No Perfect Storm in 2004

No Perfect Storm in 2004

Susan Estrich
Wednesday, Oct. 27, 2004

Who's going to win? Everyone I know wants to know.

I'm not dumb enough to answer that one. But one week out, here's what I think I know:

Story Continues Below

Kerry can win, if Democrats execute something they've never done before. There is more money being spent, more people out there working, than any one person can exactly add up. Legally, at least.

Some of the states that you read the national campaign has written off the state managers still think they can win on the ground with the locals. Stay tuned.

We'll have a winner Tuesday night, or Wednesday morning, anyway. There isn't likely to be a perfect storm two seasons in a row. So for all the talk about recounts, it's just not likely. Bet against it, the smartest person I know on the Democratic team told me.

The Republicans' strategy is to challenge voters, especially black, Hispanic and Jewish voters, believing Democrats will commit voter fraud; the Democrats' is to ensure that the challenged voters aren't intimidated, and know their rights.

Much of this plays out in advance. There is very little principle, and a great deal of politics, involved.

In Florida, voters who are registered in more than one state have gotten letters from the Republican Party. I'm told that the letters aren't all the same.

Those who were also registered in New York and New Jersey receive warning letters on the illegality of voting in two places. The goal seems to be to discourage them from voting in Florida until they unregister back home.

Those who are also registered in Georgia and Alabama receive letters encouraging them to vote in Florida, without regard to the other registration.

You don't have to be a veteran of Florida politics (Carter '80, in my case) to know the difference between groups that lean Democrat (elderly Jewish New Yorkers, overwhelmingly) and those that lean Republican (white Southerners).

Goose-hunting helped. So does Bill Clinton. Guns. Camouflage. Much better than windsurfing and those blue shorts, wasn't it? It turned the tiny tide on Mary Cheney, which hurt not because of anything having to do with gay rights in particular, which only bothers the far right, but because it didn't seem nice.

Anyway, goose-hunting, the continued mess in Iraq and the second coming of Bill Clinton, who in this case pumps everyone up (in America, recovery from illness excuses all), has turned the mini-tide back to Kerry.

No one knows who is going to vote. If you know what percentage of the ultimate electorate should be Republican and Democrat, you should be able to tell who will get what. But there's no agreement on that.

You can't get it from calling people and asking them what they are, because that assumes that the people you call on the phone reflect the voting population. Republicans are much more likely to be the stable, residential phone-answering types than the cell-phone-only kids, minorities and poor people that Democrats are hoping will turn out in record number.

Who are these new registrants? For my two cents: I've never seen anything like the enthusiasm on the Democratic side. There's a phone bank in Delray Beach, Fla., that is known from coast to coast as the best in the country.

The only way to read national polls is to look for trends. Pick one poll and watch it. Of course, we all know that national polls don't matter at this point, that it's a state-by-state contest and that's all that matters.

So why focus on the national horserace? Isn't it distorted by big leads for a Democrat in states like California and New York? But the truth is that whoever wins the popular vote should win the electoral vote. That's the way it always happens, except on the rare occasions when it doesn't.

When things break at the end, they usually break in one direction or the other, not in half. That's how you get a winner. We've all been waiting for it to happen. It just hasn't ... yet.