Who do you feel WILL win the election?

I ask this question only because much of the public is fickle and uneducated [regarding politics], and will base their votes on propaganda, rumors, etc.

I, as a human being, do not have much faith in the general public (as many of you know), so I am just throwing this question out there as a matter of interest.

Thanks dudes.

i think bush is going to win. hes still got a few tricks up his sleeve, itd be naive to think he'll go down easy. bottom line: he is more willing. more willing than kerry to engage in true realpolitik, and therefor will engineer a win. a lot of people, including myself, think that theyll capture bin laden at a very beneficial time, legitimately or not. by legitimately i mean they held off vigorously pursuing him in the past, and now with the election on the horizon are now trying to procure the capture - or by not i mean they/an ally already have him or know where he is, etc. its easy to blow these off as conspiracy theories, but i wouldnt discount anything yet. theyre certainly willing

<font color=#007AAA face="courier new">There's so much material that the DNC can use leading up to the election to completely destroy Bush. They could have at least five different spots of just press conferences in which he fibbed about, well, almost everything.

Bush is toast. The DNC is just holding back, letting him run what basically amount to flame wars on Kerry and letting him defend himself. Honestly, now that the Bush campaign has started trying to defame Kerry I'm starting to like him more and more. "This is a phony controversy!" Right on, K man.</font>

Eh. All I am willing to say with some certainty is that it will be a close election. I'm not at all convinced that Kerry can beat Bush. However, there are a shitload of new grassroots organizations gearing up with the sole purpose of defeating Bush...so there will be more people out there in the field than ever before. And I think we will see some incredibly high voter turnout this year. But yeah, I wouldn't place bets on Kerry beating Bush. It's weird, no one I know that works in politics (and they are pretty much all Dems) thinks that Kerry will beat Bush.

It's still in the air, I think.

All polls that I've seen have the election going either way wthin their respective margins of error.

It's a terrible shame that Bush isn't losing by 20 percentage points. Given all of the controversies regarding the war, 9/11, intelligence failures, corporate crime, etc., the opponent should be able to blast the fucker in a race. Unfortunately, Bush's opponent went along with him 80 to 95 percent of the way, depending on which day you hear him speak. He's a weak candidate without a distinguishable platform who wants to concurrently agree with Bush and present himself as serious opposition. As a consequence, I don't think a lot of people have confidence in him. Most of my friends who are registered Democrats are completely unenthusiastic about Kerry but will reluctantly vote for him.

It's a sad situation. We certainly deserve better than Bush, but we shouldn't have to settle for someone like like John Kerry either.

I'm not sure how anyone could say Bush is"toast" when in fact it is Kerry who cannot capitalize on what would seemingly be a crushing string of bad news over the past two months for Bush. If he can't pull ahead of Bush in a time like this, how do you expect him to in November when things are relatively better? After symbolic soverignty is transferred, less U.S. troops are involved in Iraq and the economy is rolling full steam ahead?

The DNC ain't got shit that we haven't already seen, unless they're sitting on something no one knows about. Anything they dish out the GOP can throw right back in the form of Kerry's record of flip-flops (both real and perceived). Anyone in Washington will say a candidate who spends more time explaining himself instead of detailing a platform is a goner.

Newsview: Dems Fear Kerry Looks Like Gore

By RON FOURNIER, AP Political Writer

WASHINGTON - It's a recurring nightmare for Democratic strategist Tony Coelho — the party's presidential candidate portrayed as a flip-flopping opportunist, ill-served by a strife-torn staff. It happened in 2000, when Coelho ran Al Gore (news - web sites)'s campaign. Now, it's happening to John Kerry (news - web sites).

Democratic leaders fear he's getting "Gored."

"What the Kerry people don't understand is, it's succeeding," Coelho said.

Scores of Kerry supporters like the former California congressman say their initial response is to remain hopeful, based on polls showing the presumptive nominee tied with President Bush (news - web sites) while the Democratic Party is better funded and more united than in 2000. But they are worried about history repeating itself.

"No question, it's a rerun of 2000," said Donna Brazile, campaign manager for the former vice president's 2000 race.

"Every Sunday, Team Bush goes in overdrive by outlining the upcoming week's attacks on Kerry. It's followed by paid advertisements and assigning top-notch surrogates," Brazile said. "This is the exact moment in 2000 when Gore was seriously damaged as the Bush team painted the former vice president as a `serial exaggerator.'"

Republicans are pressing the same points against Kerry, mocking him at every turn.

"How many times can a flip-flop flip before a flip-flop becomes a flop?" Bush spokesman Steve Schmidt asked in a recent news release.

Said Kerry spokeswoman Stephanie Cutter: "The guy who has the problem here is George Bush, who is stubbornly sticking to the same failed policies, despite the fact that they are hurting this country. ... Asleep at the wheel or stubborn failure? Either way, America pays the price."

Kerry has given the GOP plenty of fodder, including:

_ Voting against the Persian Gulf War (news - web sites) in 1991, in favor of the use of military force in Iraq (news - web sites) in 2002 and against final passage of an $87 billion reconstruction bill for Afghanistan (news - web sites) and Iraq. Explaining that he supported an amendment that would have provided the aid by rolling back Bush's tax cuts, Kerry said, "I actually did vote for the $87 billion before I voted against it." The Bush campaign turned the quote into an ad.

_ The Massachusetts senator, who supports higher automobile fuel economy standards, told reporters last week that he doesn't own a gas-guzzling sport utility vehicle. Asked whether his wife, Teresa Heinz Kerry, had a Suburban at their Ketchum, Idaho, home, Kerry put a razor-fine point on his answer: "The family has it. I don't have it."

Kerry supporters say the White House is throwing every conceivable flip-flop or character flaw at Kerry's feet, just as they did to Gore.

Early in the 2000 campaign, Republicans accused the former vice president of taking credit for inventing the Internet, a claim Gore never quite made. Bush's team also jumped on a suggestion by Gore that he and his wife were the models for the novel "Love Story." The vice president later said he was wrong, and chalked it up to a miscommunication.

Neither incident alone ruined Gore's image, but Republicans planted seeds of doubt harvested late in the campaign by Bush.

During a fall debate, Gore said he accompanied Federal Emergency Management Agency (news - web sites) director James Lee Witt to a Texas fire zone. Gore's campaign later said he inspected the fires, but not with Witt.

It was a small mistake, but big enough for GOP vice presidential candidate Dick Cheney (news - web sites) to say in September 2000 that Gore "has failed to speak the truth" about all sorts of things.

Sound familiar?

"They're painting Kerry as a liberal, and it's succeeding. They're painting him as somebody who flip flops, and they're succeeding," Coelho said, adding that the race is far from over because Kerry has time to show voters his own biography and character. The campaign plans to unveil new biographical ads as early as next week.

Coelho left Gore's campaign in June of 2000, citing health problems. The staff was torn by rancor.

Several Gore advisers who survived that mid-year purge now work for Kerry, including Bob Shrum, with whom Coelho clashed. Shrum fought with Kerry's first campaign manager, Jim Jordan, and first ad-maker, Jim Margolis. Both are gone.

Coelho said he's feels good about Kerry's prospects, even if the campaign structure makes him uncomfortable. Several other Democrats expressed similar views, but only on condition of anonymity.

A senior official at the Democratic National Committee (news - web sites) said that while Karl Rove is clearly running Bush's campaign, Kerry's team appears rudderless.

Kerry has said he won't be a "wishy-washy, mealy-mouthed" Democrat, pledging to challenge GOP attacks in a way that 1988 Democratic nominee Michael Dukakis never did. But he may want to worry more about comparisons to Gore.

"I do think Republicans are trying to Gore him," said Waring Howe Jr., a Democratic leader in South Carolina.

Yeah i wouldn't be surprised if shortly before election time something crazy happens. If Bin laden was to finally be captured or weapons of mass destruction were to be found the votes could seriously be swayed.

I can't believe that it's going to be that close. It's just fucking scary that so many people down there are going to vote for Bush. Unbelievable.

:(

Remember, voters don't care what happens in April, or June or July. Voters pay attention to what happens the last week of October up until the election.

All these "attacks" on Kerry will only make Bush look like he's gasping for straws come September on onward. These non-issues people "care about" now will not even be mentioned in October unless Rove brings them up because he has to - and he probably will.

From now until July is the worst part for Bush, barring another terrorist attack in the U.S. If Kerry cannot show he is capable of cutting through Karl Rove's spin when Bush should in all honesty be behind by about 10-15 percentage points, how is he going to gain enough momentum going into the fall when things are relatively better? Keep in mind Kerry has the luxury of a "dead heat" only when Bush is at his absolute worst.

i am not going to let rove slander make me think my candidate is weak and unwinnable. people who should and would vote kerry are letting gop crap into their systems. do you think right wingers are letting lefties change their opinion of w?

kerry or his family drive an suv? so what? i'm supposed to actually think cars affect him running america? please. arnold has 8 humvees, and i bet the crawford ranch has an suv or two. what nonsense.

i think there are enough people like me who are sick and tired of letting some liar dictate this nation, and i do think kerry will win. i'm not giving that liar an inch in media spin. bad karma catches up with you.

I think Kerry will win. My gut always tells me that Bush is a liar (through omission or on purpose). I don't think that he is good for this country. I would vote for probably 100 republicans before I would vote for him. If a TRUE conservative stepped up to the plate and ran a platform on their ideology, I would support that. Bush is a globalist first and foremost.

Originally posted by homechicago


i'm supposed to actually think cars affect him running america?



Of course not, but the difference is Kerry is supposed to be the guy the Sierra Club and all those environmental groups gave an A+, while giving Dubya a big fat F. It's just hypocritical to blast his rivals for not pushing for better fuel efficiency standards and hybrid/alternative vehicles and then roll up in a gas guzzling Suburban. Plus, he hemmed and hawed about it until finally saying it wasn't his but the "family's." Just another example of him wanting to have it both ways.

i agree. i would vote for quite a few republicans. my vote for kerry will help him win over a true spend-o-crat, w.

what's conservative about hemorrhaging money from americans into foreign countries? what's conservative about breaking an all time high national deficit? what's conservative about allowing outsourcing that undermines and unprotects american jobs? he doesn't understand the meaning of the word.

Er, I wasn't arguing those things, I was just pointing out why his owning and driving an SUV could easily be defined as hypocritical, in relation to his supposed high-minded environmental ideals.

i too think he should get rid of the vehicles if he sets himself that far apart. i guess i was trying to say that the media covering things like a car and trying to build a yes or no opinion of him as president worthy seems stupid. i know people who own suv's and are environmentally conscious. you could own a honda civic and be a single driver instead of taking public transit, you could own a honda civic and not recycle cans, bottles, etc.

in idaho an suv is good in heavy snow. i just don't want him owning an suv to be made into the biggest deal on earth. he votes in favor of the environment, and that means more than if w drove a hybrid because he has tried to dismantle the epa regulations which cause irreversible environmental damage.

I don't think anyone's saying it's the biggest deal in the world, it's just an appropriate example of him wanting to have it both ways, that's all.

Kerry was a truly poor choice. In debates, Bush came off like the everyguy, caring fellow, and Gore came off like the stiff career politician.

So, instead of going with someone like Edwards who also has the everyguy appeal, the Dems nominate the only man on the planet who may be stiffer than Gore.

Originally posted by Nimrod
Kerry was a truly poor choice. In debates, Bush came off like the everyguy, caring fellow, and Gore came off like the stiff career politician.

So, instead of going with someone like Edwards who also has the everyguy appeal, the Dems nominate the only man on the planet who may be stiffer than Gore.

<font color=#007AAA face="courier new">Whenever rightists point this out they forget to mention that Gore won the popular vote and was only kept out of the White House because of all the stuff in Florida.

I mean, it's not like Bush won by a landslide.</font>

Thank you all for posting here. It really helps me to understand the US election better!