One of the recurring hypotheses in here, typically accepted on face, is that John Kerry was an inept campaigner/ had an inept campaign organization, costing him the election.
I could not disagree more.
Kerry had a resume for the job as stellar as any, save perhaps Bush 41.
Kerry's campaign correctly identified the winnable swing states.
Kerry's campaign attracted a fantastic ground operation.
John Kerry came within 100,000 votes in Ohio of becoming President, despite running against a corrupt-to-the-core fascist whom pulled out all the stops to steal an election he could not risk losing.
In the face of relentless attacks from the right-wing media, every American who cared could know George Bush deliberately lied about Iraq and sacrificed thousands of lives to keep OPEC together and oil prices high, to enrich himself and his cronies. You could ask yourself "Why was the first thing we did in occupied Iraq to put Iraq back with OPEC, before we even had a running occupation going? You could ask yourself "What is so "American" or "free" about a cartel that sells us our oil at monopoly prices?" If you cared to ask.
To those of you who feel the need to blame, I say blame America, not Kerry.
John Kerry was not perfect. In a contest against a more credibly human opponent, the flaws might matter. But, here, the choice was stark- it was the choice between flawed good and pure evil
Every American who wanted to could understand the issues. If it remains that a majority of Americans never want to know the truth about why their sons and daughters are being killed in a third-world nation halfway across the world, then the blame lies with America.
Ugly America.
In Oklahoma, South Carolina and Kentucky, Senate races tell us no decent person stood a chance. In Alabama, a constitutional referendum tells us no decent person stood a chance.
John Kerry could not have overcome that. Nor could any other Democrat. Kerry is a decent person and the Democrats are a party of decent people. It is up to indecent America to come around to the Democrats, not the other way around. The only real hope for us is to decide to enlighten ourselves, and a true tragedy would be if no enlightened party existed when we were finally willing to come around.
PS Let me also praise George Soros and Michael Moore for their extraordinary contributions to the cause. Soros and Moore put their own lives at risk for this country.