>I think, however, with all due respect
>that lefties campaigning for Kerry can do more damage than good. The
>only folks these can mobilize are their fellow travelers and assorted
>liberals, and these are already highly mobilized. The task is to sway
>middle Amerika to pull the lever for Kerry, and since most of that crowd
>tend to be conservative, religious, and patriotic - it is more likely to
>be turned off by left endorsements.
This is where we might differ. Half of the potential electorate does not vote and much of the non-voting population are poorer and less white than the voting half. So there are a lot of solid progressive appeals to motivate their turnout at election time, not necessarily couched in Marxist cant, but in appeals that Kerry will raise the minimum wage, provide health care to the working poor, and provide more funds so their kids can go to college. Turnout will be the key in this election, not motivating the swing votes.
Folks are bemoaning the meltdown of the "Kerry campaign" as if the media fight is where the action is (despite the fact that a number of the polls still show the race nearly even). It matters but as important are the thousands of activists working full-time and the tens of thousands of volunteers building turnout in the battleground states. National polls are interesting but this election is decided in the electoral college, as folks should remember from 2000.
What's amazing to me is that for decades, the Left complained that too much effort was spent on media appeals to swing voters and not enough on turning out largely ignored poor voters. Well, we have major groups like Americans Coming Together mounting the largest voter turnout operations in American history, and they are barely being discussed as a factor in this election.
But more than these dirty ads from Bush, those turnout efforts will end up being the real story of this election.
Nathan Newman