[Mb-civic] NYTimes.com Article: Kerry at the Wheel

Tue Jul 27 20:02:37 PDT 2004

The article below from NYTimes.com 
has been sent to you by michael at intrafi.com.

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Kerry at the Wheel

July 27, 2004
 By DAVID BROOKS 

It was a winter's night in Iowa, round about midnight. John
Kerry should have been wrapping up a town meeting, but he'd
decided to go into his "I'll answer every question'' mode.
Most everybody desperately wanted to go home, and insects
and other small life forms were perishing from boredom.
Every time he'd launch into another Castroite soliloquy -
on the history of the Middle East or the pay structure of
the civil service - the audience would groan. I sat there
listening to this drone, thinking, "If this man becomes
president, I have to stop being a pundit because I know
nothing about politics." 

I didn't realize that tediousness is John Kerry's greatest
trait. I didn't realize that a country barraged by a decade
of Gingrich, impeachment, hanging chads and war may
actually be looking for a Brezhnev to give it a break. 

I didn't realize how much this campaign would feel like
George Bush's run for a third term. So much stuff has
happened over the past four years, he's already built up
two terms' worth of animosity among his foes and two terms'
worth of exhaustion in his friends. 

It's not that voters will ever love Kerry, but it could be
that if you presented them with some variety of an
interesting candidate, they would recoil and like that
candidate even less. 

I also didn't sense that the Democratic Party is just sober
enough to realize it needs a designated driver like John
Kerry to get it home at night. This is a whacked-out party
that has spent the past year throwing back Howard Dean
hurricanes, being gripped with Michael Moore fever and
indulging in Whoopi-esque animosity binges. 

And yet there's that moment when you are drinking, before
you get really blotto, when you realize that you have just
enough sobriety for one last lifesaving act of
responsibility. For the Democrats, nominating Kerry is that
act - and now he's running a professional, disciplined
campaign. 

If the convention program reflected the collective party
subconscious, the first night would feature a life-size
rubber Dick Cheney doll, and the speakers would take turns
throwing it around the stage. And yet the Kerry party elite
is insisting that everybody wear a responsibility corset.
Restrain yourself. Be positive. This is sound advice from a
man who never met an emotional tide he didn't opt out of. 

This could be the only political environment in recent
memory in which it actually helps to have spent 20 years in
the U.S. Senate. The Senate is like the "Top Gun" school
for bores. It takes people who have certain natural
facilities for pomposity and it turns them, by putting them
through years of pointless droning, into weapons of mass
narcolepsy. 

Look up Kerry's radio address from Saturday. No banality is
left behind. If a soporific sentiment is hit upon, it must
be repeated. Kerry has the virtues of a fine bore. He is
steady, persevering, deliberate, unflappable and safe. This
could serve him well. 

He has unified the party through sheer force of prolixity.
Bill Clinton pandered by telling you what you wanted to
hear. John Kerry panders by never telling you what you
don't want to hear. This is negative pandering; he talks a
lot without really ruling anything out so you can draw your
own conclusions. 

Over the last few days I have spoken to Democrats who are
firmly convinced he is a hawkish free-trading fiscal
conservative who believes that life begins at conception,
that marriage is between a man and a woman, and that the
U.S. should bulk up its forces in Iraq. I've also spoken to
other Democrats just as convinced the Kerry is really a
protectionist, socially liberal dove who actually opposes
the war and supports gay marriage and nationalized health
care. 

Kerry has been talking for years, and yet such is the
thicket of his verbiage that he has achieved almost
complete strategic ambiguity. 

All this may work. But there is still more to learn. Is
Kerry a little dull because he is steady and sensible, or
is he just incapable of making up his mind? Is he
prudential because in times of crisis the nation needs a
steady hand, or is he cautious because he simply doesn't
grasp that we're in a new world, confronted by a rabid
ideological foe? 

This is what I'm hoping to discover in the next few days.
Either way, if he wins, I'm not quitting my job. In this
age of Kerry, I'm flip-flopping on that one. 

http://www.nytimes.com/2004/07/27/opinion/27broo.html?ex=1091983757&ei=1&en=0a13f9c663d9d35f

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