Maureen Dowd article

[Clinton Crusader]

http://www.nytimes.com/2004/09/12/opinion/12dowd.html?hp


September 12, 2004
OP-ED COLUMNISTS
Westerns and Easterns
By MAUREEN DOWD

It's a remarkable feat, but teeter-tottering John Kerry is even
managing to land on both sides of the ambition issue.

For his entire life, he was seen as so ambitious to be president, as
so eager to consort with heiresses, that it was off-putting; his St.
Paul's classmates played "Hail to the Chief" on kazoos when he walked
by, and in the Senate, Bob Dole mocked the Massachusetts senator's
love of cameras by nicknaming him Live Shot.

But this summer, when that lust for power should have been coursing
through his veins, Mr. Kerry grew timid and logy. He let the Bush
crowd and Swift boat character assassins stomp all over him and, for
the longest time, didn't fight back. He stumbled into every trap Bush
Inc. set.

Finally, the only Democrat who has fended off the WASP Corleones
reminded the nominee of the prep-school mantra: punch the bully in
the face, and do it in the same news cycle.

When he hasn't been busy with his quadruple-bypass operation, Bill
Clinton has been chatting with John Kerry on the phone from the
hospital, urging him to juice it up. The Clinton posse - James
Carville, Paul Begala, Joe Lockhart, Mike McCurry, Stan Greenberg,
Lanny Davis - has intervened to prop up the sagging leadership of Bob
Shrum, who had advised Mr. Kerry not to go negative (and allowed the
once-hot John Edwards to vanish without a trace).
<more>
:kick:

[blm]

1. Dole was trying to shoot the messenger. Kerry had to get camera time to

get the story of IranContra and BCCI out to the public while the Bush thugs and their GOP operatives tried to DISMISS HIS FINDINGS AS CONSPIRACY THEORIES.

Dole and the rest of the Bush thugs chose to cover up for terrorists and their financial dealings while Kerry was working to expose them.

Dowd should SHUT THE FUCK UP if she can't figure out why Kerry was attacked so viciously back then.