Can someone win the presidency entirely on the basis of a negative asset? I wouldn't have thought so, but here's John Kerry, three months shy of election day, promoting himself as a man of presidential caliber entirely on the basis that he's the Anyone in "Anyone But Bush." Come next January the Anyone behind the desk in the Oval Office may be a bit taller. There'll be medals on the bookshelf showing he killed Vietnamese in the service of his country. As for the policy furnishings, most everything else will stay the same. Kerry's been pretty clear about that, letting his core constituencies know that as President Anyone he's not going to cut them any favors.
The nation's hungry, its underemployed, its jobless? In April Kerry announced that his economic strategy will be to wage war on the deficit, which means he'll do nothing to alleviate problem number one in America today--the lack of jobs and the rotten pay for those lucky enough to have some form of work.
Women? Kerry, the man who voted for Bill Clinton's savage assault, labeled "welfare reform," on poor women, said he might well appoint antiabortion judges, adding magnanimously that he wouldn't want such appointments to lead to the overturning of Roe v. Wade.
Subscribe Now!
The only way to read this article and the full contents of each week's issue of The Nation online is by subscribing to the magazine. Subscribe now and read this article -- and every article published since for the past five years -- right now.
There's no obligation -- try The Nation for four weeks free.
- Get The Nation at home (and online!) for 75 cents a week!
- If you like this article, consider making a donation to The Nation.

Buzzflash
del.icio.us
Digg
Facebook
Newsvine
Reddit