" for which he can claim credit as a legislator. The charge is unfair, but Kerry left himself wide open to it.

As for indicting the incumbent administration, Kerry and other speakers soft-pedaled their criticism -- or couched it in cliched terms. And they left unanswered what might be the single biggest question on the minds of undecided voters: What exactly would Kerry do differently to bring the bloodshed in Iraq to an end and secure a stable democracy there? The answer, apparently, is to ask allies for more help, but that calls for a leap of faith. It is not a political strategy.

You know the Senator is in trouble when Mr. Broder goes back to rewrite a column and make it harsher just to make sure he's on record as having buried the campaign first.

Posted by Orrin Judd at August 5, 2004 1:44 PM