Misdirection

Any magician's trick has, at its root, a technique known as misdirection. Make the audience look one way, while the real action takes place somewhere else. Look at the magic wand in my left hand, while I take the Dove from my vest with my right. Look at the top card, while I deal from the bottom. Believe what I say, forget what I have done. Vote for the moderate, get the liberal. Marry my name and my office, but don't forget to bring the billion.

I used to think that BJ Clinton was the most duplicitous and mendacious President. If the American people elect John Forbes Kerrry, BJ slides into second place on inauguration day. A "hero" who, on the basis on two self-inflicted wounds and a little used loophole, stiffed his country out of two thirds of his combat tour. A nineteen year liberal in the Senate, who tries as hard as he can to sound like a hawk on Iraq. He votes against the war appropriation, then blames Bush that the troops don't have enough equipment. But, after all, he voted for the money before he voted against it.

Teresa Simoes-Ferreira Heinz Kerry is another one cut from that cloth. A supporter of many zany environmental causes who owns, and heats, and air-conditions, five immense residences, complete with 5000 pound SUVs. Even a two faced person can only sleep in one house at a time. Oh, and don't forget the yacht and the jet. This couple leaves a huge ecological footprint, even as she supports a lawsuit against the EPA, seeking to ban the use of coal to generate electricity. She is married to one man, while choosing to retain the name of the previous one. She brags about her involvement in the struggle against aparteid, yet no one who was there remembers her that way. Today her philanthropy extends to a host of loopy leftist, Islamic, and environmental groups, but she retains plausible deniability by laundering those millions through the front organization, the Tides Foundation.

There is a lot of truth to the dictum that Democrats feel their politics, while Republicans think theirs. Even so, the touchy-feely democrat misdirection of this campaign is so transparent, one would think that those less committed would see through the charade. The wealthiest couple (and the first kept man) to contend for the White House will have to provide some hard answers to some really difficult questions before election day. Their campaign stands ready to implode. Unless they can misdirect the implosion toward the Bush campaign.