The Road to Victory
Okay. Over the years, people--well, really just Anne--have suggested that I have, in addition to whatever other talents and qualities I might possess, a finely honed strategic sense when it comes to politics. Generally, I've used this the way cooler guys might use a card trick or magic: as a sort of parlor amusement or mildly diverting intellectual exercise. ("If Bob Kerrey had just used x campaign theme in 1992, Bill Clinton never would have been president in the first place!") More often, I think I've been able to take a pretty good recall of American history and a lot of wasted hours reading old Life magazines and the Theodore H. White books and What it Takes, and somehow convince people I knew what I was talking about.

But just in case I do know what I'm talking about, I thought it would be interesting to try and map out a campaign strategy for John Kerry. If nothing else, I'll be able to compare what they actually do with what I prescribe, and clearly I'm not overly (some might say sufficiently) afraid of looking stupid anyway.

So here it is. I'm talking about broad themes here rather than specific episodes of flesh-pressing, cash-calling or wedge-issue-exploiting. (Well, maybe a little of that last one. But see.)

1) Clinton Plus
One of Bill Clinton's biggest challenges was convincing the electorate that he was a grown-up. He evidently lacked personal discipline, and was a bit of a policy slut in that he would flit from one issue to the next... at least while in office. On the campaign trail he was actually quite good at staying "on message," and this was why he was more or less able to convince skeptical voters that he could be trusted with both The Button and The Budget. And while he proved largely unable to keep his trousers up, he also proved a good fiscal steward and economic manager, and repeatedly showed his policy centrist bona fides through the pledge to "end welfare as we know it" (eventually, to keep up appearances, he signed a bill far more harsh than what he wanted) and other measures such as the 1994 crime bill.

John Kerry is well positioned to leverage the trust Clinton won that a Democrat won't just come in and spend like crazy, empty out the jails, legalize every drug on the market and cut the defense budget to the bone. (I offer, for now, no editorial opinion on whether or not some or all of these moves might actually make sense.) He's a somewhat budget-hawkish New Englander, a former war hero and prosecutor, and he just looks responsible (he's shaggy, but more in an Aragorn-ish way than like a '70s-era ballplayer). If anything, he's too much of a grownup, vis-a-vis Bush's Bad Wittle Boy.

So he starts by embracing Clinton's basic policy centrism: fiscally cautious, tough on crime, not beholden to the high-profile interest constituencies on the left. And he's off to a fairly good start here, though the "Contract With the Middle Class" was both clunkily phrased and too quickly abandoned for the next slogan. (The inverse of Clinton's discipline on the stump. Kerry badly needs a message hierarchy, though I think he'll fix that eventually.) But that's not enough.

2) One Big Dream. Maybe Two.
Michael Dukakis trotted out the slogan "Competence, not Ideology" for his 1988 campaign against G.H.W. Bush, but really it was Clinton who ran on that (while coming up with catchier catchphrases like "The Man From Hope") four years later... once Bush's competence could be called into question through four years of his presidency, and at a time when there wasn't all that much ideology floating around anyway: Americans mostly wanted to pick the better manager. Twelve years later, it's a different Bush but half the same story. So far, Kerry's entire campaign has held a critical mirror up to G.W. Bush's administration. He's making a lawyerly case that Bush's job performance doesn't merit another term.

He's right, but unlike in 1992 when Bush Sr. struggled with "the vision thing" and never offered a compelling rationale for his candidacy--leaving his "competence" as the only ground of contention--this Bush has vision out the ying-yang. Ideology is his raison d'etre. So Kerry needs a competing vision (and it had better kick the ass of Clinton's long- and deservedly-forgotten "New Paradigm").

Kerry needs one or two compelling goals by which we, and presumably history one day, can gauge his Presidency--something akin to Kennedy's race to the moon. And no, "Ten Million New Jobs in Four Years" doesn't count. It's a fine pledge, but it just doesn't get the blood racing. Ditto some non-tangible metric about student test scores or "every child gets a quality teacher." This needs to be an accomplishment that, like the Apollo Program, we can all psychologically share. Even better if we all somehow reap the benefits.

The one I would go for is energy independence. I'd pledge to free America from reliance upon Middle Eastern oil by 2025, through reduced consumption, alternate source development and enhanced domestic production. The liberals won't like that last one, but it makes sense on a lot of levels. One, you somewhat undercut the oil industry's support of Bush--they'll still back him, but inevitably some of those petrodollars will flow our way too, and maybe they won't back Bush quite as enthusiastically knowing that Kerry would, say, be open to some ANWR drilling in return for a ten mile per gallon hike in CAFE standards. And that sort of compromise--which you can couch in language of letting the Alaskans determine what to do with their own land--helps build a bridge to independent voters in the short term, while getting them onboard for the big visionary goal of energy freedom. Also, the argument that environmentalism can be an input to economic development, rather than a detriment, is a winner just because it's something that Americans want to believe. Never underestimate the power of the stories we tell ourselves.

Finally, I have a pet theory that a lot of Bush supporters are very uneasy about our close ties with Saudi Arabia (as they should be). I don't think we can peel off a lot of these people, but by flaunting a few examples where he can run to Bush's right--spending discipline is the other big one here--he might just be able to depress turnout and zeal among weak Republicans at least.

3) War--What is it Good For?
This is where Kerry is already closest to my vision of his campaign. Just like Clinton had to convince the voters he was a "New Democrat" on economic and domestic policy matters, Kerry has to do the same on foreign policy. (Clinton tried to do this too with Kosovo and other little interventions, but he didn't have the cred, and the stakes were never anywhere close to this high.) He needs to question Bush's administration of the war above all--it's fertile ground, and to the extent that he can make the argument Bush has needlessly inflamed the enemy and risked American lives, he slices the guts out of Bush's "War President" argument. The sort of question to ask is: "Has the War in Iraq really helped us win the War on Terror? Was it worth the costs? Has it been fought intelligently?" Apply a similar calculus to our larger position in the world--with respect to allies, treaties, and trade--and Bush just can't come off well.

To nail this down, I'd love to see him tap Wes Clark as his running mate. Clark, as I've noted before, has the best biography of any of the contenders--except for Rep. John Lewis, but he's not really a contender outside of my imagination--and offers much more reassurance that the Democrats can be trusted with the national defense. (Plus he probably swings Arkansas, which is currently polling dead even.) Finally, Clark is a walking, talking refutation of the truism that "the best people don't go into politics"--this is a brilliant, totally self-made man who has succeeded in one of the last great meritocracies in American life. As I've noted elsewhere, he's the sort of pol who could make being a Democrat cool again.

So that's it. Reaffirm Clinton's strengths, give us one or two big dreams, and tout a "Stronger--And Smarter" line on defense. Stay on message, don't pick a douchebag running mate, and get ready to party like it's 1933--or at least, 1993--come next January.