A reminder about Dole/Kemp
John McCain continues to wrap himself in the mantle of Dole/Kemp to prove his winning conservative bona fides. He’ll probably invoke their names 100 times at CPAC later this week.
In case you’ve forgotten what a disaster Dole/Kemp turned out to be 12 years ago or willfully blotted it from you memories, here’s a timely reminder with some themes that echo today. Via Time magazine, Oct. 21, 1996:
Remember how in sandlot baseball games sometimes nobody on your team could hit the ball, and you’d be behind by, say, 16 runs in the final inning? And yet, if you were the last kid to strike out, you were considered the one who lost the game? Well, that’s how Jack Kemp felt after last Wednesday night’s debate against Vice President Al Gore.
Never mind that the Dole-Kemp ticket trailed Clinton-Gore by 16 points in the polls. Never mind that Bob Dole had gained no ground against President Clinton in a televised debate only three nights earlier. Never mind all that, because many senior Republicans had already resigned themselves to Dole’s incoherent campaigning and likely defeat. But there was still a good chance Republicans could keep a hold on Congress and make a better run for the White House in 2000. And in both those struggles Republicans attached their hopes to Kemp, who seemed to be everything Dole was not: energetic and visionary, smiling and articulate, able to draw big crowds and connect with them.
And then, with 45 million people watching on TV, Kemp was judged to have badly lost his debate against Gore. That’s what three instant TV polls said. That’s what a panel of debate coaches said. And worst of all for Kemp, that’s what prominent Republicans said, on the airwaves and, more vehemently, in private. “A disaster,” thundered right-wing icon Rush Limbaugh. “We need new leaders!” Many of the callers to his syndicated radio show expressed amazement and anger that Kemp passed up debate moderator Jim Lehrer’s invitation to critique President Clinton’s ethics, even on such public matters as the collection of FBI background files by the Clinton White House or the President’s alleged dangling of pardons before his Whitewater associates.
Conservative columnist George Will declared Kemp to be “verging on incoherent.” Bill Bennett, a co-chairman of the Dole campaign, was worried that his close friend Kemp was “concerned too much about being ‘nice’ and not enough about winning.” Bill Kristol, editor of the conservative Weekly Standard, complained that “if you came down from Mars and saw this debate, you might think that Al Gore was a moderate Republican…and Jack Kemp was the Democrat.” Even Dole, in an interview with ABC’s Ted Koppel, cracked that Kemp and Gore got along so famously that “it looked like a fraternity picnic there for a while.”
Tuck that one-liner away. May come in handy during the fall presidential debates.
The dysfunction that currently prevails inside the Dole campaign explains why, within hours of the debate, the finger pointing was well under way. Dole’s campaign manager, Scott Reed, who once served as a top Kemp aide, put out the word that he was so disappointed with Kemp’s lack of fight that he refused to speak with his former boss after the debate. He was particularly upset that Kemp failed to use several scripted zingers. For instance, at some point when Gore cited arcana from Kemp’s record, Kemp was supposed to ask, “Say, Al, did you get that out of my FBI file?”
For their part, top Kemp advisers insisted to TIME that neither Reed nor any other campaign official had asked Kemp to attack Clinton’s character. Dole himself had sent the signal that the tactic might backfire, they said. “Our surveys show,” Dole told ABC, “that a sure way to lose the women is to do the tough stuff.”
The problem is that Dole can’t seem to decide how to take Clinton on. “I hear a lot of contrary advice from men and women along the rope lines,” he conceded last week. One of those women, Carol Higgins of Palos Park, Illinois, pleaded with Dole: “When are you going to put the boxing gloves on” and give President Clinton “what he deserves?” Dole giggled as his fans clapped and whooped.
Past, meet future? Bob Dole rides again.
***
Oh, no. How dare we criticize Bob Dole!
Via commenter Crapweasel: “Rush is eating McCain alive for lying about the email Bob Dole sent him. He’s saying that Dole didn’t scold him and that he didn’t endorse McCain as the McCain camp is claiming. Rush said that it’s a shame how McCain lied and is trying to use Bob Dole against him.”
The McCain crowd is wielding the Absolute Moral Authority Card like a crowbar.
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Déjà vu all over again.
Thanks for the reminder Michelle … I guess that means the term Electile Dysfunction is not really a new one …
P.S. Was that Time Magazine really in the year “1006″? …
Damn athletes can’t do anything right!
“1006.″ Thanks. Fixed.
“It was deja vu all over again”
Yogi Berra…1986
Astros losing the NL flag to Reds on a 9th inning HR
#5 On February 5th, 2008 at 12:20 pm, Armigerous said:
‘“It was deja vu all over again”
Yogi Berra…1986
Astros losing the NL flag to Reds on a 9th inning HR’
I thought the NY Mets won the NL title in 1986, and then defeated the Red Sox in the World Series.
I remember and it was a disaster, just as McCain and who ever will be. If Bob Dole would had been as funny before and during the election as he was after, he may not have one but he would have done much better than he did, he definatly would have not looked so scripted and more genuine.
Rush is eating McCain alive for lying about the email Bob Dole sent him. He’s saying that Dole didn’t scold him and that he didn’t endorse McCain as the McCain camp is claiming. Rush said that it’s ashame how McCain lied and is trying to use Bob Dole against him. John McCain is living scum!
And don’t forget the sound-bite of McCain lies about Romney “attacking” Dole, and calling for him to apologize…
Despicable.
But typical…and very revealing….
The only good thing about Dole’s candidacy was that he resigned from the Senate while pursuing it. Our current crop of candidates should follow his lead.
et
Better yet that should be a requirement … it offends me that these people stay on the public payroll and then if they lose still have their old job …
Try that in the private sector …
Nope, haven’t forgotten a bit. How inspiring that McCain and his supporters want to carry on the mantle of losing campaign (against, no less, a very beatable candidate).
The difference between Dole/Kemp and McCain/RINORunningMate is that I held my nose and voted for the former. I won’t be doing it for the latter, regardless of the scare tactics (Ohmygosh Hillary will pull out of Iraq!) used by his defenders.
McCain? Kemp? Dole?
Oh, my acid reflux! Where’s my Prilosec? Ugh!
Allah over at Hot Air has a post stating that Laura would vote for McCain if he’s the nominee… he adds:
I consider myself among the “hardest hardcore” of the Hot Air readership. Allah may be right but as for me, I will not vote for Juan McCain, no matter who his running mate is.
I like HotAir and Allah. But, that sounds sort of like a deity complex with such a sense of omniscience in the prediction.
So who is the lunatic in the GOP that keeps pushing these losers out there just because they are the next on the list. I’d sure love to give him a piece of my mind.
I guess it is true what they say about people that don’t know history…
Yes. Doomed. Doomed, I tell you.
*sigh*
Jack Kemp spoke at my college graduation. He is an impressive guy with all of the work he has done on the economy.
It’s pretty shameful that McCain hatred has spilled over into bashing everyone the R party ever nominated.
Kemp, come on, he’s a New York guy. NFL and all that jazz. He’s an economic wizard and you people are smearing HIM?!
Let’s see, is there a word for this type of behavior? Oh yeah, ummmm ‘UNHINGED’.
Who needs enemies if you guys are ‘friends’ of Republicans? You do a better job railing against Republicans than the Democrats do.
I tell ya what. . . you all convinced me. . . I’m voting Democrat. Thanks for letting this independent see the light. Carry on you stalwart ‘R conservatives’. I can’t thank ya’ll enough for all this negativity.
Presidential campaigns are supposed to be about the future. They are supposed to inspire and uplift. All we get is vote for this guy because he’s the least objectionable available. As I’ve said before though. . . the fact that Coulter doesn’t like McCain probably wins him more votes than he loses in the general. Likewise with many of the other self important media.
Limbaugh says Dole did not endorse McCain in the email sent to him. Dole stated in the email that he was not endorsing anyone at this time because his wife was seeking re-election and voters in their home state were evenly divided among the candidates ( i.e., he does not want to anger any voters who then might not vote for his wife). Dole was on Hannity & Colmes last night and was asked if he endorsed anyone and he said “I don’t have anybody in this fight”–but he added that “my heart’s kinda with McCain.” That was a subtle endorsement. It is not a loud open endorsement, which could cost his wife votes, but it shows his thinking on the matter.
I think pretty much any Washington insider, McCain, Graham, Kemp, Dole, etc., etc., etc. are the problem. Yes. I am well aware that Bob Dole is not a U.S. Senator. But, he is still hip deep in D.C., which is well evidenced by his support of his fellow insider, John McCain.
If only there were a way to clean house and send all new people to Washington and get rid of all the politicians on both sides of the aisle.
Dole/Kemp vs. Clinton/Gore was a much easier call than the one we’re going to have to make in November (because I really like Kemp). I don’t think Dole was *that* bad; but there isn’t anyone out there that McCain could tab as a running mate who could win me over like Kemp did.
This is my 7th presidential election and I’ve never been this conflicted, that is, unless Mitt pulls a rabbit out of his hat tonight.
I saw a Dole speech (personally) where he pointedly barbed the Clintons for the FBI files. I think the one liner went something like they read his FBI file but fell asleep.
It had no traction with the namby pamby liberal republicans in my state!
Heh Heh…rabbit
I made the Bob Dole comparison a couple of weeks ago and caught nothing but “oh, but he’s such a nice guy”, grief for even suggesting it.
I’m finally glad to see that I wasn’t the only one who realized this.
After voting this morning, I asked a pollworker if voters were allowed to leave a space blank without it invalidating the entire ballot.
For instance, if I decided not to vote for any POTUS candidate, would the rest of my ballot still be valid.
He said yes…you’re allowed to leave spaces blank. A pollworker would simply have to override the “are you sure” question whenever your ballot is placed into the electronic ballot box.
So come November, I still have the option of voting on other issues while leaving the POTUS portion blank.
Not as good as “None of the Above”, but it’s better than not voting at all.
Of course, this all depends on where you vote as your results may vary.
Term Limits for Congress.
And then Term Limits for the bureaucrats.
Today Jack Kemp was on Fox News talking about his love for McCain, the “true conservative,” how McCain was tough on immigration and has always been a tax cutter.
I forgot about Kemp on the Dole/Kemp ticket. They were a disaster with virtually no message for Republicans other than we are the good guys so vote for us. When I look at the “old timers” and the politicians lining up behind McCain, I see just how far left the Republican party has drifted.
OK I’ll keep an open mind.
I too am willing to vote for McCain IF, and its a big IF, someone can convince me that he is not this generations Richard M. Nixon. The only difference I can see is Nixon lost the general election and came back and won 8 years later. McCain lost the primary and is coming back 8 years later for his second chance.
No, I think his wife ought to follow his lead. Another RINO.