Wesley Clark has hopped into the presidential campaign about a week ago. In that short time, he has blazed to the top of the democrats. Even more surprising is that, according to the polls, Clark is ahead of Bush by 3%. Even Kerry is a bit ahead of Bush (from what I saw, I believe it was 1%).

So, should we celebrate a guaranteed democratic victory, or are these polls deceiving? How tough will it be to get a democratic president in 2004 (considering the polls)?

*Great, I misspelled democrat. Thats going to look good....




What misspelling? -J

There are no guarantees in politics. Clark's strong showing is indicative of how much it means to a candidate when the media makes you the Flavor of the Week.

Sen. John Edwards "officially" joined the presidential race last week, but nobody was paying attention because Clark was getting all the media attention. Trust me, in another week or so, they'll be back to blowing kisses at Howie Dean or whomever else strikes the Washington pundits' fancy.

In my state of Ohio, Bush's approval ratings have plummeted from 76 percent in April to a lousy 52 percent in September. 14 months away from a election that's not good.

But national polls don't mean much now. When the thinning of the herd starts in Iowa and New Hampshire next year that's when we will know whether Dean or Clark or Lieberman or Kerry or somebody else has "the right stuff" to take on a incumbent president. Bush has shown signs of coming down off the astronomically high approval ratings he enjoyed earlier this year.

Thomas Friedman, the two-time Pulitzer Prize winning columnist of the New York Times says while Bush was vacationing for a month in Crawford, the American people began to notice that soldiers were dying almost two-a-day in Iraq, the economy was still in the toliet and the tax cuts hadn't created any new jobs lately. That's when Bush started to come back down to Earth.

I wouldn't get too optomistic yet. Weapons of mass destruction could be found in Iraq. The economy could start to rebound in 2004. Another terrorist attack could either sink Bush's reelection or guarantee it. Who knows?

What I DO know is it's too early to underestimate Bush. He's going to have a ton of money to flood the airwaves with all the wonderful things he's done and he's going to fight hard, mean and dirty to keep his job and he's got a well-oiled machine behind him to accomplish that task.

But he can be beaten. It just won't be easy.

I am not at all surprised by the surge in popularity for Clark. I'm sure his "waiting to decide" really wasn't so much uncertainty about his decision as a publicity stunt...he's certainly reaping the benefits of it: good for him - I like him and might like him even more than Dean (it certainly helps that I know so many people who have actually met and worked directly for Clark and that I hear nothing but great stuff about him as a person and a military officer).

But as far as polls, IMO, the most important polls are the ones mentioning how few people can even name ONE Democratic candidate. The number is OUTRAGEOUSLY high and that is extremely disturbing. I've got 5 in my immediate family (sister, mother, step-father, step-sister, and step-brother) who have no clue - I'm the only one who "cares" about politics.

A CBS News Poll from Labor Day weekend suggests that two-thirds of Americans (including two-thirds of Democrats) can't name a single Democratic candidate. That, my friends, is NOT good! Of course Bush will be re-elected if no one even knows anything about the Democratic candidates! Of course he's got more support...most people would rather vote from the current president that they might not like over someone they've heard nothing about, I'd imagine.