The Democratic voters in the early primaries want more than anything to beat Bush. And they are beginning to size up the candidates as to who has the "stuff" to do it. By that they want a man that can not be ridiculed on a tank or for his record on the issues. They want a man who other centralist voters will support (liberal and conservative Democrats, Independents and moderate Republicans).

That man is John Kerry.



Disdain for Bush Simmers in Democratic Strongholds
By ROBIN TONER NY TIMES

DES MOINES, July 31 — While Democratic leaders in Washington debate strategy and demographics for the 2004 election — the wisdom of campaigning from the left, right or center — something far more visceral is at work in the first caucus state, and in other Democratic redoubts.

There is a powerful disdain for the Bush administration, stoked by the aftermath of the war in Iraq and the continuing lag in the economy. There is also a conviction that President Bush is eminently beatable, and a hunger to hear their party's leaders and candidates make the case against him — straight up, from the heart rather than the polling data.

It is not simply a lurch to the left, many Democrats say; it could, in fact, lead caucus voters to more centrist candidates, if they seem most likely to defeat Mr. Bush in the general election.

Tom Rusk, a state welfare worker who turned out this week to see Senator John Kerry in Fort Dodge, Iowa, describes himself as "pretty liberal." He says he likes what he hears from former Gov. Howard Dean of Vermont and from Representative Dennis J. Kucinich of Ohio, but he worries that both candidates could be "Dukakisized" in the general election.

What Mr. Rusk is looking for, he said, alluding to the infamous image that doomed that past Democratic nominee, is "someone who will look impressive enough at the helm of an M-1 tank."...





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