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Today's
Stories
September 20,
2004
David Price
Relying
on Phonies: What If The Problem with Phone Polls is That They
Are Phone Polls
September 18
/ 19, 2004
Alexander Cockburn
Forgeries,
Fingerprints and Forensic Fakery
Jeffrey St. Clair
High Plains Grifter: Bush's Mask of Anarchy
Patrick Cockburn
Into the Abyss: the Week Iraq's Dream of Peace Fell Apart
Fred Gardner
Pot Shots: Financial Torture (Asset Forfeiture)
Joe Allen
The Comrades Kerry Abandoned: the Real Story of Vietnam Vets
Against the War
George Corsetti
Poletown Revisited: Finally, Some Vindication
Scott Handleman
The Knock-Knock of a Sledgehammer: Sequestered in Nablus
Richard Ward
Two Weeks in Beit Arabiya
Conn Hallinan
Ashcroft and Indonesia
Lori Smith
Health Care in America: And Then I Got Sick...
Dave Zirin
Hold the Booyah!: SportsCenter Out of the Middle East
John L. Hess
Rather Will Take the Heat, As Bush's War Deteriorates
Brian J. Foley
W is for Wimp: So Why do Manly Men Love Him?
Mickey Z.
Pat Tillman and Osama bin Laden: Odd Juxtapositions
Poets' Basement
Vest, Landau & Albert
Website of the Weekend
Eye on the NYTs
Septemeber
17, 2004
Ray McGovern
Gossing
Over the Record
Patrick Cockburn
The New Iraqi Economy: Baghdad's Thriving Kidnapping Industry
Lee Sustar
The State of Working America: an Autopsy of the American Dream
Mike Whitney
John Kerry: 195 Lbs. of Political Helium, Not an Ounce of Sincerity
Victor Kattan
Black September
Ray Hanania
Israel's Demographics
Greg Bates
Nader's Victories: a Mid-Campaign Assessment
Website of
the Day
The Road to Hell
Sex,
Drugs & the Blues!
Serpents in the Garden
CounterPunch's
Sizzling New Book on Culture and Sex is Now Available
Click here to purchase
September 16,
2004
Landau / Hassen
Meet
the New Villain: Syria
Joanne Mariner
Inside
Darfur: a Photo Essay
Patrick Cockburn
US
Offers Conflicting Accounts of Baghdad Bloodbath
Greg Moses
Four Million Children Might Be News
Joshua Frank
Nader in the Battleground States
Christopher Brauchli
The Bush Drug Lottery Flops
David Himmelstein
Folke Bernadotte: a Rosh Hashonah Remembrance
Website of the Day
The Abu Ghraib Index
September 15,
2004
Patrick Cockburn
Hell
on Haifa Street
Ron Jacobs
Oppose War, Not Just Bush
David Lindorff
Blanking Out Dissent
Joanne Mariner
Talking About Darfur: Is Genocide Just a Word?
Angela Godfrey-Goldstein
An Open Letter to Madonna: Please Don't Support Israeli Apartheid
Dave Zirin
Is the NFL Ready for Us?
Yigal Bronner
"They
Are Building Walls Around Us"
September 14,
2004
Gary Leupp
The
Problem of Chechnya
Jennifer van
Bergen
What's
Wrong with Torture?
Stan Goff
Wake Up and Smell the Jungle Rot
Patrick Cockburn
The
Punishment of Fallujah: US Precision Strickes...on Ambulances
Anis Memon
Nader
in Michigan
Michael Donnelly
The Nuance Comes Off: Former Naderites Beg for Kerry Votes
Werther
Zell Miller: the Peckerwood Pericles
Website of
the Day
Osama Bin Forgotten?
September 13,
2004
Gabriel Kolko
Elections,
Alliances and the American Empire
Phillip Cryan
How Do You Say "Death Squad?": Language in Colombia's
War
Patrick Cockburn
One of Baghdad's Bloodiest Days: "I'm a Journalist! I'm
Dying! I'm Dying"
Noah Leavitt
The War on Civil Liberties
Robert Jensen
Highjacking Catastrophe: Bush, the Neo-Cons and 9/11
Mike Whitney
Alan Greenspan: Fed-Master to the Wealthy
John Chuckman
Stop Talking About the "Election"
Mike Burke
Kerry/Edwards Website Censors Discussion of Israel/Palestine
Issues
CounterPunch
Wire
The Quotations of David Cobb: "I Don't Care How Many Votes
I Get"
Website of the Day
Keep It In Your Pants: the Bush Plan to Combat Teen Promiscuity
September 11
/ 12, 2004
Alexander Cockburn
Swatting
at Flies
Fred Gardner
Yet Another Prozac Scandal
Saul Landau
When Our Assassins Go Free
Jennifer Van Bergen
How to Beat Bush: a Simple Strategy for the Average American
Roger Burbach
/ Jim Tarbell
The Real Dead Enders: Iraq and the Crisis of Empire
Christopher Reed
9/11 in an Historical Context: a Minor Event When Compared to
Worldwide War Casualties
Francisc Catalin
An ABC of American Interventions
Carl Estabrook
Big Science and Government Terror
Bernard Chazelle
Anti-Americanism: a Clinical Study
Sharon Smith
Third Party Blues
Dave Lindorff
Perhaps This Time We're the Silent Majority
Mike Whitney
Fallujah: an Iraqi Beslan?
Frederick B.
Hudson
Their Sons Perished in the Flames, But Not Their Faith
Mickey Z.
Round Up the Usual Suspects: a Look Back at 9/11
Ron Jacobs
Redneck Music for the New Century
Greg Moses
Soap Opera Moments in Texas School Funding Trial
Benjamin Dangl
/ Andrew Kennis
An Interview with Leslie Cagan
Poets Basement
Del Papa, Albert, Gelman
September 10,
2004
Patrick Cockburn
Disappointment
at Samarrah?
Michael Donnelly
Democrats v. Democracy
Alan Farago
Mosquitoes in a Hurricane
Doug Giebel
Karl Rove's Terror Playbook
Mike Whitney
Bob Graham's Political Tsunami
David Domke
God's
Will, According to the Bush Administration
September 9,
2004
Joe Bageant
Karaoke
Night in Bush's America
Ed Kinane
Abducted in Baghdad
Peter Bohmer
The Cuban Revolution: Present and Future
Todd May
The Emerging Case for a Single-State Solution
Jeremy Scahill
The New York Model: Indymedia and the Text Message Jihad
Joshua Frank
Green House Party Gasses
Fran Shor
The Crisis in Public Dissent: When Protest is Considered a Terrorist
Act
Patrick Cockburn
Welcome
to the Dirtiest City in the World: Despair in Baghdad
Website of
the Day
Liberty Street Protest: No to War at Ground Zero
September 8,
2004
Patrick Cockburn
This
Doesn't Smell Like Victory: A War on Two Fronts in Iraq
Dave Lindorff
Bush Confuses; Kerry Mute: Spinning 1000 Dead
Bulent Gokay
Russian and Chechnia After Beslan
Lisa Viscidi
Land Reform and Conflict in Guatemala
Niranjan Ramakrishnan
Byrd's Eye View
Mike Whitney
Afghanistan: American's Drug Colony
Stan Goff
Body
Count: 1001
Website of
the Day
Bush and the Love Doctors
September 7,
2004
Diane Christian
Hostage Tactics: a Game of Mortal Poker
Joshua Frank
Greens
Unravel from Within
Patrick Cockburn
Fallujah
Erupts Again: US Death Toll in Iraq Nears 1000
Ron Jacobs
Bush and Putin: "We're Not Girlie Men"
Chris Floyd
Cry Havoc: Bush's Own Personal Janjaweed
Dr. Carol Wolman
No Blood for Oil at Paul Bunyan Day Parade
John Ross
The
Politics of Darkness North / South
September 6,
2004
Alexander Cockburn
An
Anti-Labor Day That Lives in Infamy: How Many Democrats Voted
For Taft-Hartley?
Ralph Nader
The
Cruel Legacy of Taft-Hartley: a Labor Day Call for Rights for
Working People
Lee Sustar
What's Driving the Attack on Pensions?
Kathleen and
Bill Christison
Dual
Loyalties: the Bush Necons and Israel
September 4-5,
2004
Alexander Cockburn
Elephants
and Gramsci
Ted Honderich
The
Way Things Are
Sasan Fayazmanesh
The
Holy Empire: Who We Are and What We Do
Douglas Valentine
What the World Should Know About Guantanamo
Patrick Cockburn
New Iraqi Police State Flexes Its Muscles
Gary Leupp
Neo Cons Under Fire
Fred Gardner
Pot Shots: the Hempstead T-Shirt
William A.
Cook
The
Day of the Lemming
Dave Zirin
Kobe Bryant and the Price of Freedom
John Chuckman
The Day the World Ended
Karyn Strickler
God Save the Endangered Species Act
Vanessa Jones
Bad Day with an Ikea Cup
Mike Whitney
Kerry: the "Better" War Candidate
Mark Donham
Dear John (Kerry): Start Explaining and Fast
Mickey Z.
McBypass Nation: Feeling Clinton's Pain
Alan Farago
Can the Everglades be Fixed?
Poets' Basement
Landau and Albert
September 3,
2004
Jeffrey St.
Clair
High
Plains Grifter: Jesus Told Him Where to Bomb
Rahul Mahajan
Bush's RNC Speech: an Annotated Response
Carl Estabrook
The
Book of Slaughter and Forgetting
Joshua Frank
The Florida of the Northwest: Oregon Dems Sabotage Nader Again
Gary Leupp
Music to My Ears: Sunday's March
James Hollander
Deja Vu in Manhattan: Assisted Political Suicide?
Mark Engler
Republicans
Among Us: a Week at the RNC, Inside and Out
Jesse Sharkey
Making Students and Teachers Pay for the Crisis in Education
Jane Stillwater
Calling the Cops on Your Own Kid
Stephen Green
Serving
Two Flags: the Bush Neo-Cons and Israel
September 2,
2004
Jeffrey St.
Clair
High
Plains Grifter: Part 3: More Pricks Than Kicks
Max Gimble
Et Tu, Menchu? Extrajudicial Killings and Clandestine Graves
in Guatemala
James Petras
President Chavez and the Referendum: Myths and Realities
Christopher
Brauchli
Bush and the Afghan Electoral Model: "If They Want to Vote
Twice, Let Them"
Todd Chretien & Jessie
Muldoon
Will the Democrats Expel Zell Miller?
Jack Random
Spite and Venom Day: the Turncoat and the Profiteer
Alan Maass
The Real Vietnam
Christa Allen
Contre Bush
Website of
the Day
[Redacted]
September 1,
2004
Alexander Cockburn
The
Stench of Doom
Kathleen and Bill Christison
Poor Larry Franklin
Dave Lindorff
Kerry's Litmus Test
Josh Frank
Protest in White: Not All of New York Rises Up
John L. Hess
Moles, Scoops and Flip Flops
Mike Whitney
Deconstructing Arnold
Jack Random
Kindergarten Night at the RNC
Andrew Wilson
War on the Pachyderms: Why Do Elephants Hate Us?
Jeffrey St.
Clair
High
Plains Grifter: Part Two: Mark His Words
August 31,
2004
Joseph Nevins
Escapism
and Global Apartheid: The Dominican Republic & the NYTs
Matt Vidal
Beyond
Bush's Rhetoric on the Economy
Neve Gordon
Kerry and the Middle East
Dave Lindorff
Bush
the Peace Candidate?
Mike Whitney
NPR Leads the Charge for War Against Iran
Jack Random
Opening Night: Playing the War Card
Jeffrey St.
Clair
High
Plains Grifter: the Life and Crimes of George W. Bush (Part One)
CounterPunch Photo of the Day
Pete Seeger in NYC
August 30,
2004
Justin Podhur
The
Disappeared Mayor
Shaun Joseph
The
Hypocrites at TheNaderbasher.com
Mike Whitney
Israeli Moles in the Pentagon: What More Could They Possibly
Want?
Ron Jacobs
Live, From New York: the Majority of Protesters Claimed No Candidate
David Lindorff
Sunday in Manhattan: the Sound of Marchin', Chargin' Feet, Boy
Dave Zirin
USA Basketball: The Team White America Loved to Hate
Sam Husseini
Israeli Spying on the US: a Long History
August 28 /
29, 2004
Alexander Cockburn
Zombies
for Kerry
Patrick Cockburn
Najaf Ceasefire Good for Iraq, But Weakens Allawi and US
Ray McGovern
Blowing Smoke on Intelligence
Dr. Juan Romagoza
From El Salvador to Abu Ghraib: Reflections of Torture Survivor
Ray Hanania
An Israeli Spy in the Pentagon? Ridiculous!
Fred Gardner
Eddie Lepp Busted by DEA: Facing Life for Growing Medical Pot
Diane Christian
Big Men: the Better Leader Lets You Live
William S. Lind
The Desert Fox
Paul D'Amato
The Left Takes a Dive for Kerry
Joshua Frank
Greens at the Crossroads
Mickey Z.
Media Declares War on Anti-War Protests
Winslow T. Wheeler
Sen. McCain's Pork Chops: an Exchange
Justin E.H.
Smith
The New Age Racket and the Left
Thomas St. John
Burning Slaves at the Stake: On "Sinners in the Hands of
an Angry God"
Ali Tonak
Help the NYPD?
Mark Engler
New York Says "No"
Justin Felux
Haiti: the Attica of the Americas
Poets' Basement
Gelman, Albert, Ford and Hamod
August 27,
2004
Gary Leupp
Neocon
Musings
Robin Cook
The
Ghosts of Abu Ghraib
Diane Christian
Disarming
Michael Donnelly
Situational Democracy: the Show Me the Green Party?
Jack Random
4F and Other Heroes: an Army of War Resisters
Mike Ferner
"To the Swift Boats!"
Mazin Qumsiyeh
7000 Palestinian Political Prisoners
Veronza Bowers, Jr.
"You Won't Be Leaving Tomorrow"
August 26,
2004
M. Shahid Alam
The
Clash Thesis: a Failing Ideology?
Diane Christian
War
Rules: Bush is No Sun Tzu
Derek Seidman
"They're As Bad As Wal-Mart:" Starbucks Workers Get
Organized
David Lindorff
Court to RNC Protesters: Drop the Rally
Christopher
Brauchli
Signs of Dissent: the Bush in the Bubble
Stew Albert
Reporting Suspicious Activity
Mark Donham
Judgement in Athens: Give the Koreans Their Day in Court
Saul Landau
Pinochet:
the Al Capone of the Southern Cone
Website of
the Day
The Kerry 527 Ad You'll Never See
August 25,
2004
Amelia Peltz
Can
I Have 9.8 Seconds of Your Time?
Noah Leavitt
Defining and Redefining Torture
Ron Jacobs
Takin' It to the Streets: It's Not About the Election, It's About
Democracy
James Brooks
Coronado Crosses the Jordan
Akiva Eldar
How to Win the Jewish Vote: Turn Gaza into a "Mini-Afghanistan"
Gemma Araneta
Chavez's New Brand of Populism
Philip Cryan
Uribe's Boys: the Death Squads of Colombia
CounterPunch Wire
Cheney Opens the Closet Door
August 24,
2004
Jeremy Scahill
John
Kerry: the Warchurian Candidate
Gary Leupp
"We
Want Them to Go Away"
David Domke
God
Willing: an Echoing Press and Political Fundamentalism
William Loren Katz
The Meaning of Hugo Chávez: Black and Indian Power in
Venezuela
Jonah Gindin
With Chavez? Reading the International Private Media
Fran Schor
Denying Atrocities: From Vietnam to Fallujah
Joe Bageant
Driving
on the Bones of God
Website of the Day
The Great America Lockdown: a Primer for the RNC
August 23,
2004
Winslow Wheeler
Don't
Mind If I Do: Porkbarrel and the War on Terror
John Pilger
Bush
May Be the Lesser Evil
Stan Goff
Swift
Boat Dogfight
Bill and Kathleen
Christison
Notes
from the West Bank: Build, Demolish, Rebuild
Mike Whitney
The Unraveling of Afghanistan
William Blum
Brave
New World of Iraqi Sovereignty
Ralph Nader
A Letter to the Washington Post: a Shameful and Unsavory Editorial
August 21 /
22, 2004
Cockburn /
St. Clair
"They
Want Blood:" The Bi-Partisan Origins of the Total War on
Drugs
Landau / Hassen
Failing
the Mission? Form a Commission
Brian Cloughley
The
Bush Team in Iraq: Moral Cowardice, as Practiced by Experts
Josh Frank
Nader as David Duke? The ADL Wants You to Think So
Mike Whitney
Reincarnating Mengele: the Torture Doctors of Abu Ghraib
Ron Jacobs
Day Labor Blues
Mickey Z.
Shooting at Whales: 40 Years After Tonkin
Fred Gardner
Dr. Wolman Comes Out: The Cannabis Consultants
Dave Zirin
Uprising in Athens: Iraqi Soccer Team Gives Bush the Boot
Josh Saxe
Witnessing Police Brutality in LA
Yanar Mohammed
Letter from Baghdad: a Democracy of Killings and Bombings
Helen Williams
Ali's Story: a Taste of Reality from Baghdad
Michael Donnelly
Elemental and NaturalForests, Fire and Recovery
Elizabeth Schulte
The Crisis in Affordable Housing
Poets' Basement
Adler, Albert, Virgil, Ford and Krieger
Hot Stories
Alexander Cockburn
Behold,
the Head of a Neo-Con!
Subcomandante
Marcos
The
Death Train of the WTO
Norman Finkelstein
Hitchens
as Model Apostate
Steve Niva
Israel's
Assassination Policy: the Trigger for Suicide Bombings?
Dardagan,
Slobodo and Williams
CounterPunch Exclusive:
20,000 Wounded Iraqi Civilians
Steve
J.B.
Prison Bitch
Sheldon
Rampton and John Stauber
True Lies: the Use of Propaganda
in the Iraq War
Wendell
Berry
Small Destructions Add Up
CounterPunch
Wire
WMD: Who Said What When
Cindy
Corrie
A Mother's Day Talk: the Daughter
I Can't Hear From
Gore Vidal
The
Erosion of the American Dream
Francis Boyle
Impeach
Bush: A Draft Resolution
Click
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|
September 20, 2004
The Keys to
the White House v. the Shrum Curse
What
Really Happened in the 2000 Election
By
KARYN STRICKLER
Few people know the real reason why
Al Gore simultaneously won and lost his bid for U.S. President
in 2000. It was the clash of two mighty forces of American Presidential
history that came together to create the divergence between the
Electoral College and the popular vote for the first time since
1888: The Keys to the White House vs. The Shrum Curse.
Bob Shrum is a brilliant, Democratic
political consultant with notable successes on Gubernatorial
and U.S. Senate races -- but with a 100% losing record on Presidential
elections. Shrum consulted on every Democratic Presidential campaign
from John Lindsay to Al Gore. Shrum did not work on the Clinton
campaigns. Jimmy Carter's campaign would have ended "The
Curse," but Shrum quit only days into his consultancy on
that campaign, keeping the losing streak alive.
Talk of the Shrum Curse is
normally only discussed in hushed tones in Washington, DC political
circles. But a recent article in The Washington Post let the
Genie out of the bottle, freeing me to discuss what really happened
in the 2000 Presidential election.
Bob Shrum worked on Al Gore's
campaign in 2000 and his unbroken track record virtually guaranteed
that Gore would lose the election -- except that The Keys to
the White House also had a 100% track record of accuracy and
they were predicting a Gore victory in 2000.
The Keys to the White House
is a system for predicting Presidential elections, based on a
mathematical model for predicting earthquakes. History professor
Allan J. Lichtman, developed The
Keys to the White House in collaboration with a world-renowned,
Russian geophysicist named Volodia Keilis-Borok. (Note: Lichtman
is my husband.)
The theory is that presidential
elections are referenda on the party in power. The Keys assess
the performance, strength, and unity of the party in power, in
order to determine whether or not that party will continue to
hold the White House. The Keys are based on the analysis of every
American presidential election since 1860.
First developed in 1981, The
Keys looked backward in American history, and retrospectively,
they account accurately for the results of every presidential
election from 1860 through 1980. Prospectively, The Keys predicted
well ahead of time, the popular-vote winners of every presidential
election from 1984 through 2000. As a nationally based system,
The Keys cannot predict the results in individual states, and
thus relate to the popular vote not the Electoral College results.
The Keys are 13 diagnostic
questions that are stated as propositions that favor reelection
of the incumbent party. When five or fewer of these propositions
are false, or turned against the party holding the White House,
that party wins another term in office. When six or more are
false, the challenging party wins. The Keys indicate incumbent
party success or failure long before the polls or any other forecasting
models are of any value. (Refer to THE THIRTEEN KEYS TO THE WHITE
HOUSE, at the end of the article.)
In a published article in January
of 2000, The Keys predicted that Al Gore would be President of
the United States. My husband, Allan Lichtman and I looked at
each other wide-eyed and agape when we learned that Bob Shrum
was consulting for Al Gore's campaign. We were both immediately
aware of the historical dissonance created by the clash of absolutes:
The Keys vs. The Curse.
Being the only people in America
aware of the impending collision of the two mighty forces, Allan
and I speculated privately about which force would predominate
in this historical tug of war and went to bed on November 2,
2000 thinking that The Keys had prevailed. When we awoke on November
3rd, we discovered we had not seen the last of the clash of these
behemoth forces of history.
The next couple of weeks saw
the corrupt appointment of George W. Bush as President of the
United States by the U.S. Supreme Court, going against the popular
vote. And now we know -- both The Keys and The Curse still have
unbroken track records -- as Al Gore won the popular vote, but
George W. Bush occupies the White House. And now you know why.
Sadly, The Keys and The Curse
are aligned this year for another Bush victory since Bob Shrum
is working for John Kerry and The Keys are in indicating that
the incumbent Republicans are currently well positioned to regain
the White House in 2004, despite the sour economy for much of
the Bush term, and the war in Iraq.
The Republican Party now has
four keys turned against it for 2004, two short of the fatal
six negative keys. Thus President Bush could endure one more
major setback between now and November and still win reelection.
The following nine keys currently
favor the incumbent Republican Party (The verdict of the Keys
in 2004 absolutely does not indicate an endorsement of George
W. Bush.):
* By gaining seats in the U.S.
House elections of 2002, Republicans locked in the party mandate
key. (Key 1--Party Mandate--TRUE)
* The lack of any nomination
challenge to President George Bush gives the Republicans the
incumbent party contest key. (Key 2- Contest -- TRUE)
* Likewise, Bushis nomination
secures the incumbency key. (Key 3--Incumbency -- TRUE)
* The absence of any prospective
third-party challenger with prospects of winning 5 percent of
the vote or more gives Republicans the third-party key. (Key
4--Third Party -- TRUE)
* The recovering economy secures
the short-term economy key, unless there is a return of the recession
in 2004, but this is looking increasingly unlikely. (Key 5--Short
term economy -- TRUE)
* Despite anti-war protests,
the absence of sustained, violent upheavals like those of the
1960's, avoids loss of the social unrest key. (Key 8--Social
unrest -- TRUE)
* The lack of a significant
scandal implicating the president averts loss of the scandal
key. (Key 9--Scandal -- TRUE)
* The presidentis response
to the September 11 attack including the expulsion of the Taliban
from Afghanistan and the capture of Saddam Hussein secures the
foreign/military success key, unless the United States suffers
major reversals in both Iraq and Afghanistan in 2004. (Key 11-
Foreign/military success -- TRUE)
* Kerry does not match the
charisma of Franklin D. Roosevelt or John F. Kennedy, keeping
Republicans from losing the challenger charisma/hero key. (Key
13--Challenger charisma -- TRUE The following four keys turn
against the Republicans:
* The weak economy during the
Bush term as compared to the boom years of Clintonis two terms
costs the Republicans the long-term economy key. (Key 6--Long
term economy -- FALSE)
* The modest domestic accomplishments
of the Bush administration topple the policy-change key. (Key
7--Policy change -- FALSE)
* With 9-11, the first successful
foreign attack on the continental United States since the war
of 1812 costs the party in power the foreign/military failure
key. (Key 10--Foreign/military failure -- FALSE)
* George Bush is no Theodore
Roosevelt or Ronald Reagan, forfeiting the incumbent charisma/hero
key. (Key 12--Incumbent charisma -- FALSE)
According to Dr. Lichtman,
while the possibility is extremely remote, The Keys could still
change between now and November. But the history professor warns
that late-changing keys have not affected the outcome of a presidential
election since September and October of 1864 when General Shermanis
taking of Atlanta, General Sheridanis victories in Virginia,
and the sinking of the last Confederate ramming vessel turned
the foreign/military success key in favor of the Lincoln administration
and averted loss of the third party key.
It is surely too late for the
economy to tumble into a double-dip recession in time for Americans
to feel the pain before November 2, 2004. Never has the economy
taken a major new turn this close to a presidential election.
Conceivably one of several
smoldering scandals n the outbreak of prison abuse, deception
about weapons of mass destruction, the release of the name of
the CIA agent married to administration critic Joseph Wilson
n could burst into flame and singe the president. However, the
Republicans who control both Houses of Congress have kept the
lid on investigations. It took many months of diligent investigations
and persistent questioning of witnesses, for example, to crack
the Watergate Scandal of the Nixon administration. So the only
possibility, however remote, is that the Special Counsel investigating
the CIA leak indicts top administration officials before the
election.
The shakiest key for the administration
is the foreign/military success key. It is possible that conditions
in Afghanistan and Iraq -- especially now that military deaths
in Iraq have crossed the 1,000 mark -- could become so dire as
to cancel the Presidentis earlier successes. Even this turn of
events, however, would still leave Bush one key short of defeat,
according to the professor.
Kerry could lose the popular
vote and win the Electoral College tally, which Bush accomplished
in 2000 for the first time since 1888. Savor the irony of that
for a moment. Although Kerry cannot depend on such unlikely turns
of fortune, he can help himself by trying to scramble the historical
odds.
"Nothing changes from
one election to the next in America, because the media, the candidates,
the pollsters, and the consultants are codependent in the false
idea that elections are exercises in manipulating voters, and
in giving us negative campaigns, bland and scripted lines,"
said Allan Lichtman.
Lichtman says that Kerry has
a chance to break this cycle by firing the hucksters, tearing
up their scripts, and speaking forthrightly and concretely about
what Americans should be accomplishing during the next four years.
Al Gore finally decided to take this route, albeit too late.
Kerry should lead a debate
on critical neglected issues. He could, for example, respond
to the worldwide scientific consensus on the perils of global
warming by exploring how we can make a complete shift away from
fossil fuels toward clean, renewable energy. He could even explain
how fossil fuel dependence warps our foreign policies, hurts
our national security, and lead to the war in Iraq. Imagine such
a discussion in a presidential campaign.
"Why not break precedent
and set up a shadow government, with a suggested CIA Director,
and Secretaries of State, Defense, Treasury, and Interior. Tell
us how this shadow administration would government differently
from the Bush administration. Submit an alternative budget and
drafts of international agreements, and major legislation; let
the shadow officials campaign for Kerry and his policies,"
said Lichtman.
Professor Lichtman says that
John Kerry has a choice between following the usual meaningless
routine in the hope that setbacks to the administration and the
country will elect him in November or take a chance on running
a new kind of daring, innovative, and programmatic campaign.
With the right choice, Kerry can achieve an historical breakthrough
that would establish the basis for a principled choice of our
national leader and a grassroots mobilization on issues that
matter to Americais future.
Karyn Strickler is a campaign expert, activist, and
writer living outside Washington, DC. You can reach her at fiftyplusone@earthlink.net
.
THE 13 KEYS TO THE WHITE HOUSE
The Keys are statements that
favor the re election of the incumbent party. When five or fewer
statements are false, the incumbent party wins. When six or more
are false, the challenging party wins.
KEY 1 (Party Mandate): After
the midterm elections, the incumbent party holds more seats in
the U.S. House of Representatives than it did after the previous
midterm elections.
KEY 2 (Contest): There is no
serious contest for the incumbent party nomination.
KEY 3 (Incumbency): The incumbent
party candidate is the sitting president.
KEY 4 (Third party): There
is no significant third party or independent campaign.
KEY 5 (Short term economy):
The economy is not in recession during the election campaign.
KEY 6 (Long term economy):
Real per capita economic growth during the term equals or exceeds
mean growth during the previous two terms.
KEY 7 (Policy change): The
incumbent administration effects major changes in national policy.
KEY 8 (Social unrest): There
is no sustained social unrest during the term.
KEY 9 (Scandal): The incumbent
administration is untainted by major scandal.
KEY 10 (Foreign/military failure):
The incumbent administration suffers no major failure in foreign
or military affairs.
KEY 11 (Foreign/military success):
The incumbent administration achieves a major success in foreign
or military affairs.
KEY 12 (Incumbent charisma):
The incumbent party candidate is charismatic, or a national hero.
KEY 13 (Challenger charisma):
The challenging party candidate is not charismatic, or a national
hero.
Allan J. Lichtman, The
Keys to the White House (Lexington Books: Lanham, MD). Lichtman
can be reached at: lichtman@american.edu;
Weekend
Edition Features for August 7 / 8, 2004
James Petras
The
Anatomy of "Terror Experts": Meet the Mandarins of
Abu Ghraib
Fred Gardner
Run
Ricky Run: Football, Pot and Pain
Justin Delacour
Anti-Chavez Pollsters Panic: Fix Numbers; Reinvent Venezuela
Brian Cloughley
Persecuted by All; Supported by None: Who Would Be A Kurd?
Joshua Frank
The
Outsider: a Talk with Ralph Nader
Iain A. Boal
On "Shame": Warmed-Over Orientalism and Racist Projection
Chris Floyd
All About Eve: Open Season on Women in DC and Rome
Andrew Fenton
Fighting for Democracy and Justice in Haiti
Aseem Shrivastava
Saga of an Anguished Afghan
Neil Corbett
See Cuba: Sometimes a Cigar is Just a Cigar, Mr. Bush
Carol Miller
/ Forrest Hill
Rigged Convention; Divided Party: How David Cobb Won with Only
12% of the Vote
Tarek Milleron
Breaking the Principled Voter
Donald Macintyre
The
Battle of Najaf
Ron Jacobs
Spirits of The Dead: Why I Love My Petty Bourgeois Tendencies
Mickey Z.
Kid
Gavilan's Grave: Propaganda Scores a TKO
Poets' Basement
Adler, Ford and Albert
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