No, I’m not taking this poll that seriously. When a poll of likely voters shows a bigger Democratic lead than among registered voters, it’s a little suspect. But I have absolutely no doubt that there has been a profound mood-change in the country toward president Bush. Some of this is a result of the Democrats’ dominating the media during primary season. But much of it is also due to the president’s extraordinary drift, incoherence and – at the same time – cockiness. That’s a lethal combination. People have registered that the WMD issue has undermined one argument for the war. But instead of acknowledging this forthrightly and making a strong case for the war’s morality and the importance of Iraq’s democratization, the president has fallen back on self-satisfied platitudes. People know that public finances are in a terrible shape. But the president first denied the problem, then minimized it, and then argued that tax cuts would cure it. No one is buying it. There has been little coherent defense of the education bill, or of the administration’s environmental policies. There is, in short, no argument for a second term. Instead, we’re told that the re-election theme will be: I’m a strong leader in a time of change. But leading where? We don’t know. If the president wants to get re-elected, we should.
EDWARDS IS WINNING THE SMART VOTE: Or so says Noam Scheiber:
Less sophisticated investors just pick the stocks whose prices they’ve heard are going up. More sophisticated investors actually do some research about the companies they plan to invest in. Up until yesterday, Kerry was that tech stock that the girlfriend of the cousin of the guy down the street said was a can’t-miss opportunity, while Edwards was the unheralded stock of a company with a little-known but solid product.
Judging from the way Kerry timed his victory speech last night to bump Edwards off the air mid-sentence, it sounds to me like he’s getting scared.
I still haven’t met a clued-in Democrat who’s enthusiastic about Kerry. But Edwards hasn’t yet clinched the deal. He’s got two weeks.
The Dish 