The Note

ByABC News
March 19, 2004, 9:41 AM

W A S H I N G T O N, March 18&#151;<br> -- TODAY SCHEDULE (all times ET)

FUTURES CALENDAR

NEWS SUMMARY

As John Kerry begins his own (semi-)private Idaho vacation, here are the mistakes his campaign has made of late, allowing an aggressive Bush-Cheney operation to win a series of news cycles, during this (ALL TOGETHER NOW!!!) critical period in defining John Kerry for America:

1. The "Crooks," "'I actually did vote for the $87 billion," and "more leaders" quotes, and the handling of their aftermath.

2. Still failing to present a coherent, unified message.

3. The failure of his campaign to successfully tape the original "leaders" quote and nip the matter in the bud.

4. Believing his own "bring it on" rhetoric and getting drawn into an extended debate on national security, just as he is leaving for vacation.

5. Failing to take a page from the Dean campaign in the fall of 2003 by not staying ahead of the story.

6. Having Dean serve as a surrogate on a media conference call on national security (a bizarro choice even before the Spanish comment). Dean couldn't even stay on his OWN message; what made them think he could stay on Kerry's?

7. Failing to instantly repudiate Dean's remark.

8. Buying a jockstrap in front of the press corps. Just weird.

9. Not more aggressively checking his instinct to equivocate and parse (see mistake 1), even if that equivocation might have some degree of intellectual soundness.

10. Waiting too long to put out Holbrooke, Richardson, and others to push back on the "leaders" quote.

11. Going off on vacation. It's unavoidable, and goodness knows Kerry deserves a break and that some of his verbal errors were probably owing to fatigue, but now might not be the best time, with the Iraq stuff swirling out there ..

12. Failure to go back in time in a time machine and quit the Senate to run for governor or work in a business in the late '80s - thereby limiting all this votes 'n' quotes exposure. (Granted, this one would have been tougher to pull off than some of the others .)

13. Not fully affecting the look and feel and stature of an actual, full-fledged general election standard bearer.

14. By making all these mistakes, squandering the Post -nomination window of attention and frittering away the momentum he had built up. Not to mention -- to a large extent overshadowing Spanish deaths, more killed in Iraq, the Medicare controversies, and other Bush problems about which more donkey hay probably could have been made.

14. Not fully realizing that by making all these mistakes, the door was opened for the Bush-Cheney campaign to get some of its mojo back, allowing it to get a much-needed shot of confidence -- for themselves and those skittish Hill allies.

(In the hauntingly "normal" Note-Orin mind meld, our gal Deb has something similar in the New York Post . LINK)

This has all taken place as the Bush campaign has manifestly moved the White House political phasers from "stun" to "kill."

Karl Rove attended Grover Norquist's off-the-record Wednesday meeting yesterday, and the AP's Scott Lindlaw managed to convince an attendee to describe what Mr. Rove said. LINK

"Addressing a small group of conservative activists, Rove assured them that Bush planned a nimble campaign able to counterpunch even before Kerry opens his mouth. The White House adviser pointed with pride to the Bush camp's response Tuesday, when it got word that Kerry planned a national security speech to veterans in West Virginia."

Go read the whole thing.

Elisabeth Bumiller in the New York Times writes that it was the president's decision to "transform himself into an out-and-out political candidate a full eight months before the election," according to White House and campaign officials and that it was Bush's decision "to directly attack Senator John Kerry the day after Super Tuesday." LINK

(Bumiller's sourcing for some of her 1600 blind quotes "a senior White House official who asked not to be named because he did not want to be pestered by reporters" is something we think she has used before and we LOVE it!!!)

(And: hey, Peter King, wear a wire next time you ride on AF1!!! Or maybe hide a camera in your briefcase!!! This stuff is too good to waste on second-hand print accounts!!!)

Look out John Kerry - if you think the "Republican attack machine" is after you now, it's just going to get worse.

Bill Sammon of the Washington Times emphasizing BC04 successes, rather than Kerry errors Notes the "hard-charging approach entails simultaneous attacks on Mr. Kerry by the Bush campaign team, the Republican National Committee, the White House and the president."

Sammon reports that the strategy might be working: "After months of refusing to respond to attacks by Democrats during their fractious primary elections, the president now appears to be having some success in defining Mr. Kerry as a tax-raising, flip-flopping political opportunist who is dovish on the war against terrorism."LINKBC04 pollster-turned-strategist Matthew Dowd has thus proved his own fallibility - since he had suggested that the president would stay behind in the national horserace stuff for awhile.

Even with Kerry-allied groups stepping up their help-is-on-the-way ad buys on the economy and credibility, we suspect that the president will only help his standing today and through the weekend, with more boffo national security events.

Some potential good news on the job front. Per Reuters: "The number of Americans filing for initial jobless benefits dropped to the lowest level in more than three years last week, the Labor Department said on Thursday in a report that pointed to a brightening job market. First-time claims for state unemployment insurance benefits dropped by 6,000 from the prior week to 336,000 in the week ended March 13 well below Wall Street analysts' forecasts and the lowest for any week since 316,000 reported on Jan. 13, 2001."

All of this pales in comparison and importance, of course, to tonight's Gillespie v. McAuliffe Catholic University face off.

President Bush is in Fort Campbell, Kentucky to speak to the troops.

Senator Kerry is on vacation in Ketchum, Idaho.

Rep. Kucinich is in Alaska.

Rev. Al Sharpton and Ralph Nader have no public events today.

ABC News Vote 2004: Bush (Cheney) vs. Kerry:

Roll Call 's Stu Rothenburg writes, "Recent historical trends suggest that President Bush and Senator John Kerry (Mass.) have from now until Labor Day not Election Day to make their cases before voters decide whom to support for president. A review of polling by Gallup over the past 40 years (sometimes in conjunction with CNN and USA Today ) shows that in most cases the candidate leading after the presidential nominating conventions has their ticket punched for the White House.

"Specifically, in 11 of the last 13 presidential elections, the major party nominee leading in the Gallup Poll conducted immediately after the second national convention went on to win the popular vote in November."

Truth and credibility.

On the former, The AP's Ron Fournier writes, "Truth is trailing distortion in the White House race," citing examples of the candidates' accusations of each other.LINK

"Few of their assertions are patently wrong; most reside in the murky gray area between correct and incorrect a rhetorical margin of error."

On the latter, Jill Lawrence of USA Today shows how both Senator Kerry and President Bush are using the same issue against each other: credibility. With one of those just plain great lead's she writes, "Anyone listening to the Bush and Kerry presidential campaigns this week might wonder how two men with such disregard for truth got this far." LINK

In one of his most politically charged appearances yet, Vice President Cheney delivered a 28-minute foreign policy speech yesterday at the Reagan Presidential Library in Simi Valley, California - and spent over nine and half minutes focusing on Senator Kerry.

The Washington Post 's Harris and Allen wrap Cheney and Kerry's back and forth accusations on Wednesday. Cheney "assailed the national security credentials" of Senator Kerry, while Senator Kerry accused Bush of leaving U.S. troops overextended. LINK

"Vice President Dick Cheney on Wednesday portrayed the Democratic presidential candidate as weak, inconsistent and a threat to the security of the nation," writes the New York Times ' Madigan and Seelye, Noting that "some television news programs used a split screen to show both Mr. Cheney's speech, which was under way, and the scene of devastation in Baghdad." LINK