The Fix Is In

A year ago, before anyone had heard of Dean, the story was that the Democratic party insiders had already decided on Kerry as the nominee. And today it looks like that’s what’s going to happen. Dean just “peaked too soon,” as Richard Nixon might have said. He wasn’t able to endure the relentless negative campaigning that blanketed Iowa over the last few weeks. (Negative campaigning, and exaggerated scrutiny, of the sort George W Bush never received from the press, and that Kerry probably won’t receive until after he is nominated).
Now, I’m not a big fan of Dean, and the fact that he’s a psycho in the mold of John McCain may indeed be a handicap. He might well not be able to win, but he would have at least an outside chance, the kind of long odds a risk-taking gambler would put down money on.
(For what it’s worth, I still think that General Clark has the best winning chances of any prospective Democratic candidate. The smoothie Edwards might have a chance, too, just because he’s a Southerner, though I doubt that his phoniness is good enough to really carry things off. But then, neither Clark nor Edwards is going to get the nomination, any more than Dean will).
Kerry probably has the nomination sewed up; he probably had it sewed up, as I said, a year ago. But he has no chance whatsoever of beating Bush. He has loser written all over him: he’s a tired, colorless hack in the exact mold of Mondale, Dukakis, and Gore. When will the Democrats ever learn? They would rather lose every election from now until eternity, than allow a single breath of fresh air to enter the chamber of mummies that they laughingly call a “party.” And we pay the price, in the form of one-party rule by the predacious Bush clan and their sycophantic retainers.

A year ago, before anyone had heard of Dean, the story was that the Democratic party insiders had already decided on Kerry as the nominee. And today it looks like that’s what’s going to happen. Dean just “peaked too soon,” as Richard Nixon might have said. He wasn’t able to endure the relentless negative campaigning that blanketed Iowa over the last few weeks. (Negative campaigning, and exaggerated scrutiny, of the sort George W Bush never received from the press, and that Kerry probably won’t receive until after he is nominated).
Now, I’m not a big fan of Dean, and the fact that he’s a psycho in the mold of John McCain may indeed be a handicap. He might well not be able to win, but he would have at least an outside chance, the kind of long odds a risk-taking gambler would put down money on.
(For what it’s worth, I still think that General Clark has the best winning chances of any prospective Democratic candidate. The smoothie Edwards might have a chance, too, just because he’s a Southerner, though I doubt that his phoniness is good enough to really carry things off. But then, neither Clark nor Edwards is going to get the nomination, any more than Dean will).
Kerry probably has the nomination sewed up; he probably had it sewed up, as I said, a year ago. But he has no chance whatsoever of beating Bush. He has loser written all over him: he’s a tired, colorless hack in the exact mold of Mondale, Dukakis, and Gore. When will the Democrats ever learn? They would rather lose every election from now until eternity, than allow a single breath of fresh air to enter the chamber of mummies that they laughingly call a “party.” And we pay the price, in the form of one-party rule by the predacious Bush clan and their sycophantic retainers.