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NEW YORK -- If I've heard it once, I've heard it a hundred times
from discouraged Democrats and liberals as the Republican convention
here wrapped up this week.
Their shoulders hunched, their eyes at a droop, they lower their
voice to a whisper hoping that if they don't say it too loud it
may not come true:
"I ... I ... I think Bush is going to win."
Clearly, they're watching too much TV. Too much of Arnold Schwarzenegger,
Zell Miller, Dick Cheney and Rudy Giuliani. Too much of swift boat
veterans and Fox News commentators.
Action heroes always look good on TV. On Wednesday night, the GOP
even made an action-hero video and showed it at the convention.
There was White House political czar Karl Rove and other administration
officials dressed up for "war" and going through boot
camp on the National Mall in Washington.
I could only sit there in the convention hall and wish this were
the real thing: Rove, national security adviser Condi Rice and Co.
being sent to Iraq, and our boys and girls being brought home. But
then the lights came up, and everyone sitting in the Bush family
box was having a grand ol' hoot and a holler at the video they just
saw.
For some reason, all of this has scared the bejabbers out of the
Democrats. I can hear the wailing and moaning from Berkeley, Calif.,
to Cambridge, Mass. The frightening scenes from the convention have
sent John Kerry's supporters looking for the shovels so they can
dig their underground bunkers in preparation for another four years
of the Dark Force.
I can't believe all of this whimpering and whining. Kerry has been
ahead in many polls all summer long, but the Republicans come to
New York for one week off-Broadway and suddenly everyone is dressed
in mourning black and sitting shivah?
Exactly what moment was it during the convention that convinced
them that the Republicans had now "connected" with the
majority of Americans and that it was all over? Arnold praising
Richard Nixon? Ooooh, that's a real crowd-pleaser. Elizabeth Dole
decrying the removal of the Ten Commandments from a courthouse wall
in Alabama? Yes, that's a big topic of conversation in the unemployment
line in Akron, Ohio. Georgia Sen. Miller, a Democratic turncoat,
looking like Freddy Krueger at an all-girls camp? His speech --
and the look on what you could see of his strangely lit face --
was enough for parents to send small children to their bedrooms.
My friends -- and I include all Democrats, independents and recovering
Republicans in this salutation -- do not be afraid. Yes, the Bush
Republicans huff and they puff, but they blow their own house down.
As many polls confirm, a majority of your fellow Americans believe
in your agenda. They want stronger environmental laws, are strong
supporters of women's rights, favor gun control and want the war
in Iraq to end.
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Rejoice. You're already more than halfway there when you have the
public on board. Just imagine if you had to go out and do the work
to convince the majority of Americans that women shouldn't be paid
the same as men. All they ask is that you put up a candidate for
president who believes in something and fights for those beliefs.
Is that too much to ask?
The Republicans have no idea how much harm they have done to themselves.
They used to have a folk-hero mayor of New York named Rudy Giuliani.
On 9/11, he went charging right into Ground Zero to see whom he
could help save. Everyone loved Rudy because he seemed as though
he was there to comfort all Americans, not just members of his own
party.
But in his speech to the convention this week, he revised the history
of that tragic day for partisan gain:
As chaos ensued, "spontaneously, I grabbed the arm of then-police
commissioner Bernard Kerik and said to Bernie, 'Thank God George
Bush is our president.' And I say it again tonight, 'Thank God George
Bush is our president.' "
Please.
There were the sub-par entertainers nobody knew. There was the show
of "Black Republicans," "Arab-American Republicans"
and other minorities they trot out to show how much they are loved
by groups their policies abuse.
And there were the Band-Aids. The worst display of how out of touch
the Republicans are was those Purple Heart Band-Aids the delegates
wore to mock Kerry over his war wounds, which, for them, did not
spill the required amount of blood.
What they didn't seem to get is that watching at home might have
been millions of war veterans feeling that they were being ridiculed
by a bunch of rich Republicans who would never send their own offspring
to die in Fallujah or Danang.
Kerry supporters and Bush-bashers should not despair. These Republicans
have not made a permanent dent in Kerry's armor. The only person
who can do that is John Kerry. And by coming out swinging as he
did just minutes after Bush finished his speech Thursday night,
Kerry proved he knows that the only way to win this fight is to
fight -- and fight hard.
He must realize that he faces Al Gore's fate only if he fails to
stand up like the hero he is, only if he sits on the fence and keeps
justifying his vote for the Iraq war instead of just saying, "Look,
I was for it just like 70% of America until we learned the truth,
and now I'm against it, like the majority of Americans are now."
Kerry needs to trust that his victory is only going to happen by
inspiring the natural base of the Democratic Party -- blacks, working
people, women, the poor and young people. Women and people of color
make up 62% of this country. That's a big majority. Give them a
reason to come out on Nov. 2.
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