US President Bush has been having a difficult summer. Recent polls show a considerable decline in public approval of his conduct of the nation's business, yet in just few weeks voters will decide whether he or Democrat John Kerry is to be the next president. If things are going so badly for Bush, then Kerry must be doing well, right?
41)__________. His public appearances kindle little enthusiasm. His TV ads sway few viewers. As a result, Kerry supporters tend to be more anti-Bush than they are genuinely pro-Kerry.
Democratic strategists point out that Kerry has a pattern of coming from behind to win political races. And even though Kerry stirs little excitement, many Americans are quite eager to learn whom he will choose as his running mate. A popular vice presidential candidate could energize his campaign, especially since there is little chance that President. Bush will dump the much-loathed Richard Cheney from the Republican ticket.
Most observers agree that Kerry is not a particularly strong candidate for the US presidency. He tends to be respected, but he arouses little enthusiasm.42)__________But then, two weeks ago, the Republicans counterattacked vigorously, end the race is once again wide open.
The public's generally positive impression of Senator's Kerry's character is based in large part on his record during the war in Vietnam, when he performed heroically as the commander of a "swift boat", a light military craft used by the US Navy to thread the rivers and canals of southern Vietnam. The crew of his old boat are united in their praise of him.
43)__________.Two weeks ago they began appearing in stingingly negative TV ads aired in crucial states where currently undecided voters will probably determine the outcome of the election. And the ads were effective, drawing independent voters away from Kerry. In the meantime, Kerry's own crewmen have strongly rejected the new version of events.
44)__________Journalists quickly turned up links between the navy veterans and Texas fat cats who had long supplied the Bush family with funds for political campaigns. These rich folks were in turn linked to Karl Rove, Bush' s masterful political strategist--his very own Zhuge Liang.
45)__________. Cartoonist David Horsey, like many other observers, thinks Karl Rove is up to his old tricks; a similar effort--in this case, untraceable slanderous rumors during a key primary race--undermined popular Republican Senator John McCaine's campaign for the GOP nomination in 2000. In today's cartoon Rove is portrayed as the puppeteer controlling Bush' s wealthy supporters in Texas (notice the Texas-style cowboy hat). The hand puppet in turn seems to be manipulating another, smaller puppet that represents the angry swift boat veterans.
A. Nonetheless, thanks to the slow economic recovery, the difficult situation in Iraq and changing perceptions of President Bush's competence, he seemed to be on the road to a very narrow victory in November.
B. But leadership, you know, isn't about taking the easy route; it is about making the tough, sometimes unpopular decisions. President Bush has demonstrated that he can make tough decisions, and I personally like the fact that his faith end his values are the foundation of his decisions.
C. Not exactly. Americans outside Massachusetts, which Kerry represents in the Senate, seem to find it hard to relate to the Democratic candidate.
D. While Bush would dearly love to undermine Kerry's image, he cannot afford to be seen doing so. (His own military record, after all; makes a sorry contrast with Kerry's.)
E. Are the ads the Bush campaign in action or just the vengeful protest of naval officers whose leadership was questioned in a recent biography of Kerry? It costs hundreds of thousands of dollars to make such an ad and buy air time; so many people immediately suspected that wealthy Republicans were behind the effort.
F. However, a group of navy veterans (all present in the same area of Vietnam as Kerry and during the same period, some as senior officers, others as crewmen not on Kerry's boat but on other, similar craft) have denounced Kerry in a book that came out last month. They allege that he did not deserve the medals for valiant leadership he won in the war.
G. Kerry remains an unknown quantity to most Americans, but better known Democrats are much in the news. Examine the publicity posters in the cartoon. In both upper comers are ads for ex-President Clinton's lengthy autobiography, My Life.