The Rope-a-dope of the Kerry Campaign

In what may prove to be a turning point in the public's perception of John Kerry, the Kerry team invoked a rope-a-dope pre-debate strategy. The political buzz leading up to the dates was entirely about how weak a candidate John Kerry was. Some democratic leaders criticized Kerry's failure to make a clear compact statement, basically they felt his positions were too "nuanced." Kerry perpetuated this opinion through numersous statements, some of which were taken out of context, that were long-winded and lacked strength. Last night John Kerry pulled off the unthinkable, he morphed from a "waffling" politician into a man who normal Americans could picture as their next president. He was everything the pundits said he could not be, he was direct, concise, and strong. The president seemed taken aback by the "new" John Kerry, this was noticeable from the occassional angry smirk to the stuttering when attempting to respond to attacks on his deplorable record. In essence John Kerry turned the table and put W. on the defensive, he turned W. into the indecisive candidate that the press had lead many americans to believe Kerry was. Whether intentional or not, the Kerry campaign, the Democratic party and the "liberal" media made many believe that John Kerry was a weak candidate. They allowed Kerry to be backed into the corner of the ring, a weak waffling senator ready to receive his knockout punch. Out of nowhere he stood up at the podium in Miami last night, he began with direct concise jabs at the body of the record of W. He had pulled a rope-a-dope on everyone and last night was hopefully just the beginning of the emergence of the Strong John Kerry that we were all looking for.