Replies

The correct tactic for Bush here is to use wit, humor, jokes to dig deep (real deep) into Kerry (his votes, his stance, his flipflops, his non-accomplishments in the senate). Drive the base supporting Kerry nuts and thereby forcing Keery (with his own very dry humor and long winded answers)to fight back. The nastier Kerry looks, the more he will lose in the tiny middle slice of the voting public. If one assume the R base will bascially cancel out the D base this fall, this election will be decided by less than 10% of the middle slice. The question for this middle slice is do you want Lurch be in your living room for the next four yrs or you wanna have the folksy common man who is less stiff for four more yrs.

Wit will go a long way for Bush in this election. His greatest advantage is the ability to sum up complex issues into a single one-liner for the public. The public need not to know HOW you are going to get the bad guys, just say, we are going to get them, no hole is deep enough for them to hide...that's more than enough. Better than the long-winded answers like ok, we will get nato approval, we will get UN approval, we will talk to chiraq, have a summitt blah blah...

I happen to agree with Morris on this issue. Bush should stay positive; the ads should be negative.

I think that strategy is a wise one.

Good read on the battle tactics. Keep weighing in on the culture war, you sound like you know what you're talking about.

RNC, listen to this guy!

The correct tactic for Bush here is to use wit, humor, jokes to dig deep (real deep) into Kerry (his votes, his stance, his flipflops, his non-accomplishments in the senate). Drive the base supporting Kerry nuts and thereby forcing Keery (with his own very dry humor and long winded answers)to fight back. The nastier Kerry looks, the more he will lose in the tiny middle slice of the voting public

I agree with you. And, I don't always agree with Safire, but I thought he was right on the money here.

BTW, last night on the Daily Show, the host Jon Stewart mentioned this column by Safire in talking to the guest, NY Dem Senator Chuck Schumer.

Schumer claimed Kerry was only talking about the GOP "attack machine" and claimed the Dems do not even have an "attack machine."

But, I think Jon Stewart knew that Safire, not Stewart, had it right as to how Kerry's crude comments and subsequent non-apology was understood by some voters. And, it was not received well, IMO.

More gaffes like this from Kerry and he will lose the interest of certain voters. As Kerry once said to Howard Dean: "You can't make 15 gaffes a week and be president." Same holds true for Kerry. And lately it's been one gaffe after another (these crude comments; then: "foreign leaders support me," etc.)