Sen. Joseph R. Biden Jr. (D-Del.) said Kerry must "stop litigating what has been their [the Bush campaign's] deftness in taking advantage of a complicated issue," a reference to Kerry's struggle to explain his positions on Iraq.
"Start focusing on what's the plan, Stan," Biden said. "This administration wants to be judged on what they say is the central front of the war on terror which is Iraq. The president says we're doing well in Iraq. The president misunderstood, misjudged and misled the American people on Iraq consistently, since the fall of the statue of Saddam Hussein."
Kerry has run into two problems of his own making, aides say: He voted to authorize the war in 2002, says today the war is wrong but will not take back his vote; and he has yet to detail a markedly different strategy than Bush's for ending the conflict. This has allowed the president to argue -- with great success, Democrats say -- that Kerry and Bush basically agreed on the need to go to war and see eye to eye on how to get out.
Bush boxed Kerry into a situation where the Democratic nominee was "running in the same circles on the same questions," said Michael McCurry, the former White House spokesman under President Bill Clinton who was brought aboard this past week to sharpen Kerry's message. Moreover, polls show the president has convinced a large number of voters that Kerry is a flip-flopper whose word cannot be trusted.
McCurry admitted that this will be difficult to undo. Bush "paid a lot of money to drive up Kerry's negatives," he said. "Once you wear those negatives they put on you, it is hard to get them off."
The goal of Kerry's advisers is to change the dynamics of the debate. Kerry has reworked his stump speech with a new toughly worded indictment of the conditions in Iraq: the increasing number of deaths, the spread of terrorists and extremists, the growing clout of anti-American insurgents, and what some say are fading hopes for the country's first-ever democratic elections in January.
He also is punctuating the speeches by accusing Bush of misleading the nation about these problems. "He misled America step after step about what this is about and what is at stake," Kerry said Friday at town hall forum in Aurora, Colo. "We deserve a president who tells America the truth." It is not uncommon for Kerry to use some variation of "dishonesty" more than a dozen times in a 30-minute appearance now.
Amid daily reports of deaths in Iraq, Kerry is trying to portray Bush as disconnected from voters and reality when he offers optimistic assessments. "With all due respect to the president, has he turned on the evening news lately?" Kerry said Friday in Albuquerque. "Does he read the newspapers? Does he really know what's happening? Is he talking about the same war that the rest of us are talking about?"
Kerry advisers vow not to cede any ground to Bush as he performs his presidential duties this week at the United Nations and the White House with Allawi, but the president's advisers believe that, even amid concerns rising about Iraq, they can hold the high ground in the debate. "The reason the debate has served to strengthen the president's position and hurt Kerry's position is President Bush shows strength and resolve and Senator Kerry shows weakness and vacillation," Bush campaign manager Ken Mehlman said.
Bush used the Republican National Convention in New York to refocus public attention on the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, as much as on the war in Iraq, hoping to solidify public confidence in his leadership in the war on terrorism. That day has an emotional hold on voters, and the Bush campaign effectively evoked the memories from the convention through the memorial services of last weekend.
"Now we're seeing something slightly different: all the problems in Iraq," Democratic pollster Peter Hart said. "No matter how we tote it, things are not going well in Iraq. I've always believed the number of days Iraq is on the front pages of the newspaper has direct impact on Bush's reelection."
