As New Hampshire Democrats vote on whomever to nominate, the campaigns of the candidates are getting quite sloppy.
Kerry's campaign now consists of either "I'm telling the media that Dean is mean to me" or "vote for me because I was in Vietnam." Quite frankly both are the top two lamest (and oldest) political tricks. Under close examination, the "Candidate A is negative" trick is a negative attack in and of itself. And what's the problem with someone making accusations? If I get called a communist on oh-I-don't-know Hummer forums, I present my case and try not be a complete wuss. And the war hero thing is sickening. Gee I fought in a war, therefore vote for me because fighting in an aimless war OBVIOUSLY constitutes foreign policy experience. Instead of trying to turn his experience into something that shouldn't be repeated for millions of others (such as the Vietnam War), he prides himself as taking part of that aimless war. But then again political whores aren't practical or principled. Kerry voted AGAINST the first Gulf War (during which time Saddam DID try to take over the Middle East and controlled over half the world's oil supply for a brief time) but Kerry voted FOR the second Gulf War in which Bush II fabricated evidence. So much for foreign policy experience expected from a senator.
Edwards's folksy condescension campaign of "GEE YAAAL I'm positive ahhhll the whhhhay" is enough to make me puke on Kerry's face. I live in Texas, but I can't stand the guy's demeanor. It's like "Gee yhaawl, I'm the stereotypical Southern idiot." A vote for Edwards is a vote strengthening unfair stereotypes. Edwards makes the South look like a joke by his incessant mention of his textile mill worker father and that he was the first in his family to go to college. You ain't no log-cabin Lincoln, you are a high-priced lawyer, who in his WHOLE career didn't take a single pro bono (free) case. Oops, we sure forget our roots in the courtroom but not on the campaign trail!
Clark, having raised thousands of dollars less than two years ago for Republicans, is a waffler. It doesn't matter if he's a good general, his dedication to the side he thinks is winning is disgusting. Like Edwards, Clark had tried to ride the poor train by declaring that he didn't go to Yale. It's a disgusting thing to underclass yourself just to get voted for.
Dean has now shown himself as a coward. Instead of getting even more angry after his YEAAAAAH screech and Geography Bee appearance, he backed off and tried to show himself as a mild-mannered man. That's not good. Each time Kerry went to cry to the press about Dean's justified negativity (this is a campaign after all not Oprah), Dean should have asked Kerry to stop acting like a mama's boy clinging onto his mother's skirt. Whenever Dean was hounded as a foreign policy novice by all the other war monger candidates, he should have arrogantly declared that he is the only one in the field who predicated what a horrible mistake the war was. Instead Dean has calmed his rhetoric down.
People might have noticed that Joe Lieberman was not critiqued. Oh yeah, he's out of the race.
In a small sidenote, I have not seen an actual TV show which discussed ISSUES. As if pundits were bad gamblers, they like to place their bets and predict who's going to win. Here's a shock: the media made itself look like a clown by switching Florida from Bush to Gore to Bush to whatever in 2000. Why do the media whores think that predicting winners days (and even months) before the de facto election will make them look any more credible? Pundits should go to the tracks instead of blabbering on TV.