Dear Democrats:
I love many of you, but you are going to lose. I had thought that the GOP has been too sanguine -- I'll say it, cocky -- about our chances in '04. But now I am in the fold.
I just came from breakfast at the Brighton Depot (one of johngalt's favorite spots). It is a great place. In the parking lot was a red Lexus with a bumper sticker on the rear window that said "W. Let's not elect him in 2004 either" with the requisite red circle-slash over the W.
As Rimmer tells Lister in "Red Dwarf," it's all wrong. The Lexus is incongruous in the working-class, commercial area of Downtown Brighton, Colorado. Two pickup trucks with Spanish language stickers looked like they belonged -- my Subaru Outback was an interloper, but the red Lexus with gold wheels... A nice, yuppie, 50-something, lawyerly couple was seated a few tables down. I am going to make the leap and say that this car was theirs.
My wife and I did our best sarcastic laughs at the sticker "OOOH -- I get it, 'cause VP Gore really won in 2000 -- hahahahahahaha!" But you are going to lose:
1) You may want to relive those heady, halcyon days of December 2000 in Palm Beach County, but a plurality of the electorate has moved on.
2) You can't beat something with nuthin', as Chris Matthews says. Your sticker endorses "None of the above." How about "Howard Dean! He's our man!" or "General Clark will keep us safe and free!" or "Dennis Kucinich -- he really is from Earth!"
3) You know better. You're much better politickers that the GOP. You're the pros. But your antipathy is going to scare away moderates. Read Tocqueville -- it'll do you some good. You have to appeal to Tocquevillian Americans. President Clinton did. John Kerry will not.
Good luck! Chins up! But you guys are gonna lose.
Posted by jk at September 28, 2003 10:40 AM