I agree - a Kerry victory - and a Bush pledge of allegiance
As I've said for some weeks now, Kerry will win, and that's not just whistling in the dark. I gave several reasons yesterday. http://www.giveyoujoy.net/001555.html .Kim Amaral came back with another: Bush is only preaching to the converted. He keeps his own spirits up - he says - by "feeding off the crowds." But as everyone knows, the crowds are highly artificial. He talks only to people who have signed apledge of support to get into the event. This is the most isolated president in history, living in a total fantasy land. A good deal of the press will wake up Wednesday morning saying: "Well, this is what we should have told you. "
Any ways - here's how Newsweek columnist Eleanor Clift see it:
It’s hard to game the election with all the conflicting polls, but my prediction is that it will break at the last minute for Kerry. With more than two thirds of the undecided voters saying the country is on the wrong track, Kerry should win. Bush got 47.9 percent of the vote in 2000, and that’s where he is stuck today. A record voter turnout is expected, and that signals change, not four more years of the status quo.
Oh - and speaking of preaching to the faithful, Josh Marshall ran an incredible extension of this the other day. Apparently some crowds are saying a "pledge of allegiance" to Bush. This is downright spooky - but then, a lot of those folksbelieve a 5-year-olf can be a born again Christian, saved by Jesus, so . . . here's what Josh reported:
Can you say 'cult of personality'?Posted by Greg Stone at October 31, 2004 04:27 AMChris Suellentrop has a half bizarre/half chilling report from the campaign trail in Florida last night. It's about what seems to be a new feature of the Bush rallies: the pledge of allegiance to President Bush.
Here's Chris ...
"I want you to stand, raise your right hands," and recite "the Bush Pledge," said Florida state Sen. Ken Pruitt. The assembled mass of about 2,000 in this Treasure Coast town about an hour north of West Palm Beach dutifully rose, arms aloft, and repeated after Pruitt: "I care about freedom and liberty. I care about my family. I care about my country. Because I care, I promise to work hard to re-elect, re-elect George W. Bush as president of the United States."
I know the Bush-Cheney campaign occasionally requires the people who attend its events to sign loyalty oaths, but this was the first time I have ever seen an audience actually stand and utter one. Maybe they've replaced the written oath with a verbal one.
I believe in one father, one son and one other son, who's now governor of Florida, who will take over after this son retires from office in 2009.
-- Josh Marshall
