Former President Bill Clinton, in a 90-minute telephone conversation from his hospital room, offered John Kerry detailed advice on Saturday night on how to reinvigorate his candidacy, as Mr. Kerry enlisted more Clinton advisers to help shape his strategy and message for the remainder of the campaign. (NYT)
I'm glad John Kerry is getting advice from the #1 magician in American politics. I was, in fact, totally dumbfounded in the closing couple weeks of Al Gore's 2000 campaign that he was too proud to let Clinton campaign with him.
But beyond the question of whatever advice Clinton might give him, this story is the absolute best possible lead campaign item for today's Monday morning paper. The Times was the first to break the story, but its structure indicates that its basic contours were shaped by Kerry staffers. It's a great story for a number of reasons:
- it makes Kerry, not Bush, the lead story on the Monday following the RNC
- it links Kerry very strongly to America's most popular Democratic politician
- it changes the story from "the Kerry campaign is in trouble and searching for a new direction" to "John Kerry is getting the best advice in the whole wide world" (and Kerry managed to change the story in a quick, decisive way that bodes well for the coming weeks)
- it's got the added drama of Clinton being in his hospital bed (some have mused that Clinton's going into the hospital for bypass surgery and perhaps pushing Bush's convention off the front page is a very, very nice turn of events for the Dems)
- most importantly, it sets up future media coverage detailing "John Kerry's sharper attack on Bush" and discursively creates a break between Kerry's unfortunate August and the remainder of the campaign
- the story also repeats several variations on "Mr. Kerry's aides emphasized that this was an expansion of the staff for the fall campaign and did not represent another upheaval of the Kerry campaign" - which is obviously just window-dressing, but saying it over and over is still a good idea.
I also love that today's Washington Post quoted a retired math teacher in Norristown, Pennsylvania, as saying that "jobs, health care, the environment and not lying are the important issues" in the presidential race. I just love the idea that "not lying" has become an issue. Maybe the Kerry campaign should take it up. As in, "John Kerry and John Edwards - stronger on jobs, health care, the environment, and not lying."
In other news, unfortunately my home state of Michigan is going to to have an antigay state constitutional amendment on November's ballot. The hastily formed Coalition for a Fair Michigan is going to do its damnedest, but we have less of an organizing base in Michigan than in many states. Please contribute! Also, check out the website of Citizens for the Protection of Marriage and note that the country coordinators' phone numbers are listed on the website. As a private citizen, please call up these volunteers who have chosen to make their names and numbers public, and have a conversation with them about what gay people's rights mean to you.
Finally: check out some wonderful lines from Big Whicker Ventriloquist about the prospect of waking up and realizing that "George W. Bush is still in your bed...."
1 comment:
Thanks for the plug! I do think the Clinton bypass is perfectly timed. I'm glad all of those Big Macs chose this week to make their presence felt, assuming that they were going to do so anyway. If Clinton can get himself inducted into the Arkansas Black Hall of Fame (it's a fact!), surely he can have a sick bed effect on an otherwise dire Kerry campaign...
bwventril(.com)
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