The media pundit's pundit. Written by NYC insider Jeff Jarvis, BuzzMachine covers news, media, journalism, and politics.
Voting against, cont.
: Chas Rich says he, too, has seen the DNC campaigning to beat bush rather than to elect Kerry.
He has further evidence with a classified ad, shown here. Hmmm. And I thought the guys coming after me in New York were volunteers. Back in my day, we volunteered for campaigns because we cared, not because we were paid.
Hey guess what! People want to vote Bush out of office. We should be shocked? Honestly, please wait until the convention before we get nervous here.
Whetever works. Republicans crash Democratic party phone lines, or “erroneously” place 60000 blacks on “ineligible to vote” lists.
Democrats hire people to work the streets.
Slight difference, ethically.
Whetever works. Republicans crash Democratic party phone lines, or “erroneously” place 60000 blacks on “ineligible to vote” lists
*SNORT* the Democrats never do anything of the kind, do they Angelos? *cough* disqualifying FL military votes * cough*
Please save us your self-righteous indignation
Jeff, we’ve seen so much of you whining about how you want to see Kerry do this, say that etc. Yet you support the flawed candidate that he is.
Why? What is your deciding factor, especially in light of your previous support for Gore (ashamed yet?) I’m guessing it’s typical dogmatic partianship, but I’ll give you a reason to explain and prove you can think for yourself….
It’s going to be really weird if Kerry wins, to have a guy in office because of who he isn’t, rather than who he is. And Kerry’s message is pretty much just that which is the most disappointing.
I think people are going to be disappointed though when they find out anti-Americanism is here to stay – with or without Bush. John Kerry can kiss as much Euro-hiney as he wants but it’s not going to make much of a difference.
Although as InstaPundit points out, it will be a relief to see the media switch gears and begin focusing on the positive aspects of Iraq instead of this constant drumbeat of failure.
The Democrat victim shtick is wearing very thin. Bill Clinton, to his credit, recognizes this.
Al Gore fell naturally into the victim role after the Florida vote count fiasco.
There was a time when the Democrat/Union message was very relevant, and we should never forget that. It is now a relic of the industrial age.
Kerry is railing against outsourcing, how droll.
And I am supposed to believe that he has the understanding required to shepherd our children into the fierce competition of an emerging global economy?
Be serious.
As information technology becomes more pervasive and the means of production become more portable, we are going to find ourselves in the fight of our lives. Heck, we are already.
No amount of protectionist rhetoric will prevent it.
The American people and the Democratic constituency deserve better.
Walking into the future facing backwards is not responsible policy, nor is it presidential.
Examples of hypocrisy:
a) telling everyone you’re not a bush voter but running a rapid war blog
b) telling everyone the media sucks and is dividing the country and then being crassly snarky and petty
c) claiming the dems are abusing you and then constantly abusing each and every dem that you your self see.
d) censoring commenters for saying f’ while using f’ all the time yourself
Jeff, heal thyself.
I think you’re missing it on the media bias there g wiz. Liberal, conservative, naaah. Two biases (among others) pertain here:
(1) A nice big story. Like, for example, a war. We had some pretty uncritical support for this war during the run-up (hello, Judith Miller). But this isn’t anything new. The electricity in the media body during that time is both visceral and coolly logical. Exciting to be ‘scribe in the foxhole;’ practical because the news leaps to the forefront of the national conscience, wiping away the placehoder stories like miners trapped in a shaft or this year’s Bangladeshi floods.
(2) Muckraking. Clinton got it, Bush is getting it now. But there’s just so much more muck during any kind of big gamble like this. Even if Bush had done competent work, there’d be things the press would find–probably on the level of Halliburton and their $85,000/year Sopranos-at-the-construction-site jobs. It’s the nature of the beast. One good ‘gotcha’ makes your day.
It’s pretty silly (read: disingenuous) for the Bush Administration to ride the wave of (1) without complaint, then be shocked at (2). They know the game. Likewise, anyone who dislikes Bush, like me, shouldn’t only be shocked at the (1) while benefiting from (2).
The handover to Kerry won’t be nice but for about six weeks. March 2005, the drumbeat begins again. Sure I’m worried, but at least this pooch can’t be screwed as badly this bunch has screwed it.
Yep, ‘anyone but Bush’ qualifies in that last paragraph. I also happen to respect Kerry, and I’d really love Biden at State.
Oh, in regard to the classified ad which Jeff has posted. I actually interviewed for one of those activist jobs some years ago.
I went into the interview proudly wearing my liberal ideals and my heart, on my sleeve. The person who interviewed me was more interested in whether I had what it took to talk people out of their hard earned money.
I wonder if it is different now?
http://www.georgewbush.com/VideoAndAudio/
and
http://www.johnkerry.com/videos/
Contrast and compare. Who is running the negative campaign?
Is it Kerry’s fault this his grassroot supporters want Bush out so baddly?
Just compare the TV advertisments DNC vs. the RNC. pay for.
That says a hell of a lot more.
The Bush message is simple: Let the buyer beware!
The weekly rag here in Austin has been running ads like that for a couple of months now.
That’s right. The Bush message is simple. It sells way easier. And your right John. It’s message is to utilize fear, uncertainty, and doubt to win votes.
To say that only the Dems are doing so is disingenuous at best.
I expect better here.
No offense Jeff :) I’m a avid reader :)
Voting against, cont:
http://blogs.law.harvard.edu/crimson1/pictures/viewer$1984
I’m still laughing at the “grassrootedness” of this effort!
John Kerry’s first day in the Oval:
“Hey, I’m not George W. Bush. I fulfilled my entire electoral mandate, and it isn’t even lunchtime yet.”
i think instead of squinting your eyes to the “anyone but bush” mantra you hear and see out there, you should allow it to be what it is: real feedback.
meanwhile, how ironic that this is one of the first times in a long time that there isnt even a mildly interesting third-party candidate running for president, and yet that mantra continues to remove bush.
what’s also odd is the people are interested in doing it not through the impeachment process, as logic would imagine when you have a president who brought us to war due to “evidence” of wmd, but through the faulty and clunky election process.
if i was kerry i would keep my damn mouth shut, which seems to be precisely what he’s going to do.
the first time i would open it would be in an arena where it would actually serve him to speak: a debate against the mumbling president, or the hoopla of a convention.
kerry is acting along rule number one of any successful organization: if it aint broken, dont fix it.
Here’s my two cents,
Jeff great post.
Open minds = open thoughts
You get the most out of something when you have the capacity to take in all sides.
Keep up the good work.
Everyone please stop bad mouthing politics. This is politics. It is a competitive sport. A showing of the dirty laundry. The only way we will ever find out about the politicians skeletons is if the other guy tells us.
It is a great system and it has been working this way forever to one degree or another.
Great article about the loser known as Jimmy Carter. John Kerry reminds me most of him.
Jimmy Carter – Click Here
Back in the old days we volunteered to work for a candidate….yup. And icecream tasted real good then too. People still do voluteer work. In fact I have afriend who is going from New England to Florida for two weeks of voluteer working for Kerry…
Back in the old days we volunteered to work for a candidate….yup. And icecream tasted real good then too. People still do voluteer work. In fact I have afriend who is going from New England to Florida for two weeks of voluteer working for Kerry…
John has it right. These ads are looking for work-the-phones or work-the-streets fundraisers. See also the perennial favorite in college newspapers “Summer Jobs to Help the Environment”.
Walked past the Avalon on upper Connecticut yesterday, where, of course, Fahrenheit 911 is playing.
Two college kid in DNC T-shirts taking information.
“Would you like to help kick Bush out of the White House?”
“Absolutey not,” I replied.
A similar encounter occurred the day earlier at 18th and Pennsylvania.
I assume this is the same drive as mentioned in the ad you’ve posted here. (I’ve seen similar fliers on bus kiosks here in D.C.)
I mention this because it’s the fundamental weakness and moral failing of the Democratic campaign this year. These kids didn’t say, “Help put a Democrat in the white House,” or “Help elect John Kennedy.”
They said, “Help kick Bush out of the White House.”
A pathetic rationale for a presidential political campaign, but the obvious choice the DNC has made. Kerry’s a loser, so let’s attack a president during wartime.
It is obvious that the Democrats have decided that only way they can defeat Bush is to undermine the war.
It goes like this:
“Bush is a liar”
Well…. if that is the main issue, either he is, or he isn’t. I trust, respect, and have even come to admire President Bush. And what’s more, I believe he is a moral man, and that goes a long way in my book.
“Oh, well, even if he doesn’t always lie, he’s a moron, and so it follows that his administration is a moron too, get it?”
No, actually I don’t see how one necessarily follows from the other.
“Well……….. take our word for it, and we know………….Did you know John Kerry was in Vietnam?”
Weak
Go take a job and dork it. The party of the working man would surely understand.
The Democrats also believe that the US is unable to hold its own elections and have requested that Koffi Annan and his ME cabal run elections here. God ,what a joke–asking the useless UN to run elections here while that useless bunch can’t decide whether the Arabs are perpetrating a genocide in the Sudan. Democrats wanting to entrust the most important act of American democracy – to an institution, which is corrupt and crooked. Do you Democrats have no pride?
“wanting to entrust the most important act of American democracy – to an institution, which is corrupt and crooked.”
Hey, it’s just as bad as entrusting oversight of elections to the Democrat and Republican Parties. But I guess if the elections are going to be overseen by corrupt and crooked sheisters, they might as well be domestically produced corrupt and crooked sheisters.
With such a positive message, you might also be seeing these ads next summer…and the summer after that…etc.
And someone needs to tell Melissa that “whitehouse” is actually two words.
The Democratic Party anno 20004 is beyond pathetic.
No message, no ideals, no substance.
2000 was the last time I voted Democrat. Never again.
I love it.
Hire and pay a bunch of people to help defeat Bush by adding jobs to the dole! Aren’t declaring these people? Then how do you expect us to take their money for the common good?
“Republicans crash Democratic party phone lines, or ‘erroneously’ place 60000 blacks on ‘ineligible to vote’ lists.”
Er, actually that was a list commissioned by the previous administration… that would be a Democratic administration. Nice try.
Waaaaaa!
Waaaaaa f*****g waaaaaaa.
Oh and would you like some cheese and crackers to go with your whin? Oh wait, that’s not wine, it’s Jack Daniels.
Sorry, my bad.
Oh, and are there any WMD at the bottom of that bottle?
The website http://www.pleasevote.com is a call to vote the Bush administration out of office. Richard Serra contributed an illustration of Bush eating a baby, based on Goya’s “Saturn Devouring one of his Children” that appears on the site’s home page. The image will also appear on the back cover of The Nation magazine, issue date July 5, 2004. How low will the leftists go?? Such hatred! Such scumminess! Such classless pricks.
The so-called “artist” Richard Serra (I learned that construction from the lefties) should have known this has been done before and lacks any originality or creativity. About a year ago this Goya treatment was done in a cartoon of Ariel Sharon. Anti Americanism and anti semitism are becoming indistinguishable.
Why do Jews vote for Democrats? Beats the hell out of me. The Jews I know don’t vote for Democrats.
The characterization of an entire group because of the actions of a few. The same can be said for many far right sites.
I am, however, going to e-mail PleaseVote. They have their heads up their asses. Would any of you on the far right do the same when similar divisive tactics are used?
That was evasive and dissembling, Karl. Go to your room.
the first time i would open it would be in an arena where it would actually serve him to speak: a debate against the mumbling president, or the hoopla of a convention.
Because we all know that any Democrat is so much smarter than the mumbling president that he would defeat him in a debate without trying hard.
Just like Al Gore did.
Oh, wait …
The only thing worse than believing your own press is believing your own press about someone else. Misunderestimate President Bush’s strategery at your peril.
anne.elk:
1. Can’t take a little debate? He doesn’t like Bush and also isn’t real happy with the current attitude displayed by many Democrats, which is pretty much the kind of ‘homeless’ feeling a third of the population of this country feels.
2. He goes after people who think Bush is Hitler or as bad as Bin Laden. He goes after people who don’t argue fairly, and thus undermine real debate we need to be having, and I thank him for that.
3. There are a lot of people in the US who feel the Democrats have lost their focus, have ridden the wave that was the Civil Rights Movement right into the beach and have nothing but “Bush is Hitler” left to chant when there are a 1001 issues out there for them to grab. It’s frustrating. I’m so glad someone is willing to point it out.
4. I have no idea about the cursing thing.
Until someone gives me some excellent, positive reasons to vote for Kerry, I’m writing-in Tony Blair in November.
[span class=DemonstrateAbsurdityByBeingAbsurd]
We Democrats must work to defeat George W. Bush, the smirking frat-boy chimpanzee drunken moron who staged 9/11 to give a pretext for a racist war for oil (’cause Israel paid him to!) so Halliburton and Enron could build a pipeline in Afghanistan and distract us all from how he stole the election in 2000. Plus, he’s a fucking idiot! We can’t let this drunken moron defeat us with his negative campaign tacticsand foul language of hate. Fuck Bush! Vote Kerry!
[/span]
Dear Mike,
It’s too darn early to hit me with those ‘1984’ moments. At least ask if I’ve had my coffee yet.
Love,
Alice
Alice: Here, have another double latte on me.
And another thing: $300-500 per week is only $7.50 to $12.50 per hour. No health coverage, no pension? Why, those evil, exploitative capitalist pigs! Why can’t the DNC pay a living wage? It’s not like Mrs. Kerry and George Soros don’t have the money.
“Hey guess what! People want to vote Bush out of office. We should be shocked?”
Mr. Fish, meet Mr. Water.
“Chas Rich says he, too, has seen the DNC campaigning to beat bush rather than to elect Kerry.”
Very true. I’m coming to suspect that the real, underlying dynamic here may be “Daddy doesn’t love me; so I hate Daddy.” It’s the only hypothesis I’ve seen so far that actually fits the observations.
So with a job posting like that, who gets credit for job creation? The Democrats for actually providing the job, or Bush for providing the environment for that job to be created.
Pay people to spread hatred, is this the ticket?
Well, the Dems have nothing positive to say about Kerry, so their only alternative is to smear Bush with leftist lies. Sad thing is that there are gullible people willing to drink from their sewer. The Nation is even willing to run this garbage. Our biggest threat may not be terrorists overseas–but the ones right here spewing this crap….and those buying it.
http://homepage.mac.com/cfj/.Pictures/please-vote-ad.jpg
At this point it’s like watching a pitcher who can’t find the strike zone, has loaded the bases, and threatens to turn a three-run lead into a one-run loss. And then he starts a vicious beef with the umpire over balls that weren’t close.
The crowd is booing. They’ve just handed this president a new low for job performance rating. Nobody is thinking about the relief pitcher. They just want this train wreck off the mound before his next pitch leaves the parking lot attendant with a depressed skull fracture.
Oh, yes, the terrorists are cheering for the relief pitcher. They know they can hit many home runs with him on the mound. The terrorists hate Bush. {If the world is to be freed from the tyranny of terror, the American people must will it so through their support of courageous leaders who mean it when they say, “Enough is enough!” The terrorists will continue their heinous efforts to thwart the American will. The U.N., France, Germany and others will continue to try to gain control for their own interests. The world’s socialists will continue their anti-American campaign, and the Democrats will surely continue to manufacture excuses to bash the president. }
http://www.worldnetdaily.com/news/article.asp?ARTICLE_ID=39261 Good read.
The Florida miltary votes were illegal under Florida law because the deadline for filing them was up.
A worldnetdaily cite! This should be fun!
Okay, done. Who wrote that article, a seven-year-old? The rah-rah in that piece is so second-rate makes Michael Moore look like Barbara Tuchman.
Being put on the side of the terrorists is so RAD! Thanks for being number 65 to do so. This even though I was two miles from the WTC on 9/11, lost a colleague and made my place into a boarding house for Battery Park City refugees. Thanks, Kat!
And the simplistic generalizations continue…
http://www.johnkerry.com/pressroom/speeches/spc_2004_0227.html
“America
Back to the original thread:
I had one of those robot phone calls from the Kerry campaign on my answering machine a couple of days ago. It sounded like Kerry himself, and it was asking me to “press 1 to send Bush back to Texas.” And my reason for voting for Kerry is supposed to be that he is not GWB?
By my rough estimate, there are at least 30 million or so men and women who are not John Kerry and meet the requirements in the Constitution. Why Kerry? As far as I know, there is not a single piece of major legislation that owes its existence to Kerry’s authorship. That’s after nearly 20 years in the Senate. Why do the Democrats continue to nominate mediocrities? Do they not know the difference between mediocrity and moderation?
Kerry’s voting record is far to the left, but coupled with his lack of meaningful legislation, I don’t think it’s because of any deep convictions on his part. It probably betokens intellectual laziness and political caution: it’s easier and safer to vote the party line, especially if you neither understand nor care much about the issues.
The man is a $100 haircut with nothing underneath it.
Hey Mitch. It’s July 3. The election is $800 in haircuts away. Plenty of time to learn more about saving a fellow soldier’s life in Vietnam, the long record in Congress, the multitude of policy positions. But do you really want to hear the VN heroism story more? Bringing that up was the beginning of shrub’s screaming downward spiral.
But you’re right, the Dems are discriminating against qualified bald men in favor of a man whose credentials merely put the current office-holder’s to shame. They should in the future include men of inexpensive hair styling habits–or of no hair at all–who also have more qualifications than Bush, Quayle or whatever halfwit the Republicans cart out. I like how that bolsters the applicant pool by millions.
Personally I think the Mort Kondracke ‘do sets the standard for what the Republicans should find more of. (Please don’t claim he’s a Democrat. He’s a paid-for wingnut through and through.)
djangone –
The ad hominems are nice, but you failed to respond to a single substantive point that was made by the other commenters…When logic and argument fail, just attack the messenger, right?
The point being made is this: Kerry has to pay for his “grass roots.” By definition, that means it’s NOT “grass roots”: it’s bought-and-paid-for campaigning. There is a true difference between those who volunteer for campaigns because they believe in the candidate or cause and those who do so because they’re being paid to do so.
Regardless of your personal attacks, when your candidate has to pay people to be enthusiastic, it’s a major problem. You can continue to delude yourself that everything is hunky-dory in DemocratLand and amuse yourself by making snide remarks in Jeff’s comment section…OR…you can recognize the obvious problem with your candidate’s campaign and work to correct it before it’s too late….
It’s your choice…but all your snarky comments ignoring the crux of the problem is going to buy you is four long years of whining and wondering how Kerry could have lost the election you were so utterly confident was rightfully his…
The crux of this most recent problem is going to be my first real ad hominem. You’re boring, Jim. Jim, you’re boring.
djangone –
Well, at least you’re consistent…If this is the best you can muster to paper over the problems with your candidate’s campaign, then get comfortable because the next four years are going to be very long ones for you indeed…
Bookmark this page…Perhaps reliving the glory of the snarkiness you chose over working to actually help your candidate instead will keep you warm while you eat the cold gruel that will be President Bush’s next four years in the Oval Office…
Mmm mmm good…Enjoy! Have a nice day :)
Dietary advice from a winger. Thanks, that’s a first. Sixty-five ‘you’re a traitor’ and now one ‘cold gruel.’ The balance is shifting in unexpected ways…
In case you haven’t figured it out, I’m not in the least bit interested right now whether there’s any moral lassitude in the equation anti-Bush != pro-Kerry. Whatever gets the kiddies out. If this was September, I’d be a little queasy, but it’s July. This thread is a preemie.
It’s also a tautology. To win, one must ‘knock off the incumbent.’ The incumbent never runs to ‘knock off the challenger.’ He’ll say that he ‘looks French’ as a desperate way to associate him with the Gallic Satan. He’ll smear, smudge and have his surrogates use the term ‘Hanoi John’ whenever possible. I’ve seen fifty campaign work ads with ‘Defeat Bush’ messages, and they’re fine: it’s the challenger’s role to do the knocking off.
Yes, Bush is vulnerable. Sadly, the Democrats don’t want to win badly enough to nominate a credible candidate for right-of-center moderates. Someone like, say, Lieberman.
Instead, they push forward Kerry, a guy who turns off even many of the moderate left, and who has evidently decided that his best shot is to focus on his opponent’s weaknesses instead of his own strengths.
As they say, “Anybody but Bush” will not be an alternative on the ballot.
Please… People are paid to work on campaigns all of the time. There are also people who volunteer, too. There is more than one way to organize. Think about it. Grassroots groups do it all the time.
Also think about the tactics in the state of Massachusetts: Gov. Mitt Romney’s administration is paying tens of thousands of dollars to Republicans who will run against incumbent democrats in key communities.
Paying someone to break his/her back this summer to go door-to-door in the hot sun, fighting the elements, just to encourage people to vote doesn’t seem like such a bad thing to me. If a Bush supporter came to my door to encourage me to vote I’d be just as happy to see her or him as a Kerry supporter or anti-Bush activist. I’d be happy to talk to him or her about his or her beliefs, happily engage in debate and wouldn’t bat an eyelash if I learned he/she was getting paid to do it. It’s just smart organizing.
I would agree that it doesn’t matter to the “end-user” whether the person doing the door-knocking is a paid employee or an unpaid volunteer – but it matters a great deal to the campaign itself.
John Kerry has raised record amounts of campaign money and has record amounts of 527 money supporting his challenge. Between the two, they have raised more money than Bush…yet Bush has (at last estimates a week ago) twice as much money in the bank as the Kerry campaign.
Ask yourself why: look at Jeff’s post and you’ll find your answer. Bush has spent a great deal of time and effort organizing unpaid volunteers to do the “grassroots” stuff while Kerry has to pay people to do it…Think of how many precincts there are and how many people it takes to cover a precinct…and you’ll see why the Kerry campaign is leaking money faster than the Titanic…
It doesn’t matter a lot before the conventions while Kerry can still raise money and the 527s can still put ads on the air, but when September and October come around, the 527s have to go dark and both campaigns are limited to spending identical amounts of public financing money – which campaign is going to have the decided advantage? The one that has to choose between running more ads and keeping employees on the payroll or the one using unpaid volunteers that faces no such choice?
Add to this the fact the early Democratic convention is going to already put significant restrictions on Kerry’s funding after the convention while Bush can continue raising money through the beginning of September…
Hence my response to djangone…He (or she) evidently doesn’t understand the fundamental problem this presents the Kerry campaign and how significant this is to the endgame…Election winners aren’t determined by well you run the first furlong: the winners are the ones who have enough left in the tank to make it down the final stretch….
It may not matter to you, but come September/October it will matter more than is readily obvious today…and Kerry’s campaign and his supporters ignore the peril at their own risk….
Mine was a response to Jeff’s comment: “Back in my day, we volunteered for campaigns because we cared, not because we were paid.”
There are many efforts going on at a grassroots level in support of Kerry. From my standpoint, I know that busloads of volunteers are headed up to New Hampshire as the campaign heats up.
So. Paying college students to raise campaign contributions is somehow at odds with American grass-root politics? Offering a young person an incentive to enter into politics, interact with American voters, and probably get into some debates and mudslinging. How is this bad in a capitalist society? Bush
