Obama's now president, a major success for the Democratic Party, along with their majority in both House and Senate leading to a Democrat-controlled US Government (that true to modern Democratic form has failed to make any serious changes to the policies in place since Bush). But, it is sometimes a good idea to look back at what went before. In this case, what went on before was John Kerry.
I'd like to think that the reason John Kerry was nominated to as the Dems' candidate in 2004 was all part of a cunning plan to ensure the election of Barack Obama. I mean, it was either that, or a very large practical joke. Because I refuse to believe that as Democrats, the party of FDR and Kennedy, and Clinton, men who had so much charisma they were getting some on the side even during their presidencies,would be able to nominate a man like John Kerry, who had all the charisma of an old gym sock. I mean, sure, we nominated Al Gore in 2000, but to be fair, we also thought that George Bush was an inbred hick and that America could see right through his "I'm a political outsider, yeehah" routine. We were stupid in 2000, we were cocky. We'd gotten Clinton through impeachment precedings, and yet they'd be totally unable to remove him from office. We thought we ruled the roost. So we gave Al Gore the nod, against a field of Republican loonies, who promptly nominated the looniest and least qualified of them all, George W. Bush. Who surprised us all by running a close enough election in Florida to have his Dad's Supreme Court nominees choose him for President (FACT: The Supreme Court Justices in 2000 represent only the second time in the history of the country that people were legally allowed to vote more than once in one election and have their vote counted twice. The first time was the 1824 election, wherein the US House of Reps elected another son of a President, John Q. Adams. FACT: He also sucked at his job).
So we learned in 2000 that having someone who inspired confidence would probably help us defeat Bush.
I mean, when you think about, there's no way we could have lost in 2004, even if we hadn't been trying. The economy was in the dumpster (although it got worse four years later), we were engaged in two wars, one of which was highly unpopular and the other one of which no one gave a damn about after we won, Bush had a historically low approval rating. The country was ready for change.
But, somehow, we nominated John Kerry, who promptly shot himself in the foot, then cut that foot off and beat himself with it until he passed out. The man was a war hero, yet they painted him as a traitor. Bush was just as highly educated as Kerry was, and in fact, Bush was even more of an aristocrat, being the son of a President and the grandson of a Senator who had been on Eisenhower's shortlist for possible GOP Presidential nomination in 1960 (Read more about Prescott Bush's shady past here), but somehow, it was Bush who was the man of the people, and Kerry who got labeled as a rich, eggheaded elitist from the Northeast.
It's almost like we were trying to lose.
Actually, there's no doubt in my mind that that's exactly what was occurring. See, the nomination of John Kerry was, in fact, a long-term strategy, to get Barack Obama elected president. The DNC knew that America looked to be at rock bottom. But, like the stock market, where you're betting on the stock that does the best in the long run, the DNC is was betting that Bush could do worse. And they were right.
By running Kerry, the Democrats knew that Bush would win reelection, and screw the country for another four years. If the Dems won in 2004 there would be no guarantee they'd get anything but the Presidency. Congress and the Supreme Court would still stay red. In fact, just that happened. In two years, America was so hopping mad that in my state of Rhode Island, we got to choose between the incumbent, a pro-choice, pro-gay rights, pro-green, and pro-tax, anti-war Republican, and the challenger, a pro-choice, pro-gay rights, pro-green, and pro-tax, anti-war Democrat. The candiates were exactly the same. And we chose the Democrat, merely to stick it in Bush's (read: Cheney's) eye.
After four years of this, the Democrats got to run anyone they damn well pleased. In fact, the old tradition of a white guy for president, a streak that had gone unbroken for 43 out of 43 of the past Presidencies, got thrown completely out the window. "We can't really decide whether we want to run this black guy, or this woman" the Dems said. The black guy won, because the Dems have been a party of the minority, ever since the Republicans started screwing the minorities over by also being the party of big business, back around Harding.
I mean, if Kerry had been President from 2005-9, literally anything could've happened. The Republicans could've found some Eisenhower-esque guy to run. The Democrats could have disintegrated into a million pieces as they seemed about to do immediately prior to and after the 2004 election. It would've been really hard running a candidate that broke any sort of barrier in the years following 2004 if Kerry had run. As The Onion said, Barack Obama's election proved the nation had fallen so far, that it was finally willing to social progress and elect a black president.
So really, Kerry represents a cunningly crafted and executed plan by the DNC to blindside the Republicans in 2008. It worked perfectly. After all, they got so worried and nervous they started making even more mistakes: McCain suspended his campaign briefly, they chose Palin as a Vice-Presidential candidate. They basically screwed the pooch until they were charged with bestiality.
I mean, the DNC's plan was so ingenious, it even involved the sabotage of Howard Dean's campaign in the primary in order to later make him DNC Chairman and completely change the leadership of the DNC. That takes some serious cunning to pull off.
I'd hate to consider what it would mean if it didn't happen this way.
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
No comments:
Post a Comment